**** Phinix AURORA ****

[Brodholm]

Looks amazing Mike! Really love the SSD holders also!

[phinix_mike]

Looks amazing Mike! Really love the SSD holders also!

Cheers! I'm happy you like them!

[phinix_mike]

After my birthday I was sick for couple of weeks, then there was Easter, then I had my daughters birthday, was still sick (I think I still didn't get rid of cough.. some nusty virus I caught...) so was pretty occupied for a last month, that is why there was no update. But I'm back now and did some work on Aurora, so it is time to share

It's been raining here in Scotland for last few days (more like a week I guess) and it looks like it will rain next week too
It is time to another small-ish update.
I caught some sun today (plus some sudden rain falls too... and did some work outside.

But before this I wanted to show you want I recently received.
Watercooling magicians from EK sent me more presents

As I showed before, EK gave me their waterblock for GTX670.
To complete its look and make it in project's color scheme, EK guys sent me white acetal top for it!
And that is not all!
They also sent me their latest reservoir! With additional white top and bottom bits!!!

Look at that!








I had to try those out and swapped top and bottom bits
What a beauty...



I wanted to thank EK again for all those fantastic items - these will blend in nicely to the whole internals.

[phinix_mike]

I showed you guys those L shape frame bits before - these are the elements for radiator cover or "cage" if you like
Front of the case will be occupied by huge dual radiator with two fans. Some, 20mm exactly, will be sticking out from the internal part of the case to the front cover. This front cover is pretty thick so there is more than 2cm of space between end of internal case and front wall. So some part of radiator will sit inside, some in the front part of the cover. I hope that makes sense...

Now, radiator and fans will be covered with a nice wall, made of those L shape bits, narrow aluminium wall on the left and nice mesh inside the case.

Here are the main bits:




This is two pieces put together, left wall of the radiator compartment.
Don't worry those bits are uneven on top, they will be cut to size later on.



But first, I want to show you mounted acrylic "spine" for drive cage
Yep, I finally mounted it.

Here are main bits, two blue acrylic rods and two opal holders, top and bottom one.
As you can see, one on the left is bottom one, will be screwed to the bottom of the case. Top one, on the right, has already installed brass inserts on the side, cause this one will be screwed to the side panel of the case, internal one, which I cut to size and mounted on the right from mobo tray.




Now, these two will be pushed on those rods and will end up in the middle. They will be reservoir holders mounts.




Small adjustment to the case top rail Rods were pretty long




..and rods installed. I let myself to play with different color program son my camera








Oh, this is a part of next update, cause it's not finished, but I will show it anyway
Here you can see brass inserts already installed in acrylic rods. These are the first pair, which will hold first drive cage shelf. I tested it and it look awesome, but need to finish all the way up before show it

Kinda small teaser



OK, let's get back to radiator compartment.
Here is a small L shape holder for a left wall...




..and here you can see drilled and ready to be screwed right side L shape bracket, right next to mounted rods "spine"...



..and the left wall "pushed in". I will use rivets to mount them, so for now they are only pushed, to show the idea. Between those brackets I will install nice mesh and glue it to the frame with double sided tape, to make it look flash. I have some nice mesh left after Nano Tower project, when I got it from Bill, from MNPCTECH.




Three last photos show the middle acrylic reservoir holders mounts pushed down.
Holes are perfect so it was pushed down pretty hard, so they won't slide.
Of course they will be drilled and brass inserted, to make sure my beautiful EK reservoir won't move.







OK, that is all for now. I hope you like this update and will patiently wait for another
Looks like next Monday is a holiday, so will be taking day off to stay with my daughter at home. This may create good opportunity to go out and do some more work on Aurora.

So, please stay tuned! :thumb:

[UrbanSmooth]

Wow, Mike, that looks really cool! Your eye for aesthetics is really class.

[Saltire]

Love your attention to detail Mike.

Good to see a fellow Jock at the top of the modding scene.

Looking forward to more updates

[phinix_mike]

Guys, sorry for a delay. I was away for couple of weeks, here and there. Then had some problems with my house (leaking roof again!), now I'm working in my garden, summer started so had to do some work. Lately I have been digging in my back yard to prepare nice base for my new shed, where I will continue my project. Shed ordered so need to work hard now to meet the deadline, cause shed guys will come up soon with slabs to finish the base and build my workshop
So please be patient, soon will continue my project in brand new place

[Chr0n1c]

Nice build, very creative hard drive system. Did the plexi give you much trouble during all your cutting? Looks difficult.

