Project: Lian Li PC-A77

[fadetoblack]

so a few months ago i started hanging out here in the liquid cooling forum and i'm finally ready to go liquid! i needed a new case to fit everything in and was about to buy the tj07 but then i found out about the lian li pc-a77 which seemed pretty nice so i decided on that (had to wait over a month for it though). anyway, i havent gotten too far yet but i thought i'd start since i have questions. i dont have any previous experience with water cooling and case modding so this won't turn out anywhere near as nice as some of the awesome builds out there (especially knet's pc-a77 build), but ill do my best..

SYSTEM:
intel qx9650
evga 790i ultra
2x2gb gskill ddr3 1600mhz
2x evga gtx280
tagan bz1100w psu
2x wd raptor 150gb (raid 0)
1x wd caviar 500gb
lian li pc-a77
avertv pcie combo tuner
vista ultimate x64

WC PARTS:
Radiator 1: Thermochill PA120.2
Radiator 2: Thermochill PA120.3
Radiator 1 Fans: 2x Yate Loon D12SM 120mm for PA120.2
Radiator 2 Fans: 3x Yate Loon D12SM 120mm for PA120.3

Pump 1: DDC3.2 12V 18w w/ XSPC Reservoir Top
Pump 2: DDC3.2 12V 18w w/ XSPC Reservoir Top
Res Adapter: 2x M20x1.5 to G1/4” Reservoir Fill Cap Adapter
http://www.aqua-pcs.co.uk/m20x15-to-...ter-1351-p.asp

CPU Block: XSPC Edge Acrylic
http://www.aqua-pcs.co.uk/new-xspc-e...lic-1344-p.asp
NB Block: ViperJohn 790i NB/SPP Block
SB Block: EK NB/SB 6 - Acetal
GPU Block: 2x D-Tek Fuzion GFX 2 w/ Unisink

Barbs: All DD Fat Boy Fittings 1/2" OD
Barb Adapters: McMaster G3/8 to G1/4 Adapters (for Fat Boys on radiators)
http://www.mcmaster.com/nav/enter.as...657&pagenum=29

Coolant: Distilled Water + PT Nuke
Tubing: Feser Tube Active UV Hose 1/2ID 3/4OD
http://www.performance-pcs.com/catal...ducts_id=23370
Clamps: Breeze Miniature Hose Clamp
http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/brmihocl7int1.html
Fill Port: 2x Danger Den Acetal 1"
http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/dadendefi.html
- i was hoping to mount these at the top of the case but theres no space so i'll have to keep them inside

Chilled PC - Anodised 120.3 Rad Grill with Mounting Holes (fits thermochill rads only)
http://www.jab-tech.com/Chilled-PC-A...s-pr-4127.html
2x AC Ryan Twin Overboost Dual 12" CCFL Light UV
http://www.performance-pcs.com/catal...ducts_id=20529

LOOPS:
loop 1: ddc->PA120.2->CPU->NB
loop 2: ddc->GPU1->GPU2->PA120.3

a few questions i had:
1. given the layout below, there is only one 120mm exhaust at the back. should i make the top rad fans pull air out from the case?
2. any other suggestions/problems with the general layout?

[fadetoblack]

its time to put this thing in a case..






i'm prob gonna go with the yate loons on the pa120.2 also.. noise isn't really an issue for me, but i didn't realize just how loud those ultra kaze's are


not sure which two colors to go with


case stripped down. i still dont understand why lian li didnt make more holes in the motherboard tray for clean wiring.. i guess ill have to cut a couple of holes






it was a pain getting those two horizontal plates out, since i had to drill holes in the front of the frame to get to the front screws holding them in.


seeing how the grill will look against the top panel..


as always, measure twice cut once


holes are drilled, making sure the grill fits


making sure the pa120.3 fits.. it fits




the tubing could have fit through those holes, but i wanted to make it a looser fit so i cut a chunk out and stuck some of that c-strip rubber from petras on there


almost done cutting.. yes, i have to do my cutting in the bathroom since i live in a small apt and have no backyard . easy to clean up all the dust and mess from the drilling in the bathroom also


finally!


took one reinforced cutting wheel (dremel #426)


not exactly the greatest job in the world, but it'll do



i spent some time wondering what the best way to mount my dvd drive and 3 hard drives in the 3 free 5.25" drive bays was. the pa120.3 on top protrudes into the top 2 bays, and the pa120.2 would take up the bottom 7, leaving 3. there was no way the dvd drive would fit in the 2nd bay, but i could mount a hd in the 2nd since its not as long, 3rd, 4th using those scythe 5.25" hd mounts. and then the dvd drive would go in the 5th. problem with that was that i wasnt sure how to mount a fan in front of the hd's. then i realized the hard drive cages that came with the case would fit in the 2nd,3rd, and 4th bays if i cut into it at the top.













