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New WC rig complete. PICS!

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MoreGooder

Member
Joined
Dec 13, 2003
Location
Saint Louis, MO USA
Hey peeps!

Well, my 2nd WC'ing rig is finally complete.

This involved a case mod, but I'm sure it has probably been done before. I purchased a second case exactly like my main rig, chopped the bottom half off, and installed all of my water cooling schtuff inside.

The cases are both Ahanix Platinum XP's. It's a great case, especially because of the stealth CD rom covers. The only complaint I had for the case was that the inside paint color was a drab gray, and not very consistent.

I took both cases completely apart by drilling out the rivets with a 1/8" drill. That was easy. The hard part was painting. You have to "deglaze" the surface of the old paint so that the new can stick. You can do that with either steel wool or sand paper. I chose 220 grit. Worked well, but it took hours to get the paint roughed up in all of the nooks and crannies. The final finish is two coats each of black automotive body primer and black camouflage paint. This provided a more durable paint finish than I anticipated. Yes, it does scratch, but so does any paint out of a can from the hardware store. Unless you can bake it on, it's not as durable as factory paint.

The two cases were riveted back together with a hand rivet tool from Home Depot and aluminum rivets. Piece of cake!

Anyway, as you can see from the picks below, having a duplicate half-case on top makes for a few nice features:

  • The water cooling is compartmentalized. There's no air flow between the main case and the WC half-case.
  • The top and bottom look identical in color and finish.
  • In the event of a minor leak (drips or dribbles), the water will be contained in the WC half-case.
  • And lastly, it looks better than my previous arrangement, and serves as a great conversation piece.

Specs:

Water loop:
Typhoon res from Voyeurmods.com
MAG 3 pump, inverted so that it's sitting on its rump.
Chevette Heater Core (also painted black)
Swiftech MCW5002
Switech MCW50
then back to the res.

A bit more info about the pump use: That's a MAG 3 sitting on its end, with the power cord dropped through a strategically located hole. The inlet of the pump is used as a male barb. I used 1 inch diameter Tygoon tubing from McMaster. Now, one thing I realized is that because of the draft angle used during the molding of the pump's impeller housing, the 1 inch ID tubing would just walk off of the inlet as I tightened down the hose clamp. To solve that problem, I used two bungee cords draped across the 1 inch ID "T" fitting. (See picks below). There's plenty of downward force from the bungee to tighten down the clamp without the tube slipping off.

At the input of the "T" fitting is two 90° elbows. Yeah, I know, 90's aren't ideal, but these are 1/2" barb on one end and 1" NPT thread on the other, making these less restrictive than normal 1/2" barbs. The two 90's are connected to the water res. The idea is to increase flow by decreasing restriction into the pump.

There's so much flow in the res that despite having only a few bubbles in the res it sounds like a babbling brook. Kinda nice actually, but could get old eventually. Maybe I'll try to squeeze some more water inside to see if that helps.

Ok, well next comes the pics. Feedback welcome of course.
 
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Here's a pick of the rig with all of the covers off. I left the top cover of the WC'ing section loose so I can service the system.
 

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Detail view of the WC schtuff: (Note blue bungee cords attached to pump and draped across that huge T fitting. Provides downward pressure to keep hose from coming off)
 

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MameXP said:
how does it perform?

Ahhh.... Good question:

Relative to ambient temperature in my room, the CPU is 4°C higher while folding all day long. The temps did go down a bit from my old rig, but only about 2°C. That's because of the particular waterblock I'm using. It provides about the same cooling impact across a wide flow rate range. Of course, if I had a White Water or a Cascade I would have seen a larger improvement over my previous arrangement.

So, right now.... 26°C room 30°C CPU, running Folding@Home.
 
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Oh, I forgot to post a pic of the back of the rig. Note the large 120mm fan on top. That's the output of the rear fan. Just on the other side of that fan is the radiator, and on the inside is another fan, thus providing the push-pull fan arrangement that many folks use.
 

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that looks great i was thinking of putting a rad alog each side of a box like that. then the pump in the middle and the res at the end it will be tight but i think that it will work very well.
 
Looks great MoreGooder,

That is really a nice looking setup. I don't think I would take the time to do it right. Nice work.

BTW.... Looks very tall and thin. What's the tippablilty factor? :)
 
SOShootME said:
Looks great MoreGooder,

That is really a nice looking setup. I don't think I would take the time to do it right. Nice work.

BTW.... Looks very tall and thin. What's the tippablilty factor? :)

The whole machine is riveted together as one unit. It is top heavy. However, the base of it is still pretty wide, and it feels very stable. One would have to purposefully tip it, barring an earthquake. I have positioned it flush with the side of my desk though just in case. Besides , it's almost as tall as my desk and serves as a bit more desk space. Bonus! I think I'll put my phone on top.

Hummmm..... I wonder which I'd rescue first in the event of a disaster: Important documents or my piece of art I use as a PC. It would be a tough decision.
 
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Dukemurmur said:
that looks great i was thinking of putting a rad alog each side of a box like that. then the pump in the middle and the res at the end it will be tight but i think that it will work very well.

It appears to be a tight fit, but in reality there's plenty of room for air to move about inside. For serviceability I have purposefully left the top of the system unriveted. It just pops off, revealing all the water cooling goodness inside.

I highly recommend this mod if you are thinking of an external water cooling rig that doesn't look external. My picture quality doesn't do this thing justice at all. If you do this mod you will see just how nice it looks too. I think it would work for any type of ATX case, not just mine. Just gotta be slow with your Dremill and your Jigsaw.
 
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