[LeandroJVarini]

Congratulations on the job, is getting very beautiful!

[tiborrr]

Hey Mike, long time no chat. Any new progress?

[Bill Owen]

Hope everything is Ok, looking forward to any updates

[phinix_mike]

Nice build, very creative hard drive system. Did the plexi give you much trouble during all your cutting? Looks difficult.

Thanks! Plexi is pretty easy to work with, only the thick ones are a bit hard. When using jigsaw or dremel it melts it and makes all cutoffs stick again to it, but it is managable

Congratulations on the job, is getting very beautiful!

Thank you very much! Glad you like it

Hey Mike, long time no chat. Any new progress?

Hope everything is Ok, looking forward to any updates

Hi tiborrr, Bill!

Any new updates Mike? Hope everything is going good...

Well, not everything was going good for me lately, but my project is fine, just waiting for me to get my hands on it again.

In a last two months I was super busy, abroad for couple of weeks, then I was sick for another few (bronchitis). Lately I finally gathered funds to build new shed/workshop in my back garden. I had to spend a lot of time working on it before garden was ready for a new workshop. As I mentioned many times during Phinix Cube and Nano Tower projects, I wanted to have my workshop so I wouldn't have to work in my attic. Finally the time has come The plan was to get rid of old small soggy shed - it soaks water from the ground and was in horrible condition, previous home owner built it on the ground without any support, so it worked like a sponge, getting worse and worse over the years. Other problem was it was built right in the middle of the garden, which looked stupid and not practical. New shed was going to go right to the end of the garden. That bit was uneven so had to dig out and make even about 15 feet square of wet soil and rock hard clay. When I managed to do that it was time to prepare a base for a shed. I decided to go for a proper one, so ordered tone of sand and over 30 huge cream slabs (missus picked the color and it looks really nice Each slab is around 40kg so a lot of weight had to be shifted. I put the sand layer first and then the slabs, working on each of them to be nice and even. Slab base was ready and I could get shed guys to come and put up a new one. Of course old one had to go, so few hummers and chain saw was involved in this process:dremel: Right now at the back of my garden there is a nice brand new shed and old one is away There was a "small" problem at the end - last week it was raining heavily here in Glasgow, including thunderstorms etc. So when I got a new shed ready I had to quickly shift all the stuff from the old one. Taking all the stuff out to demolish old shed, then putting all in a new one took my the whole day, most of the time working in rain. The result was pretty disastrous to me - next day I couldn't move from my bed. Doctor said I overworked myself - my back was in pain, pinching nerve radicles, horrible feeling. For 4 days I wasn't able to walk. Going to bathroom was like a freaking 30 minutes pain-trips (bathroom is 10 meters from my bedroom) I fill better now, but still walk slowly, cannot lift anything etc.
In short, this is why I was busy away from my Aurora However, despite all the health problems, I'm very happy with the result - I have a nice workshop where I will be able to continue my Aurora project and all the following ones Yep, already have few ideas for a new projects:naughty:
Now, I'm not fully functioning but I want to show you some bits that I have done about month ago I think, just before I got sick. Not much but it will show you some new ideas I "implemented" in Aurora Plus will show you the photos of new shed!
My mum is visiting us for a next couple of weeks and this weekend (if my back will let me) we will go to wee trip to London and Legoland (my daughter is going to kill me if I won't take here there - I already had to cancel trip to Disneyland in Paris this month because I was sick, so you can imagine her frustration In a week I should be ok to move my modding stuff to new shed and start working on Aurora again.

My apologies guys for this few months delay but I'm back and ready to to grab my dremel again!

[Lord Brand]

Take it easy and try not to kill yourself. We can wait a bit longer.

[phinix_mike]

UPDATE ??!! NO WAY !!!
...yes way

Guys thank you all for your patience. As I mentioned before I was pretty busy/sick/away for last couple of months, that is why Aurora was collecting dust on my attic. I had to finish all planned "summer projects" before I could start modding again. During last two months (weekends only cause I'm unable to do anything during the week due to work I have made concrete slab base for a new shed, got rid of old one, got new one on new spot, made a nice concrete slab patio in the place of old shed and cleaned up my attic (a bit, most of the stuff is still waiting
So please let me start this fresh update with photos of steps I went through to moment I could grab my dremel and start working on Aurora again

First, everyone who was fallowing my logs saw my old shed in my back garden.




