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Mac Pro case all aluminum? Weldable?

nightfly13

nightfly13

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jul 17, 2008
679
0
Ranchi, India
So I'm trying to sell my Mac Pro 1,1 (bought in 2007) and in a check-in suitcase the metal 'legs' for lack of a better word, bent a bit. I've been able to bend it back reasonably, but 3 of the 4 corners where the side panel fits in have a bit of a gap away from the main chassis of the machine.

We tried some clamps (they pop back out) even with superglue so my last resort (aside from just eating the extra loss and selling 'as is' - cosmetically deficient but functioning well) is to consider welding to close the gap. My buddy thinks the main chassis is steel and the 'feet' (on top and bottom) are aluminum. I think it's probably all aluminum - which can be welding to aluminum, but wanted to check with you guys. http://www.apple.com/macpro/specs.html says 'highly recyclable aluminum enclosure' - do we think the original Mac Pro is the same? It's heavy!
 
99.99999999999999999 percent sure it's all Aluminum. Steel would be far heavier than Aluminum and it would:

A.) Not only be more rust prone.

B.) Be sensitive to magnetic fields (which you could try with a magnet yourself to see, may want to take the HDD's out first though, the magnet shouldn't harm anything else, even the HDD's, but I'd take those out at least).

C.) And this is a big one: Would cost Apple far more to ship to stores. I think it'd be a pointless design choice.

But I could be wrong....
 
It's aluminum, but be aware it's anodized. Welding the Mac Pro will likely remove the anodization, which would hurt the resale value.
 
Welding costs time and money, and you'll still have cosmetic problems due to the welding itself. You'll have to remove everything from the case before welding. Also there are refinishing time and costs.

Not worth it.

Just eat the cosmetic loss when you sell it.
 
Welding aluminum requires TIG welding equipment (and TIG skills). You cannot do it with MIG. It also requires that the anodizing be ground off that area, and all electronic components be removed from the case before hand. If you want to do a proper repair, find a donor case, cut the legs off the donor and weld them onto your case. Any machine shop can do this for you. That is a proper repair, however the finished product will LOOK like its had its legs cut off and welded back on, so I doubt that will help any with the resale value. There is no way to repair this in a manner that will be invisible to a prospective buyer.
 
Ok, then I'll leave it as-is.

Input appreciated. I have no idea about the different types of welding, but it's a huge ordeal to strip everything out of the MP and find someone to do this, won't bother.
 
dime21 said:
... If you want to do a proper repair, find a donor case...
Click to expand...

If you have a donor case, why bother to weld? Just put the guts into the donor case.

How badly is this thing bent if you think that welding it will improve the cosmetic value?
 
I think it's a magnesium/aluminium alloy, similar to car wheels. It's difficult to weld depending on how much magnesium is in the alloy. Lots of magnesium can lead to a fairly spectacular fire when welding.
 
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