Scratch Build – In Progress Project: Seawolf, July 20. #40 Getting ready for Assembly Summer 2010!

I love getting packages of parts in the post!

 

I'm curious how this will come out.

 

#5 Incoming

I love my postman!



Got some of that dual lock tape you guys recommended. Two packs in black and two packs in clear. Also got some mounting tape. Don't really know where I'm going to need it but I'm sure it'll come in handy.



I also got my order from Sidewinder Computers. First, a big pile of herbie clips.



Next, an emi filter for the power. I need the female connector so I figured one with a filter can't hurt.



Best of all, a spool of Tygon R-3400 1/2" ID 3/4" OD tubing and KwikCut hose cutter.



At last, a 1l bottle of Feser One UV black cooling fluid.

 

Are the chuck jaws in their right slots in the chuck? On the lathes at school it was important to put the nr I jaw in the nr I slot, nr II in slot II and nr III in slot III. If inserted into the wrong slots, it would cause the piece to wobble.

It's going to be very interesting to see what the case will look like! Keep up the good work! *subscribed*

 

I marked the jaws and their positions the first time I took them off. Thanks for watching!

 

Wow, it's the "velcro" I told you, try it and you will love it eternally
I'm so curious to see your wc setup, I love Tygon, I've used it in my last mod, it's the top for me, good choiche!

 

The dual lock seems interesting. It's surprisingly easy to push together and mildly hard to pull apart. What surprised me most is that the clear dual lock seems to be more "stiff" than the black one!

As for the watercooling, at the moment I'm planning on making a custom reservoir and cpu block. For the gpu, I'll probably get a full cover EK-block. The fittings and tubing are amazing and I'm hoping to get other components to match. Stay tuned.

 

If anyone wants to slate me for what im about to say feel free, but please note that I am speaking from recent experience and am merely throwing my two cents into this log...

Also, I havent read the log, just the last post about you getting more and more stuff in the post! I see you have got the swiftech style (as we call em) or herbie (as theyre commonly known) clips for your water cooling hoses, and wanted to advise you not to use them for your project... They seem good and I still maintain that most of the time they do a great job of holding hose in place, but I've just had a really bad leak in our new 2009 i7 based demo PC which has a tri- loop w/c system connected with tygon 1/2" R3603 clamped in place with these clips. The three loops are driven by Laing D5 vario pumps, and the pressure in them can be quite high compared to larger loop systems. The loop that we had cooling the chipset on the motherboard was the one that failed, it seems to have been quite a slow leak and theres so much in the case that its hard to see a little dribble of coolant running down the motherboard! After closer inspection and lots of leak testing, im positive that the clip wasnt holding the hose around the barb tight enough (it was completely tightened, we clamp them with pliers) and the coolant just forced a little track out past the seal. Its taken a week to dismantle the rig and find the problem, and with our schedule getting busier and busier, it looks like its going to take about a month just to rebuild it again.

I'll be using Jubilee clips this time tbh... and winding them down on the hoses so tight the barbs will almost be at breaking point


Feel free to disregard this advice, I know that the black plastic clips look a lot better than chrome/ nickel plated jubilee clips but the important thing is the integrity of the loops that cool your hardware...

Matt

 

That's a serious advice. I'll try them out when I get to the leak-test - phase and if they don't fly I'll switch to jubilee clips.

 

Yeah, I would use worm-drive clamps if you're worried about it, or compression fittings if you don't like the look of worm-drives.

BTW, I really like this mod. And the toaster is cool!

 

+1
mmm, compression fittings sexyness

 

#6 PSU once more

Got some more work done on the PSU.



Today's goal was to make some 20mm holes for the white switches I got earlier. Measuring and marking their correct place was a task of its own. You never would guess how hard this is on a curved surface! To make things worse, I didn't really have any good reference point from which to measure.



I didn't have suitable 20mm drills so I had to improvise. I used my Dremel to cut diagonal cuts which I them punched in.



To get the holes nice, tidy and correct size I had to do lots of grinding. And by lots I mean it took hours on my cordless Multipro! These bits were new when I started. Bill Owen just posted those instructional videos on Dremel cutting and there he states that cordless rotary tools don't have enough power. I don't agree. There is plenty of power. The problem is rather in the ridiculous time the batteries hold the power! 5 minutes of heavy cutting in stainless is enough to drain most of the juices.



After an eternity of switching battery packs, this was the result. Those irregularities in the hole shape are intentional. They are there to allow a small plastic tab in the side of the switch to slide in place. One of them is on the wrong side. (The one which doesn't show well from this angle)



The white switches sit beautifully flush on the curved surface. On the camera it seems like there are black shadows here and there, but in person they are not visible. The angle of the switches is intentional.



For the next operation I had to move to a cleanroom environment: the kitchen. I pried the zip tie mounts off and peeled the adhesive gunk. Luckily, it didn't leave a residue. On the horizon, you can see a bag of toast.



Next step was to clean the shell. It was first wiped with acetone, then washed in water and finally placed in the oven @ 50C for a while to dry.

I put those dual-lock pads on the mouting blocks and positioned the other ones on the shell itself. I used good 1 inch squares to ensure good grip. The squares were a bit larger than the blocks, but later this turned out to help taking them apart with pliers.

The dual-lock pads were covered in tape to keep them clean from paint. I didn't want to risk finding out their staying power diminishes when painted. Better to be safe than sorry.