Back then I could only work outside that little rotting shed. You can see there is a wee garden in the back - previous owner had some kind of flowers or weed or something there. Totally unused spot. So I decided to get a new shed right there. Ground was uneven, like a small bump, so had to dig it all out first and make it even, before I could make this slab base.




It wasn't easy - it was made of stone hard clay and lots of roots, old broken slabs, rocks, bricks... I was so happy I didn't dig out some body parts... I dug out some old brick with a date on it - 1947...
So I was digging it out day by day, slowly getting to the back end of it. I decided to leave a meter long space behind for some stuff in the future, so here was finished spot.




Then I ordered tone of sharp sand, 31 cream concrete slabs and in one weekend I made this:






Then few weeks after my brand new shed came, guys built it in 40 minutes
6x12 feet beauty. I could only have 6 feet wide cause that ground was pretty narrow and the end. So made it 12 feet long, perfect for my new workshop

Guys also took the old shed, using chain saw they took it down - it took them about 2 hours to do that - looks like destroying isn't so easy then creating after all

On the photo below you can see new shed in place, then old shed bits left and all my stuff outside - it was raining right after they finished so I had to quickly cover all my stuff then take them inside new shed. I was sick after this for couple of days, got cold, back pains and everything. But it was worth it




...and my new workshop




...and I have a window!!!




Next step was to get rid of all the rabbish after old shed, plus some old fance that my "fantastic" neighbour left on my side when he was building a new fence on his garden.. don't ask...:duh:




During this time my mum was visiting us, so she helped us with all the work - my wife, mum, daughter - all were working... under my supervision
Spot was cleaned and I shifted all the rubbish to local recycling center.




After another weekend, new patio was made. Again, I had to order tone of gravel, slabs, 10 bags of mortar etc... It was nice sunny day, so I was making thispatio, while my lovely family was making a BBQ.. there is nothing better from having a beer and nice grilled polish sausages after hard work...:naughty:

Here from bird's view - new patio in the middle of garden with a nice wooden picnic table... plus blue trampoline... little one wanted to have something for her in new garden too...
You can also admire some clean drying underwear of my neighbors on both sides




Last weekend was a time to finally do something in my new workshop - I needed a strong work table. So I took a trip to B&Q again and got myself a nice kitchen worktop and some timber for structure. After couple of hours and about 40 used screws, table was ready.








OK! So that would be it! I know that for someone who does things like that all the time, these are nothing, but believe me - being IT my whole life - making such a wee "construction jobs" was pretty a lot and I'm really proud of myself

Now, getting back to Aurora. Here is a quick shot of Aurora chillin on a new picnic table, just before it was taken to the new workshop




Now actual update on the project. Short one, cause I just started working in my new place.
It is time to finish up front radiator cage and make main right wall mounted solid.
You can see radiator stands lying on the edge of the case - it is uneven, so I had to do something with it before I could go forward.






After couple of minutes with my huge file... hehe.... well, not to embarrass anyone.. it is average size really...
...edge is sorted.






Now the right wall. I had to make an entrance to the back of the drive cage, so cut out a hole in the back - it will be covered with piece of aluminum at the end - moveable of course, so I could easily have access to drives cables.






Now, to make this wall steady as a rock, I had to fabricate small support bricks - white acrylic of course, 10mm thick. I had one spare drive shelf that I used for those....






..and with nice rounded edges...




Last bit I wanted to show is this top cover/section/balcony for dvd - it will be mounted on top of the drive cage blue acrylic rods. I will explain this later when will be mounting it.
Right now, photos of cut out fro white 3mm acrylic sheet all the bits. Those square holes are right for those rods, so you can imagine how they gonna go.








This is about it for now. I'm off tomorrow, busy most of the day but will have few hours in the workshop to do some more steps. Will show that too of course. And the new weekend is coming quickly, so will be working on Aurora again:thumb:
Thanks for watching guys! Mod on! :dremel:



Ow, forgot to mention it.
Do you guys remember that I also said I will be modding the keyboard that Cooler Master kindly sent me?

So here is first part of modding - key caps.
As a real hardcore IT, I had a sweet Commodore 128 in the past - those were days..
That is why I wanted to make this keyboard (Cooler Master TKL Quickfire Rapid) to look like an old Commodore keyboard. There was one crazy GroupBuy on keyboard enthusiasts forums that was called "Retro DSA" - and I took part in that GB.
Here is the result, ENJOY! :blush:





















































Til next time! This time, really soon!

