Custom chassis

Framework Laptop 13
1

I’m wondering if anyone has considered designing a custom chassis for the Framework.

I do not have the skills for CAD work myself, (or the CNC equipment) but I would be interested in perhaps paying someone for a custom chassis.

My specific desire being an extra thick chassis to hold a ridiculous, enormous, truly obscenely large battery. I hate wall outlets and USB-C power banks with a passion. :grinning:

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I’ve asked NRP for the cad for it so I am able to look into the possibilities of manufacturing cases.

2 Likes
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If you really don’t care about weight, you could fit ~44 18650 cells in the footprint, with some extra space on the edges. It would add ~20mm to the width and an extra ~2.2 kilograms, but depending on cell capacity you could probably last a solid week with light use.

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@BrailleCortex That’s essentially my plan. I haven’t mathed out the size, but 1865 cells are my second choice, in the event 2170 cells don’t fit adequately.

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@Josh_Cook I’m curious if you ever got the CAD file for the case, and if so, have you done any prototyping?

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I was thinking if someone disassembled the Framework to just the chassis alone and maybe use those 3D printing/C&C apps to scan it to create a 3D model?

Would be awesome to create a bigger case or maybe just using carbon fiber/fiberglass similar to Thinkpads.

1 Like
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This is a topic I am still interested in, I’m curious if anyone has made a custom chassis, or gotten a CAD file? @nrp is the CAD for the bottom chassis on the FW13 releasable?

I am starting to seriously think about dropping some cash at a machine shop, as I have some ideas…

In case anyone else is like me, and willing to carry around a brick to gain functionality, here is my vision:

  • USB 2.0 hub, 4 or 5 ports replacing the bottom left slot, (removing the card slot from the chassis, and internally connecting to the C-port on the mobo), and spanning down the left side of the chassis, using the space from the left speaker, these for the purpose of providing power (phone and tablet charging) as well as for dongles (Logitech Unifying, Yubikey Nano)
  • A bottom compartment with a whole wack-ton of battery. I’m thinking in the neighborhood of 500 Wh or more. Hence the need for a custom chassis.

If you want an example from the past, the Compaq LTE 5100 is a good example of what I’m aiming at, thickness-wise.

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I just saw a post on the subreddit about an in-development carbon fiber chassis. i believe the idea is that it would be basically the same dimensions and layout as the current chassis, just in CF. so nothing like what you’re talking about - but it is a 3rd party custom chassis, so.

  • A bottom compartment with a whole wack-ton of battery. I’m thinking in the neighborhood of 500 Wh or more. Hence the need for a custom chassis.

this is probably extremely niche, since you wouldn’t be able to fly with it.

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well yeah but its cool

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I was playing with the idea of making a “power-slice” kinda thing like you used to have on old busyness laptops just for the memes. A single layer (48) of 3500mah 18650s would give you about 600Wh. Not very practical but neat.