I have but only a half-set, and I don’t see any chance of me getting the regs anytime soon, but I was just wondering what your guy’s favorite cases are.
Cheers,
If you’re looking for max protection, I’d recommend one of these babies:
Made by “Flight Proof”, has nice ‘butterfly’ latches, and wheeles for the long haul. Its quite heavy, and I’ve added rings for backpack straps. The last pic is of the foam cut, and the pipes in the case (I had the bellows out at the time). I paid about $200 for the case new.
lordofthestrings, I thought you were being sarcastic at first when i saw that big ol’ case with just the chanter in it…hehehe.
Looks sturdy to me, though. How did you cut the foam?
The first pictures were from before my set arrived, thats actually a whistle in there (to show scale). And that whistle’s never felt safer 
To cut the foam, I flipped it over to the non “pointy” side, used cardboard templates to trace the cuts, and then used a standard boxcutter blade to slowly score the lines over and over until I made it through. Worked pretty well, and only took about half an hour once I figured out what I needed to cut. I’m sure there’s better methods if you google it.
Jaysus Strings… That looks almost BULLET proof! 
Where might you find one of those babies?
I think it was already discussed somewhere else here people adapting viola cases to fit the pipes, if you don’t want to drag an armored tank around and prefer something more portable 
You just have to cut the inside(which is obviously in the shape of a viola) of it and fill it with some protective material.
I got this ‘tank’ at a Cabella’s outfitters store. But I’m sure you can find similar cases elsewhere if you did some digging. Lots of sporting goods stores could probably order you in something too.
I’ve played viola for 11 years, and yes, a viola case will work quite well also. I know other people are using these. If you get an oblong case (rectangle shaped, not shaped like a viola profile), there should be just enough room (for up to a 3/4 set at least). I’ve slid the guts out of mine on more than one occasion to have something smaller and lighter to use. The only draw back is that it takes a good deal of disassembling to fit the set in. The ‘tank’ case is nice simply becuase you can leave everything put together.
I use a tenor trombone case from Woodwind + Brasswind;
on a low-impact gig, a Giardinelli bass bone gig-bag.
I use an old suitcase from the Salvation Army to good effect. Customized some foam inserts and was off to the races for less than $20.
Doc
I use a viola case that I got from WoodwindBrasswind. It is a hard shelled case with carrying straps and a cloth cover. The portion of the bracing that holds the upper part of the viola body (at the base of the neck) is mounted with velcro to allow for 3/4, 1/2 and other size violas. I also removed part of the cross bracing and was done.
It provides an additional level of security beyond a simple hard-shelled case in the same way that Stradivarius violins are secured:
Q - “How do they protect Stradivarius violins from thieves?”
A - “They keep them in viola cases.”
I’ll put a plug in for mountain dulcimer cases as they are long enough to fit a half-set in without any disassembly but are still small enough to be easy to carry. I can’t remember where I got mine but this is an oft discussed topic and a simple search should reveal the answer.
There’s a post about four up with a link to prussia valley acoustic
Pelican makes a bunch of nearly indestructible cases that are great if you want that kind of case. If you’re going with a half set only, you can also use a trombone case (you can get used ones sometimes from HS band rooms for nothing) or a bassoon case (ditto). They’re fairly solid.
Bassoon cases are usually hard, solid cases that don’t fly open easily. I think that would be a good choice as well!