Worklog: CM690 PA120.2 topmount

[Pisklink]

Hi all,

This is my first WC rig which means I'm still a newbie to watercooling. Since I'm planning to buy new hardware somewhere this spring/summer I started focusing on watercooling this new hardware. Because I'm still an apprentice I thought it would be smart to first practice with my old hardware in case something would go wrong. So I started to look for a new case and came across the Coolermaster CM690. I immediately got the idea of topmounting a rad in this case. I only had no idea how to do this or what watercooling hardware would be best to buy. Therefore, I started googling and found this forum, subscribed to it and here I am with my first worklog.

I think this site together with its members is a great place for finding detailed information on overclocking and everything related to it. Moreover, I want to especially thank Xilikon for helping me out in selecting WC hardware and giving advise in things that possibly are very obvious for experienced watercoolers. I settled with the following watercooling hardware which I received last week.

- D-Tek FuZion
- D-Tek Nozzle Kit
- Thermalright K8 - bolt-thru kit
- Laing D5 Vario
- Swiftech MCRES-MICRO
- ThermoChill PA120.2
- ThermoChill Shroud PA120.2
- Scythe S-FLEX SFF21F - 120 x 120 x 25 mm
- Papst 8412N/2GML - 80 x 80 x 25 mm
- Wormclamps - 12 / 20 mm. (steel)
- Tygon R-3603 7/16" ID with 10/16" OD

At this moment I will start with creating a single CPU loop and maybe expand this in the near future when I'm buying my new hardware. By then I think I will also watercool the NB (and maybe SB). When I want to watercool my vidcard I think I will mount another PA120.1 at the bottom.

Today me and my friend started to modify my CM690 case to make it possible to top mount the PA120.2. As you case see we did not remove the steel hyves between the shroud and the fans and used the removed mesh for covering the rad. I was wondering if this would not be to restrictive for air to flow through? Ofcourse if the mesh is to restrictive it can easily be removed and replaced by fanguards. However the steel hyves of the case itself is somewhat different and we didn't removed it to assure that the case as a whole is still strong enough when carried along to lan-parties. Although I think we did a pretty good job at modifying the case and mounting, I'm still interested in your advise and judgement about our piece of work. Sorry, for the bad picture quality.













UPDATE 7-18-2008

Last week I bought some new hardware which consisted of:

- Intel E8400
- Asus P5E3-Premium WiFi-AP@n
- 2Gb DDR3 OCZ Platinum XTC 1600Mhz (CL7)
- Sapphire HD4870 512Mb

Because I bought a Ati vidcard I planned on going a black and red colorscheme. Therefore I painted my case black and used red Fesser coolant. I also replaced the front standard blue led fan to a red one. As you can see in my new hardware list I still have a single loop setup with only cooling my CPU. I have temporarily decided not to expand this loop due to the extra costs and I thought it would not be necessary yet.

After 3 days of hard work this is my new rig. I hope you all like it.

















UPDATE 4-2-2009

I have an update on my rig. Changed some hardware to i7 and installed new reservoir in loop. Sorry, for bad pictures because it's hard to capture the red lightning with this ty camera. In real life it seems much more like the redlight district in my country except with one major difference that there isn't a girl waiting behind the glass.