I've recently joined after reading this site for a few months.

As many others have done before me, i'll be starting off with the cheap psOne project, to give a hands on testbed and solid foundation of the principles picked up from the guide and all of the other forums. Then do a 15", and most likely an HDPJ..

I know Lumenlab has their own guides and they sell parts for them accordingly. But I thought it would be a nice addition to start a thread that listed other people's projector plans and the costs. The project gallery and plog threads are awesome resources, but I was thinking of a cleaner section just for the plans/costs(ie: where someone bought) ..
This comes up because I've been searching for just a plain set of psOne (or any 5") plans for a while, (also that uses retail parts). A lot of people are using swapmeet, pawn shop or otherwise unreliable sources of places. Price is part of why everyone is here, but relative-ease of obtaining parts locally is a factor for me. I haven't been able to find either a detailed set of plans or a set of product numbers to pick up from any stores.

Things would be a lot nicer if there were a couple new categories (Maybe I just havent found them yet??) that said (Projector Plans - 5", 7", 15", 17") .. They would come from the community obviously, and you can sticky the LL Plans for each (so far just the 15?) up top in each.. Not knockin the LL plans at all, just trying to get some of this awesome information in places that newbies like myself can get to it..

If there are categories/threads im missing that already do anything like what im talking about, please kick my azz into the right direction and disregard

ps. if you know where i can find a set of psOne plans (enclosure design, type of lighting, etc) i'm open for suggestions.

Have you looked at all of these threads?

Psone Projector #2 mydiazclan
He has all of the parts laid out there so you can see. He is trying to make a full guide for his third projector.

DJpanther's First 5.5" PJ, 5.5" Toshiba 12volt Screen
He showed pretty well how he built it, it is very similar to a long psone projector.

5" NEW PROYECTOR, USING A M400SX EYE LAMP GRA_PELAYO
He has several good projectors all based on smaller panels.

I think that the plogs are the closest that you will get to guides. Most of them are pretty detailed, so you should be able to get enough information to build your own.

As far as you are talking about the parts being found at pawn shops, swapmeet and other places, those are the places to find things affordably. I don't know which particular parts you are referring to, but most everything can be bought new without too much trouble. The metal halide light setups are usually bought online and delivered. The lenses are usually LL or page magnifiers (office max, staples) and some strange one found on ebay. If you are referring to the psone screen, those can be bought on ebay, but I also was in Walmart today and saw one new in box for $80. Overhead projectors can be had for very cheap on ebay or at other sources, but one who is not willing to look everywhere, or has bad luck can go right to staples or office max and buy a brand new one in box for ~150-200.

mydiazclan went over where he got his parts from. He even said the specific mirrors that he got from surplus shed. If they are out for some reason, LL has large FS mirrors that can be purchased and cut down. (nothing against LL mirrors, that is just a lot of mirror for such a small project as a psone projector.)