I recently made a battery enclosure for my eskate out of Kydex. I made a buck from wood to represent the shape I wanted at the end then used 0.080 inch thick Kydex, heated it and pressed it over the buck.
Here is the first video about making the buck. I will be posting the rest of the series shortly.
I also plan on making an enclosure for my VESC in the next few weeks. I could potentially make these to sell if there is interest. The Kydex is much stronger than a standard ABS enclosure.
I just posted the next part that includes molding the plastic over the buck. Check it out:
The next part will be installing the mounting hardware. I will have that posted soon.
Have you thought about vacuum forming the plastic?
Yes, but I wanted it formed to the curvature of the deck so I either need to cut a deck up, build a mold of one, or make an enormous vacuum table. I will experiment more in the future.
Nice video. A vacuum would work better, I believe you can use the heat gun to mold it to the deck after forming.
Slowly increase the temperature and check it with an IR thermometer if you have one so it heats evenly. Rotate it every so often. I went up to 340*F on the 0.080.
Great job man… That was hard core bro…
That took some time, patience and elbow grease … Paid off 
Part 3 is now up. Installing the mounting hardware in the deck.
Awesome videos man, thanks for showing all of the steps involved. This is going to be my go to resource for when I form up my enclosure. Cheers!
Glad you found it helpful. I will keep working on getting more content out.
Looks great. Do you think you could’ve formed the enclosure with just a hot air gun ? Probably would take a lot longer but it looked like you were getting some good results when you hit it with the hot air gun after taking the foam off.
It is probably possible, but the material likes to be heated slowly and evenly when possible. Also doing it with the heat gun was very time consuming compared to the part in the press. I got some different foam to try on the ESC box I will be making soon.
This looks like a great way to make an enclosure! where did you buy the kydex? I think I’m going to try this with a few changes.
I’ll make mine with one solid piece of kydex and I wanna put rubber or something between the kydex and the board to prevent water from getting in.
I got the Kydex from knifekits.com I plan on sealing it as well. Surprisingly even with a tight fit a lot of debris still gets in so a seal is needed.
Got it, does the kydex bend well with the board? My board is only a little bit flexible but it still flexes a bit.
It’s pretty stiff but forgiving if that means anything. Let me know how it turns out.
Just finished the majority of mine with the 1/8 inch really thick kydex it turned out pretty good 
Do you recommend the 0.080 thickness? Do you think it’s strong enough?
