gate hold module fabrication/wiring

so heres the super cool switches all set in their repsective spots.. i used angle aluminum from home depot to fabricate the housings/faceplates. i made a template for the mounting screws and then figured out the correct spacings from front/side to side for a 19" rach unit with enclosure. so after i got the measurments i laid out all the holes and punched them (to minimize drill bit drift) and then used a fence on the press bed of the drill press to even minimize variance further. worked pretty well.

i then used a dremel to cut the u shaped holes into the aluminum for switches. i didnt cut the horizontal of the u but rather scored it about half way thru. this allows then to snap the alunimum off in a very precise sharp corner with no ugly over cut marks. i then cleaned the u out with a nice file. very efficient. what wasnt efficient and time consuming was tapping the holes (32 in each row ) x2 rows. for the switches. that took some time and delicacy. (4/40 taps dont like to be twisted or torques to hard. theyll say no and snap)

i used 3 pieces of angle stock to make each row. (oddly enough this is just a 1/16th over the actual size of one U rack measurments) i have this sitting in ait own area so its not directly touching any other rack gear so its no issue... the bottom is just face plate surface and will have the step numbers and info on it. the second is the switch row itself and the 3rd is a 3/4 size piece that will house a bi-colour led (red-green) for staus and scroll/count/step indication. so because of the nature of the mechanical switch you can see to parameters at once. - the hold faetures all together via the yellow mechanical flip, and the current step AND status of that step via the dual color led. so its not too bad.

im re-using an old set of rack ears from an s700 that has been canniballized for another project.. the rear panel for this module will have several db -25 connectors on the back the interfacn/connections to the main sequencer unit. so its all about figuring out now exactly where in the circiut this fucker needs to go...

one biiiiiiig step closer. id say about a month to 2 month it will be testable...:)