perfect.. now the 2nd bay wont go to waste and i have air flow to the hds.


because of the little screw at the bottom of the rad, it obviously wasnt sitting flat on the bottom of the case so i drilled a hole at the bottom which i majorly screwed up


as you can see, i drilled too far back so i had to expand the hole towards the front.. oh well, at least its not visible




now i need to secure the rad so it doesnt fall forward (it wont slide around because of the hole that the screw fits into at the bottom and obviously its not gonna fall back), and i came up with the ghetto solution below.


remember those horizontal plates in the hard drive cages? i thought i'd try cutting one of those up and mounting it in front of the rad.





alright, thats all ive got for now. any advice, suggestions?

[fadetoblack]

cut a hole at the bottom for a 120mm intake fan


aluminum dust filter and fan grill for bottom intake fan


cut some holes in the motherboard tray so i can clean up the wiring, put some of that handy c-strip rubber around them


cut a small hole in the cage above the motherboard tray so i can hopefully bring the 8-pin motherboard power connector around the back, behind the tray..


shortened the wires for the fans that will go on the PA120.3. soldered them together and put some heatshrink on


did the same for the fans going on the PA120.2


with the "spiral wrap" wire covers. i got this stuff from performance pcs. doesn't look too bad and a hell of a lot easier than putting the regular cable sleeving on

[fadetoblack]

decided to go with an ac ryan blackfire4 fan for the bottom intake. 29dba, 78cfm


dust filter underneath


enlarged the hole for the pa120.3 tubes since it was still a little tight


drilled holes for the pump screws.. i was initially just gonna stick them on with the sticky pad but then thought it would be a pain if i ever needed to take them out or move them around




i think im gonna go with green and red.. blue isnt as bright


even though its very tempting, im not gonna water cool the SB. just wanted to see how it looks with the block on


cutting tubes to proper length.. i had some trouble getting the hose between the cpu and nb without any kinks since its a tight bend, so im a little worried about that.


that horizontal plate to secure the rad was getting in the way of the tube going down to the pump so i just cut a chunk out of it.



im still waiting for the new dtek gtx 280 blocks to become available, so i wasnt able to do much for the gpu loop. i hope those will come out soon so i can do leak testing all at once instead of twice for each loop. if not, im just gonna go ahead and finish the cpu loop by the long weekend hopefully.

here's a few unrelated pics of my setup and crysis



all i can say is that crysis with very high settings at 2560x1600 is absolutely stunning

[fadetoblack]

well i didn't want to wait around for the gpu blocks any longer so i decided i'd get at least the first loop finished..


i wanted to have both male and female molex connectors on the pump and cpu block leds, so i soldered some on that i had laying around. unfortunately i didnt realize the the leds are powered by the +5v pin and not the +12v pin so i had them connected to the wrong one and fried two in the process. well they're not totally fried but they don't seem to be as bright anymore - no big deal. anyway so i switched the pins around on the molex so the leds would be on the 5v


wires tucked away to the side of the pump


behind pump - also soldered the leds for each pump together so i wouldnt need to plug them in separately


leak testing w/o any hardware. i had this running for almost two days. had the pump off for a good period of time in between as well. no leaks at all


leak testing w/ hardware, ran for about 10 hours. still no leaks . it was a little tough installing the blocks onto the hardware since the loop was already assembled and filled with water




installed rest of the hardware and turned on for the first time. up and running!






pump 1 in action

and finally, now for some temp readings.

settings:
cpu @ 3.8ghz (9.5x400)
vcore: 1.3875v (1.296 - 1.35 actual with vdroop)
fsb: 1.35v
ram: 1.9v
spp: 1.4v
mcp: auto (1.5v)
ram unlinked @1600mhz, 7-7-7-18-2T

i ran prime95 (small fft's) for an hour, you can see the results in pic below. basically, the max temp on any core i saw was 58c while stress testing. this is compared to ~75-77c with air cooling. not bad ! also, NB/SPP temps are down to 44c from 55c. SB/MCP temps are down to 50c from 64c (but thats just from the evercool SB fan). do those seem like reasonable temps to you guys or do you think they should be lower?

