Project: Taking my sweet time (A+ Black Pearl)

[Jonni Nitro]

Alright time for a real update. Keep in mind that nothing has been mounted yet and these are only mock ups to figure out what I need to do next.

I put the internal panels back in the case and rivited them into place.



I placed the rads in the bottom. The bottom rad is my original MCR320 and wont be used, becaused I bought a new one.



I also may have some psu clearance issues, but this should be easy enough to work out.

[Stvwndr219]

glad to see you're back at it Jonni! How's the ankle holding up?

On the rad clearance - maybe look into mounting it right below the divider by reversing the psu plate? You can easily point the fan downward by drilling a couple of new holes in the psu plate. Oh and how hard was it to get that front fan controller thing off?

[Jonni Nitro]

The ankle is doing good so far.

Thanks for the tip and I may looking into that. I have seen it done, but wasnt sure how secure it would be with the psu hanging off that back panel.

The fan controller comes off pretty easy. You can take all of the electronics out and you will be left with just the acrylic piece. I used a hairdryer to warm it up and push on it from the inside. It didnt take much to get one side to start coming off.

[Ketzer7]

Looking good.

I just ordered one of these cases from Newegg today to mess around with and see if I can get a couple of ideas to work on it.

About that front acrylic piece.. So it sounds like it is just glued to the front on like a little shelf recess or something? Wouldn't be anything stopping someone from putting their own piece of acrylic in it's place, or? Thanks!

[Jonni Nitro]

Yeah its just a small recess in the front of the case. I would flush mount the piece and fill the lines, but I wouldnt be able to match the rest of the case perfectly. Its close with the flat I have on it now, but I am not sure if it would look good with a flat black strip across the fron of the case. I dont want to paint the whole case just to hide these lines. I am going to re-glue if back and support the rest of the controller to the midplate.

[Stvwndr219]

The PSU screws do a really good job holding it onto the backplate - and there's that tab as well. If you wanted to be extra save a couple custom fabbed brackets from some L brackets on the inside part of the PSU could help but I had no problem hanging my PSU over my push/pull MCR320 in my v2000.

[the_dope_chaud]

Thats pretty much the same thing I did with mine, but since the photo, I mooved the pump & res, got 38mm fans, proper shrouds, and did the case interior black.

Psu does not budge when installed like this.

[R3rider63]

when you riveted the panels back in place,did you use some flathead rivets for the case sides?,or did you use regular rivets that sit deep enough in the countersunk holes on the case.
looking good

[Jonni Nitro]

I used some standard rivets and they should work if the file/sand/shave them down a little.

[Ketzer7]

Yeah its just a small recess in the front of the case. I would flush mount the piece and fill the lines, but I wouldnt be able to match the rest of the case perfectly. Its close with the flat I have on it now, but I am not sure if it would look good with a flat black strip across the fron of the case. I dont want to paint the whole case just to hide these lines. I am going to re-glue if back and support the rest of the controller to the midplate.

Nice, thanks Jonni. I'll take a closer look once it gets here and see what I can do.

[Stvwndr219]

Jonni, just a little request - can you help me place the 320 radiator at the top of the case between the 5 1/4" bays before the round part of the case and take a picture of where it intersects in relation to the motherboard (near the pci-e slots)? Thanks!

[Jonni Nitro]

Just to be clear, you want to lay it flat on the top of the case? Shouldnt be a problem, but if are going to have the fans inside the case you would loose at least a pci slot and I doubt you could ever pull off sli/xfire. I will take pics later.

[Stvwndr219]

ok. Just wanted to see how it fits - I may get one of those koolance shrouds and with the amount of pci-e slots on my p6t6, I don't think I should have a problem with making something work/figuring something out. Thanks!

[Jonni Nitro]

Small update. I was babysitting most of the day and couldnt really get much done. I got one of the side panels pretty much done with mesh mounted. I am seriously considering painting this case. It would still be black, but maybe something a little different. I also need a new dremel in the worst way. I think that thier quality has gone way down so I may get the Craftsman equal. For now here are some pics.

[Armitage]

Looks great Glad things are moving along again!

[shazza]

Looking good, Jonni! Thanks for all the tips you are sharing. You did a nice job on those side panels.

[Jonni Nitro]

So I am kinda of at a point in the build where I am making progress, but at the same time I keep thinking of other things I want/should do. I have thought about painting the entire case. There are some minor knicks in the finish here and there, but I am not sure exactly what color. My buddy has some paint left over from a motorcycle that is gloss black with some metalic and pearl blue in it. Looks pretty cool and he has enough to paint my case. I still want to keep it subtle, but I dont get a chance to do big mods often.

Also, I have a few more other things I have been thinking about. Like watercooling my 4870. I could just do a swiftech block and ramsinks, but would I need some more cooling? I could add s MCR120 at the rear of the case and put it in series after the NB. I am just not sure. Let me know what you guys think.

[Jonni Nitro]

Ok, I quit worring about how far to take this and just kept moving. I have some updates with photos this time and I hope that you guys like the progress so far. I finished up the fan controller mounting and got the rads ready to go for mounting. In the pic of the rads the stacker is on the bottom, I am obviously going to change that. I had just got everything together and this was to see how it will look. I also will be flipping the PSU as metioned earlier and I modded the stock HDD cage(still needs paint) to fit 3 drives under the PSU fan. This is going to keep the majority of the heat and clutter in the bottom of the case. I wanted to have 2 drives in raid0 and one for a scratch drive.






Right now I am planning on the fans pulling air from the bottom of the case. Any reason why it would be better to pull air from the top of the rad and push it to the bottom?



This pic is terrible, but I didnt feel like taking another one right now.

[cobra_kai]

Nice work so far. Is the side panel laser cut?

[Jonni Nitro]

No it was cut by a waterjet. A friend of my wife owns a high performance speed shop for boats equipped with a lot of machinist goodies.

[Jonni Nitro]

I did get my PSU mounting sorted out today. Other progress was made like but no need to post photos of me thinking. I flushed my rads and I will be mouting them tomorrow. I may even get to start sleeving and wiring some of the fans and such.


This is not the PSU I am using...I think my system would melt it instantly.

[Armitage]

Plate looks great And those rads were pretty easy to flush aye? Good to hear.

Hows the healing coming?

[The Water Dog]

Nice plate there and sidedoors, Jonni

[RCG_Bex]

How many times can those swiftech rads be mounted like that? Is it limited to 2 or could you stack more?

~Bex

[Jonni Nitro]

Thanks for the comments. The healing is going well, Im able to move around pretty easy. I am still on crtuches if I go any distance though.

How many times can those swiftech rads be mounted like that?

Physically you could keep stacking them, but I think the more you stack them the useful it would be. They are in parallel so the water will eventually take the path of least resistance. If you had 5 of these stacked together the bottom two would probably have now circulation.

With the room I have I could have chosen a better rad setup, but I already had one so it was cheap.