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Diecast vs Extruded Metal Handheld Enclosures

There are three main ways to manufacture a metal enclosure. You can fabricate it from folded sheet metal – but that means lots of welding to ensure the seams don’t leak. And that’s fine for very tough stainless steel enclosures with angular construction. All those right angles are excellent for maximising space…but not so comfy if those enclosures need to be held in the hand.

So that leaves us with the other two methods – diecast vs extruded. Both offer their own technical benefits:

• Diecast aluminium handheld enclosures such as handCASE offer the opportunity of superior ergonomics simply because it’s easier to cast complex curves than it is to extrude them. Curves on extruded enclosures will always be very profile-based because of the nature of the process. You’re going to get a two-dimensional X-Y curve multiplied by the length of Z.
• Extruded aluminium enclosures such as mobilCASE are easier to customise – but only in terms of length. You can’t change the width and height of an individual profile without retooling, but you can specify your extruded housing in a custom length very easily. And because the enclosures are profile-based, they tend to be available in more standard sizes and configurations than their diecast counterparts.