[fadetoblack]

two of the thermal gap pads were missing, they were actually stuck in the packaging


1.4 billion transistors...


cleaned all the old thermal paste










had to expand the hole for the 120.3 tubes yet again - turns out the tubes were being kinked by the back part


put another set of 2x12" uv cathodes at the top of the case




had to use anti kink coils.. it still flattens out a little but not as bad as it did without them. if you look closely at the tube between the cpu and nb, it also flattens out a bit but there is no kink (see pic below). would that affect performance?








leak testing.. there was a small leak on the right barb on the upper video card almost immediately. i tightened the clamp but it was already pretty secure so that didn't help. so i ended up taking it apart (man that was a pain) and i swapped out the fitting for another one i had lying around and that seemed to fix it. i guess the o-ring on the first barb wasn't sealing correctly.

[leo_bsb]

just forget the SB block and you are all set.

[Pedalmonkey]

i dont know about the 790i but normally a good heatsink will do enough for the SB and Mosfets. the less restriciton and heat dump on ur CPU block and loop the better.

[fadetoblack]

yeah i might ditch it, since it will no doubt be a pain to get the tubes in there with sli

[fadetoblack]

updated

anyone have any thoughts on the questions in the first post? im mostly concerned about the fact that there is only one exhaust at the back

[xTKxhom3r]

wow nice!

[The[R]eaper]

lookin' real good so far

I was gonna get this case when i first saw it but i got the TJ07 instead, but it'll prolly be my first lian-li for sure.

it looks like you are using some G3/8 to G1/4 converters on your PA's, are they these part # 4860K657 from mcmaster? thanks

[fadetoblack]

thanks. yeah, it was down to the tj07 and this case for me as well. yes, those are the mcmaster reducers - i have a link to them in the first post

[mike8913]

have you considered doing a reverse flow in the case...having both rads blow out into the air would be better than having them suck in and also gives you negative pressure in the case. You might see a negligible rise in temperature of perhaps one degree, but far superior to what the motherboard temperature would probably be if you have all that heat dump going into the case. And plus, the way you have your fans oriented it works better anyway, you just have to reverse their flow and then you have pull through on the rads instead of forced air through like you original plan.

Thats what I would do, take it or leave it.

[Ashraf]

It's coming along great!

It doesn't even look like it is your first time modding.

[fadetoblack]

have you considered doing a reverse flow in the case...having both rads blow out into the air would be better than having them suck in and also gives you negative pressure in the case. You might see a negligible rise in temperature of perhaps one degree, but far superior to what the motherboard temperature would probably be if you have all that heat dump going into the case. And plus, the way you have your fans oriented it works better anyway, you just have to reverse their flow and then you have pull through on the rads instead of forced air through like you original plan.

Thats what I would do, take it or leave it.

yeah i wouldnt mind doing that, it would certainly help MB temps like you said. so in that case would i mount the fans on the 120.3 on top? the other thing is if i do that, there wont be any intake to the case other than the one hd cage fan. wouldn't that be a problem? thats why i was thinking of making one rad intake and the other exhaust but if you guys think both as exhaust works then thats great.

[mike8913]

you could mount the fans on top of the 120.3 or leave them as they are but pushing air up instead of down like you have them. pulling air through the rad would be more efficient but it's up to you. I would absolutely NOT run one of the rads as intake and the other as exhaust as you will basically negate any gains you got because you're now running exhausted air through already heated water that wants to be radiated into the air. You're temps will suffer greatly.

As far as flow inside the case is concerned with the way i suggested you shouldn't have anything to worry about. You're going to have a lot fo negative pressure , more exhaust then intake, which is good to remove heat. If it made you feel more secure you would be well served to cut a small intake port at the bottom of the case. You wouldn't even need a fan, just an opening with a filter to supply more airflow in the case.

[fadetoblack]

ok, sounds good. ill change it so the the 120.3 fans are on top of the rad, pulling air up - and the 120.2 fans same place but pulling air out also.

[manyga]

Nice mate!!

SUBSCRIBED!

Regards!

[mike8913]

by the way....you're cuts are flawless and you're attention to detail with installation has been inspiring.

[Ashraf]

Hm, nah.

If I were you, I'd leave them as they are and make one (or two) 120mm hole as exhaust air on the bottom of the case.

[mike8913]

if you do it that way, it will of course work, but not as efficiently because you will have recirculation of radiated air (heat rises or cold air is more dense if you liek physics). more is not always better...however, doing more with less, or efficiency as it were, is the key to any good heat removal system.

[fadetoblack]

by the way....you're cuts are flawless and you're attention to detail with installation has been inspiring.

wow, thanks man!

Hm, nah.

If I were you, I'd leave them as they are and make one (or two) 120mm hole as exhaust air on the bottom of the case.

hmm.. now im confused

[xTKxhom3r]

how much did the case run you?

[fadetoblack]

how much did the case run you?

$265 + 20 shipping from priceguidenetwork.com