Case Mod - In Progress HP Blackbird 002

Coolputer was bought by Jimm's PC store. I'm not sure what happened to the store itself but the selection of products moved to Jimm's online store... or some of it

This summer I live with my parents in Porvoo because my summer job is here. My actual residence is in Vaasa where I study at the university.

And since I'm uni student it means I'm always short on money . That's why I try to make my current project cheaply without sacrificing quality of my work. So water cooling is coming if I have money left. Oh well, there's allways new projects and new ways to cool them

 

Yeah, I saw Jimm's is now the owner of this. Wonder what happened to Miska and Arve and the guys

But, enjoy your project, I will keep an eye on it also - you're doing a nice job there - and no worries, somehow a lot of us were all students once, so we know where you are coming from. Key point is to enjoy what you are doing

ps: Enjoy mid-summer, the second one (also last year) where you're having fantastic weather - really glad for you) - and don't drink to much of the good old Salmiakki Kossu :rofl:

 

Hello everyone,
Ah, good news. My Wife has just informed me my PMP-400 heatsinks have arrived - yeay - now I can finalise my water-loop, and get those 2x DDC3.25's into action.

Post pics soon!!

Then, been to and fro wrt my PSU, and sleeving et al -> well, here's the idea:

Ordered the following from HobbyKing, for a total of $198-, and then $48 for shipping - high quality very flexible/soft/noodle-like silicone wire - on the 16AWG wire, there's something like 660 very fine strands making up the core......

Nice.

9680 Turnigy Pure-Silicone Wire 16AWG (1mtr) BLACK 100M
9654 Turnigy Pure-Silicone Wire 20AWG (1mtr) Black 50M
10936 Turnigy Pure-Silicone Wire 24AWG (1mtr) Black 50M

So, what a I going to do with this -> well, I considered all sorts of modular PSU's out there, but, just could not get it over my heart to dump my 5 year old PC Power&Cooling 1KW, 3x 12V rail TurboCool unit. We all know they are not modular, and the cables they come with are of a good quality, but really stiff....and difficult to work with in the confines of a PC, especially the BlackBird setup.

So, I will completely rewire this old stalwart with even better quality, but super-fexible, high-temp (yeah-yeah, I know) silicone wire. Color=black, black,back.

Let's see if I will still need sleeving afterwards, I doubt it, as this cable will look very good, and server-like - it has a real thick silicone jacket, and will fill the ATX- and other Molex connectors very nicely.

Order will arrive within next 2 weeks or so......

Exciting times ahead for my dear PSU, so all old cables will be desoldered, and new ones fitted, and tailored to exact length for this setup. Told you the wiring was going to be special

I will post a few pics of the pumps and new heatsinks tonight.

 

So your making completely new cables for the PSU out of ultra flexible wire? Awesome! Flexible wire makes a huge difference in ease of use, I use nothing but when I make my own ausio cables.

 

Yes Mate, that's it It's very similar to the real high-spec multimeter probe cables, or, as you have noticed, high-spec audio cables

Will go pretty well with what I have planned. So, probably the only thing I can do to improve on the impressive design PC P&C power supply.

Plus, it will compliment the mod, so it's an added bonus.

 

Nice find. Too bad the colors are limited. Sleeving shouldn't be necessary. If they get uppity, some black tubing coils would work better.

 

@ Cheapskate: Yeah, I am pretty happy with finally getting some high-quality spaghetti-noodles Sleeving will make things to bulky, and with this, it will have a neat appearance, plus be easily routable. will keep you posted, now the waiting starts....

ps: Luv your BlooBalls project, Mate, absolutely georgious!

 

Hello Everyone,
A few pics of my recently arrived hardware - first up, the 2 Aquagrafix in-line temp sensors - one will be installed on the rad inlet, the other on the rad outlet. Would give a good indicator of hot-side and cold-side water temps.



Then, the new PMP-400 heatsinks, one for each pump:



and



and then, to allow me to fit these to the pumps, and installing them on the RP-401X2 reservoir, I need to fab 2x new mid-plates, one for each pump - these are the culprits, and short of totally butchering them, they won't fit - I knew this, so got some nice 2mm thick aluminium which will become new midplates.



