[MOD] Polar White Thinkpad W520

I have been using my Thinkpad W520 for almost 3 years and I decided to paint it white. It kept me busy for about a month and I'm pretty content with the outcome. I didn't completely paint the entire shell white, because I didn't want to disturb the keyboard bezel or the touchpad. Here are some photos of the Polar White Thinkpad W520 ( gallery link here)!

Let me know your thoughts or opinions about this mod. For those interested in the paint, I used Krylon Fusion spray can for this paint job.

 

I like it, but you need to do that palmrest/keyboard bezel! Just take the kb out and put some painters tape from underneath where the kb slots in.

 

Love it, great work!

 

Very nice, been thinking about spraying a ThinkPad white myself for quite some time now.

 

Well: I must admit, very nice work, but: A white ThinkPad is a sacrilege!

(I would rather spray it in a dark red or a dark grey if I would do this - but thats a matter of taste)

 

Removing the keyboard bezel by itself is actually quite easy, but the feel of the paint compared to the usual paint of the shell is slightly different. The touchpad is mostly embedded to the keyboard bezel and the speaker holes are very small. Small holes are a problem because the fine particles from the spray can build up and solidify, blocking some of the holes unintentionally.

 

Wow that looks really good, I had looked at powder coated Alienware models (with the metal chassis) and boy is it annoying to do. Did you just use a brush and paint after applying a coat?

 

I didn't use a brush to paint, but I did spray several layers of paint. Since the Thinkpad W520 was originally pitch black, a thin layer of white paint wouldn't completely cover the blackness of the shell. It took 3+ hours between each layer of painting to allow for drying. The difficult part was the preparation because I had to disassemble the entire system properly and put it back together. Electronic components and chemicals do not go along well. Dust particles can also cause problems because you see bumps after the paint dries (using very fine sandpaper might help, but I didn't have any to test that).