[dietje1908]

love the keyboard
have fun in the new shed !

[Bill Owen]

Yay, new update! .....everything looks great, and awesome job on the new workshop!

[phinix_mike]

love the keyboard
have fun in the new shed !

Yay, new update! .....everything looks great, and awesome job on the new workshop!

Thanks guys! This new shed is a fantastic! I can go there and work on the project straight away, without moving. Super comfortable!

OK! Time for new update.
As I said, it is SO much easier to work on projects when I have a dedicated space for it.... sweet shed

So here it is!
As I showed them before I drilled those holders and hot-pushed inserts.




Here they are attached to the radiator cover wall.






Then I fabricated another two... for other side - to mount front side of mobo wall...










Here are both sides mounted with those holders. Steady as a rock
Please have in mind that those screws and nuts I use now will be replaced with nice silver dome nuts and bolts, which I even may paint white at the end. Those I use now are just temporary. Same for rivets - have some black leftovers, so use them for now - I already have white rivets for final finish.








Also fabricated these 4 front panel holders, but will use them later - front panel will be mounted way after




Now, this is.. door.. let's call it a door Door to the rear of drive cage/shelves.
It has a nice round hole, which will be a gap where all cables+wres will go to the back of the case.








Now, I had to drill and cut out holes for cables/wires that go to the mobo...






..and all holes done.




Also mounted this blue acrylic pass-through bit for 24 wire mobo cable.




..and more holes for cables/wires that go under the mobo...




Now, here is a white/opal slim drive shelf I showed before - just a mockup, so you can see how it will be mounted. I need to do some wee adjustments to it and fit in dvd drive.






















I had some left overs of mesh I received from Bill from MNPCTECH when I was working on Nano Tower. I cut out a nice rectangle and pushed it in the radiator cage. It will be mounted with double sided tape, nice and clean.







That is all for now. Thanks for stopping by:thumb:

Next thing I will be working is that dvd mounting thingy. I noticed that top line of the internal case is too high, so need to cut off a bit to squeeze a dvd there.
After that I will finish drive cage - need to solder those leds that go under each shelf and mount those shelves in first place.

Stay tuned:thumb: stuff around from home and back...

[Bill Owen]

Loving every bit of the progression

Whats plan with aluminum fuel cover style 120mm blowhole fan grill?

[phinix_mike]

Loving every bit of the progression What is your plan with aluminum fuel cover style 120mm blowhole fan grill?

Thanks Bill!
There will be 120mm fan on top end of the case. I will push blue acrylic between this grill and case, so it will be raised 3mm. Maybe even put some leds to light it up a bit


New update this weekend! I've done some work on acrylic bits. I will start cabling process soon...

[Bill Owen]

Sounds cool, and will check back!

[phinix_mike]

A wee update/summary for today.

I have put together drive cage to finally see how it will look inside. I drilled all holes in blue rods and pushed brass inserts. Then mounted all 3 shelves and installed it in the case.
Basically, pretty much all main bits are done inside. Power cage (PSU and wire cables junction) finished before, now drive cage and radiator cage.

First - wire holders for mobo 24 pin cable.
These were cut from opal 10mm thick acrylic ****. Holes are for two wires each, 12 in total.
I drilled holes and mounted it behind mobo tray.








I put that additional wall in front so you can see how wires will go.
First will go through first wire holder, up to the second, were they will turn a bit left, to finally get to blue holder to other side. Then straight to mobo.




I used Tensol 13 to glue together those white bits for a dvd shelf.






So here it is - this is what we have at this stage.

Drive cage ready and installed, dvd shelf installed.


























Here's dvd coming in. You can see this wee bracket for mounting it.
I need 3 small screws to finish it, but they are coming to me now, thanks to mingingbollock - thanks man!:thumb:






With the top on...




Unbranding the front




That is all for now
Stay tuned!

[Bill Owen]

Everything is coming along great, looking forward to more Mike!

[Neox69]

Awesome, looking good my friend!

[phinix_mike]

Cheers guys!

I was away on holidays last month, made a short break from Aurora, but I'm back now

I worked on front panel look and made few versions, however this one has made to the end of "brain storm" so here it is, front panel sketchup:

[Bill Owen]

the bezel design looks great Mike!