China Dispatch: Adventures in Case Manufacturing

Sheet Metal & Stamping Process

The sheet metal and stamping process is the cornerstone of the case building process; it is also one of the most involved processes in the entire manufacturing process. This is because all of the metal pieces have to be stamped one by one before they can be used. That is right: one motherboard tray, one side panel right, one side panel left, front, top, bottom, and back...you get the idea. Until these metal parts are created, no other part of the case building process can occur.

Chenbro orders raw materials in a pre-cut format. Materials come in both sheets and rolls, depending on the project and the type of materials needed. Ordering the metals pre-cut saves them both time and money.

These are racks that hold the metal stamping dies used to shape the metal into the forms required for each case.

Here is a better close-up of some of the dies used to stamp the metal. These dies are very heavy and very costly, and Chenbro has to incorporate the cost of creating these dies into the cost of the case. Hard tooling is expensive, but produces much more consistent quality. New tools and dies must be created each time Chenbro produces a new case design; and there are no guarantees that this hard tooling investment in a new product line will allow Chenbro to recover all of its investment.