And all together, before modding - I will finish the plates, and water-loop setup on Saturday. Will post more updates then....



and then, something different - my Supermicro X7DWA-N motherboard has only a single dual-internal USB header, and seeing I need at least 2x, one for the Koolance TMS-200 controller, and the other for the Blackbird multi-card reader, I decided to get this - will work really well, be out of the way, and still give me a good few extra internal headers and ports:



Talk soon again

 

Where did you get those temp sensors mate? They look to be very good, not a flow killer like most others. May come in handy for my loop.

 

TKR - The Kool Room in Oz

They are not restricting flow at all, no reduction in ID from component to component....

You will only need one though, as your water-temp will reach a point of equilibrium after 20-40 minutes, depending on load, and water-volume. There will be but a very small delta-T across inlet-outlet of the radiator, so......

 

Great pics on the duel pump/reservoir bay. I love the look of it and keeps things very tidy indeed

 

Tomorrow is the big day, with lots and lots to do - a short summary:

1) Remove existing pumps
2) Remove tubing
3) Remove motherboard
4) Remove Radiator.
5) Remove old pumps
6) Remove SAS cage

7) Make new base-plate for the Koolance TMS-200 controller and mount it where where existing pumps are located, in empty space above the SAS drive-cage -> important, as I need to route all sleeved cables to here. Reason TMS-200 won't be mounted in empty PCI-slot, well, I have a very nice SCSI controller, driving my external DLT VS160 Tape backup device, which needs to be mounted in the one PCI-X 64 slot.
8) Fit TMS-200 to allocated position.
9) Sleeve and fit new NoiseBlocker Fans to the radiator, as well as the drive-bay fans.
10) Make new mid-plates for PMP-400 heatsinks, and fit to pumps.
11) Mount pumps, and locate a temp-sensor to each pump
12) Sleeve pumps, temp-sensors and route cables to TMS-200
13)Fit radiator, and route fan-cables to TMS-200
14)Fit motherboard, drive-controllers, as well as SAS drive-cage.
15) Refit tubing, and redo to accommodate new pumps/reservoir.

16) Leaktest/dry-runs.
17) 20h00 tomorrow-evening - fire up the system.

Awaiting new SuperFlex silicone wire, so rewiring of the PSU will commence once that arrives. Also, a MAte of mine is in South-Africa, and I've asked him to bringback 500 cable-tie mounts, black, 20x14mm low-profile - will work out about $50 AUD, as opposed to big-bucks buying those from mod-shops. They will be just in time to finish of the wiring/cabling.

Above just for my own benefit to keep track of what needs to be done, please ignore this rantings of a madman

 

Thanks buddy, I'll take a look at them, have used them before (TKR that is).

 

No worries, I noted these were out of stock a few days ago though, might be a while before they get them back in.

Anyway, I got up early to tackle this system today, so, off to my office (where I have a very decent bench-vice on a sturdy work-bench) to go and make the new mid-plates for the PMP-400 heatsinks. Will post pics tonight sometime, as I have lots to do today.

Talk soon.

 

Hello Guys,
Jeesh, been a long day yesterday, these mid-plates are not that easy to make, a fair bit of precision-measurement, and filing, to get everything just right.

I ended up making 2 sets, the first ones had one of the mounting-holes off-center by a 1mm, and, because the usecountersunk screws, well, just say after me speaking in languages, I decided to redo them - 4 hours wasted, down the drain

But, as they say, where there is a will, there is a way.....all holes drilled, 8 small ones tapped to 3mmx0.5, and the larger ones countersunk. Fits 100% on the pumps...and came rather sassy mounted to the res.

A single photo of my first attempt, with the heatsink sitting on the new mid-plate, which was still in early stages...



Next follows the second attempt, following a different methodlogy.

Here I am cutting them out of 2mm aluminium plate....pre-drilled, tapped et al...



Post-cut, and ready for my various fine-tooth files....



Showing how far heatsinks protrude above the pumps, pretty slimline...



