On my case at the front i have mounts for 4 fans, however they are blocked by the front cover.

i am wondering how to sort out the problem as my front fan draws its air from the bit at the bottom of the cover used to pull it off and to help carry the case. I had thought about removing the bit where the power button and LEDs are however I have no idea how to mount them and what sort of guard to put there (would wire meshing do?)

Any help would be greatly appreciated in my quest to get good air flow... oh and one last thing, how hard is it drill a blowhole at the top of a case through alumminium?

I have a Skyhawk case too
I just keep the side panels off of my systems

I have an enermax case similar to that with the holes blocked in the front. No worries, as long as you have a big intake 120mm like mine on the side panel, those fans in the front are just used to pass the airflow to the back and top of the case. That will do just fine for stable temps. Right now I have with A/C on in my house 26c cpu, 24 system 1, and 24 system 2.

ive got an 80mm intake slap bang in the middle of the side panel (got a premod window on it with a premounted fan in the middle and i wish i spent a bit more, got an antec and put my own window and fan in there)

i keep my panels under my burner off

that would be okay, however i run two hard drives which are almost always being accesed (FTP server runnign off my main pc) so they get quite hot hence the reason a low down fan would be handier than a high one under my optical drives.

would a blowhole help at all?

case temp: 24-28C
cpu temp: 30-42C