CaseLabs

Since 1971 California Fabrication Company has been building enclosures for electronic, military, medical, and industrial applications. When we needed to build a new workstation for engineering design and image rendering, finding an appropriate case proved to be the most challenging part of the project. They were either too limited to meet our changing needs or required way too much time and effort to set up.

In late 2010, we looked at what was available in the enthusiast case market and felt we could offer something that was significantly more flexible. Our goal was to design a case that was extremely modular and would allow a user to easily tailor the case to their exact needs without the need for difficult and time consuming modifications. The overwhelming majority of cases on the market impose strict design constraints; the choices for mounting hardware and cooling systems are very limited.

We wanted a design where we, as users, were in control, where we could make the design decisions, but we also didn’t want to spend hours or days modifying an “open box”, fabricating brackets, drilling holes, only to find out that we would need to change the layout again later. It needed to be easy to work on, where we could get in and out without any fuss. How many cases have you seen where the doors and covers are laying off to the side because they’re too much of a hassle to keep taking off and on?

We needed something that we could put together quickly and modify quickly when our needs changed, using standard components that we didn’t have to design and fabricate. Although we certainly had the resources to do that, it just didn’t make sense from a time and cost perspective. There had to be a better way

... and the M8 and CaseLabs were born.