And a few other angles, I think it looks pretty decent...



and



and a last one, showing how a stock 60mmx25mm fan sits on the heatsink - just for those who are considering something similar, the fan fits perfectly, even the mounting-holes are aligning 100% -> I will need to get slimline 60mmx10mm fans - they will also be controlled by the TMS-200, but probably overkill.....



More pics later, I need to sleeve pump-cables now....

 

Hello Again,
A final Sunday-evening update.

Removed the old pumps, a very decent combo in itself, connected to a Watercool dual-DDC top, and then being fed from a BP 5.25" reservoir - not to bad a setup, but, the new Koolance reservoir with 'integrated pumps' will give me a cleaner solution overall, and simplify routing of tubing.

First shot:



and here a shot of the bottom, showing the decent 'Bei Fei' heatsinks I fitted earlier.



The area indicated by the red arrow was where the old BP reservoir resided, and in blue, where the pumps used to live, immediately above the SAS drive-cage....



As mentioned earlier, the TMS-200 controller will be mounted in this now-vacant pump-space, as I would rather use the slot vacated by the TMS-200 to remount my SCSI VS160 Tape-drive controller....plus, mounting the TMS-200 in the old pump-location, will make for very easy, and tidy routing of fan/temp/flow/pump wiring....

This is where the controller will go:



and here....



well, I had to fab a mounting-base that would slide into the nominated area, fortunately, there are guides on which the old, original HP SATA harddrives used to slide in on - this will now assist locating the new TMS-200 mounting-base....

Here is the setup...



and controller mounted, I used the very handy RivNuts as standoffs, works like a dream....



and



and finally, into postion - I will fab a very small retainer clip to prevent it from sliding out, but, it is a tight-fit, and it cant go anywhere. It may seem like insignificant progress, but, now this controller is in place, I can start to measure all fans/pumps et al wire-lengths, and sleeve and route wiring.

Getting there

 

Looking good!

We finally made it home, so I can look at putting up my log. However, I don't think I'm gonna rewire my PSU like that. I have other tricks up my sleeve.

 

Thanx Kayin, appreciate your feedback.

Yep, awaiting the new superlflex wiring - I could do a fair bit custom-fabbing new pcb's etc, and make a very nice power distribution system, but, one big aim for this mod is to keep things practical too - in a next mod I will do some customization of power distribution, but not this one....

Can hardly wait to see what you have planned.

 

Good progress today:

1) Some of my superflex wiring has arrived - the 24AWG for fans etc. Well, I rewired and sleeved the 2x NoiseBlockers on the rad, as well as the drive-bay Noiseblocker. Fitted the fans, and re-mounted the rad, and adjusted cable-lengths and routed wiring to the TMS controller.

2) Sleeved the pumps.

3) Made up 5x new temp sensors for the TMS-200, and routed them to the TMS controller - 1x Chipset, 1x FB-Dimm, 1x SAS Controller, 1x Ambient Air and 1x Water senors.

4) Finally fitted the new res/pump combo, and finalised new tubing runs.

Did water-runs, and yes, the RP-401X2 is not the easiest to prime, but at least in the vertical configuration I have mounted it, a lot easier than the boys with default setups.

All good, and system working again - one big annoyance, the TMS-200 software doesn't start in Server 2008. I hope Tim at Koolance will have the software-boys address this issue, as it's a serious flaw.

Yep, tried the latest V2.30 release from their site....

So, with the inability to configure the sensors, had a very annoying alarm, triggered by the SAS controller temp - saw this once I connected the Controller to my Laptop via USB, and setup the software there, which allowed me to reconfigure all settings for the controller.

IMHO, I think the mCubed bigNG is a much better device, as at first glance, the Koolance doesn't allow you to predefine control-curves, which the bigNG does.

Ah well, will see how this goes, might revert back to the bigNG - just a damn pity the sensors will have to be rewired, as the Koolance uses 100kOhm thermistors, vs the 10kOhm's of the mCubed.

Will post pics later.

 

Nice stuff. I think you just gave me a use for a stack of P4 heatsinks too.
Wait, Tape drive? I thought keeping a floppy drive was bad, but..