So last week I was in Wal-Mart and it looks like I finally found one. It is a 6$ Rival toaster that was just absolutely tiny. Out of the box this thing is almost exactly what I needed. Only problem is that the dial for light/dark would stick out just a tad bit.. Not perfect but I will take it. I will need to cut some stuff but I think I can have this done this weekend.

After I am done I can start working on converting to a the G4 Cube into a new Media Center PC with a micro ITX board and some finagling (Hopefully with a slot loading Blu Ray player).

With the slot cut I can put the internal into the case and get an idea how it fits. Unfortunately it is still to tight but the offending piece is the fastener for the magnet.

This is a simple fix though because there is allot of excess and there is a slot on the piece to bend the metal into (after you lop off the tabs and shape it a little)

One other thing that did not fit in the G4 Case is the controls for light dark… I think I will have to put the controls on the bottom (keeping with the Apple function over form mentality).

The end result is beautiful and it is really starting to come together. Here is it all in one piece, you can see it is a little sticky but I am sure I can fix that. I think I need to widen the slot just a little bit… and grease it up of course.

I trimmed this right before the excess upward tab that was left over from the longer toaster.the metal is pretty soft so you can just score it then bend it until it breaks.

Next we are using a piece of metal let over from one of my 4 toaster (I kind of lost track). it is just a little strip and we are going to bend it into an arc and drill through the ends of the guides and attach. This will have a small hole for the wire from the spring mechanism. the wire goes through the hole and then is bent so that when the leaver is pushed down the wire will get pushed down as well.

Cut the slot for the top of the toaster to stick out of the commuter case. This is pretty much just a straight line from the sides of the existing center opening. When cutting the opening you should remove the metal bracket on the inside, it will go much faster and I needed to remove it eventually anyway.  Remove the plastic top (will put it back after it is done).

As you can see it does fit into the computer case quite well but I did have to trim it up a bit more. There is some excess on the non lever side that I took off as well. and after this point it just needs some touching up here and there to fit perfectly.

(Top)        

(Bottom)   

The top tabs and openings match up and just needs a little extra push and that’s it. The second tab is pretty simple, I just lined up a screw driver to where the slot should be and punched it through with a hammer.  The middle tab slot ended up just below where the side line gets greater in size. The bottom also lines up well and just needs a little extra push.

I am also in the clear for the retaining grates not touching any of the elements in the center. There is not much clearance but it is safely out of the way. When I settle on a way to attach the top metal piece I will be certain to center it so nothing touches.

The last couple of steps that led up to this point was moving the mounting slots for the non lever end of the toaster closer to accommodate the shorter cage.

Next step was to shorten the base to fit into the Apple Cube case ( then internal case). Both ends needed to be tightened up. A little bit was taken off the lever side then a bund of the non lever side. The lines are in blue for the cut.

Here is the shortened base.

Here is the outline on the part that will need to be modified. The boxes are marked on the top and the holes are the ones drilled on the bottom. To create the odd shaped holes at the top I used a Dremel tool with a grinding bit to take out the areas that drilling did not get and to clean it up.  I will also need the Dremel when it is time to modify the Apple Cube.

Here is the compact guides in the newly created holes.

After this step I can put it together to asses how it will fit into the case and it looks like a go. In the picture below there are a few things that will change. The base from the larger unit will be cut down taking off all excess. 

After that disappointment I went to Sears looking for toasters again. This time I went with the idea that the space between the cage where the bread goes and the beginning of the lever had to be an extremely small distance and the surface from top to bottom on the end had to be flat. This mindset really paid off. The model I found was another Oster. (Model: 6325)

Now this toaster was designed with a longer cage for waffles and such and the cage alone would not fit in the cube. Notice how short the distance from the beginning of the slot and the end of the toaster where the lever is.

  The internals of this toaster are a jackpot, everything is modular and appears to be easily moved. The quality of this toaster is much higher than the other Oster I got from Walmart just a few days earlier ..This one has an all metal shell and is now 10$ cheaper. Out of the two, if I were to buy one for toasting alone this would be the one.. The only thing the other one has going for it is that it has a compact area where the bread goes.