The paint is a cheap matt black Maston.



Here is the first thin coat of paint. I painted the insides with 4 coats. The painting wasn't absolutely necessary, but I wanted to make the insides sexy. Just in case I wan't to make the window ModMinded suggested.



There are small scratches and blemishes here and there because I didn't sand the surface. The paint feels quite a bit like the one on the original Corsair psu case!

The dual-lock was a brilliant solution to this mounting thinga-majik! At first I had my doubts, but now I'm completely won over. Thanks to you guys the psu now sits safely in its crib and I can take it out if it needs to be serviced.

I'm planning on taking a small break from the neverending PSU fiddling. Next time, I'll show you something else. Hopefully it's going to be interesting!

 

Soo f***ing sexy this coat of black inside!
Good job, Javerh, I'm happy that you find useful the dual-lock, are you gonna to be dual-lock-addicted like me?
Now I've found an industry supplier that sells the dual-lock in roll of 10 meters, I'm gonna buy two or three spool

 

Yeah! I'm already thinking about all the places I can use this stuff. Unfotunately, I only have 20 inches of the stuff left!

 

I'd be carefull, with that Feser uv black coolant, i have two litres and its not uv clear, under a black light its grey, i just switched to distilled water and my temps went down 10C

 

I've only heard good reviews of the Feser fluids. Good thing I'm not planning on using any UV-lights. I'm satisfied with a black color under normal lights. Plain water is always the best cooling fluid. I wouldn't dare to run a system without additives though. Not only the algae, but all systems have some amounts of differing metals in the loop.

 

Been following this for a while and I still have no idea on what the case will look like... Nice attention to detail Looking forward to see more of this.

 

#7 The radiator has seen the light

I got a bit carried away and did some more work.



Went to get a new ccfl tube to replace the broken one. While there at the shop, I also bought four Scythe Slip Stream 1200 fans. They're rated 68.5 cfm @ 24dB.



As a change of pace, I wanted to mod my radiator a bit. If I remember right it was a Alphacool NexXxoS Extreme 2 when I bought it years ago. Actually it hasn't looked like this since 2006!



Almost right after I bought the thing eons ago, I chopped it in half with a hacksaw. In anticipation of this mod of course. The fan mounts were also taken out way back for some modding.



The sawing only opened the big chamber at the bottom and ripped one set of cooling fins off. The tubes are perfectly preserved. Deviously cunningly I chopped the rad from the middle so that the upper chambers are still sealed.
This thing has plenty of heavy duty solder smudged everywhere. When I last tested it, it didn't start to melt before reaching good 400C! This lead me to believe that the following would work!



First things first. I cut some slots with a cutting disc. It sinks right in like a hot knife in butter. The brass shell is easy to bend with just fingers.



I bent the tab away and ripped the rad a new one. Looks horrible!



Then I just sanded it a bit and polished with dremel's wire brush. Now when you bend the edges of the tab properly and pop a fitting right in...



The gaping holes still need to be filled. Thus introducing problemsolvers Mr. Acid Flux and Mr. Pipe Solder.



My soldering station reaches the required temperatures easily. Although, the soldering iron tip is awful at conducting that heat to the required area.



This shows the first go with the pipe solder. All of the biggest gaps are filled. Leaks are guaranteed.



Next go and some filing to help level the top. Looks a bit better, but still won't do.



Third time's the charm. This time I used normal electronic solder to fill the small gaps and holes. It melts at 190C so it doesn't affect the pipe solder that starts to melt at ~400C. There are still some irregularities but it is leak proof with an o-ring on!

 

#7 never ends



The result is two new fittings where there were none! What's most amazing is that they both are at the approximately same angle. And they don't leak. By the way, the fittings worked as self-tapping screws. With some elbow grease the sharp steel fitting threads plowed into the softer solder and brass walls.



Next were the newly (not really) formed end walls. I quickly levelled them with the dremel and a flat file. I cut a suitable rectangle from 0.2mm brass sheet and sanded it nice and clean. Then I applied a liberal dose of flux and joined the pieces together and warmed the soldering iron.



The edges pulled the solder neatly into the thin cavity. The flux makes nice teapot sounds in the rad when heated. The only problem area is right next to the water tubes. The way I went, the largest sheep overlap was near the tubes. It was hard to reach in well enough. That is when most of the solder buildup on top of the plate got there.



After some filing and cleaning of the new plates and solders, I had this.



The new fans will fit over the radiator(s) like this. The fans will push half of the air through the radiators and straight out of the case from the sides. The rest of the air will flow straight to cool the motherboard and PSU.

The gap is bound to pose problems. Because the fans are so close to the radiators, there will be a pressure differential between the rads and the open air. This will make a flapping sound whenever a fan blade crosses the edge. Which is 2400 times per minute at 1200 rpm! To solve this I will need put some type of a filter in the gap. As a bonus, the filter should keep the dust out!

The optimal solution is some kind of rectangular (240x120mm) foam or mesh that has the same air flow resistance as the radiators. Do you guys have any ideas?



Finally, I did some leaktesting. I sacrificed a pair of waterproof silicon earplugs to plug the new bottom holes and filled the rads with water.



As expected there was a small leak. It was where I expected it to be. On one rad there is a gap somewhere in that red oval between the original wall and the new sheet. It's nothing major, I'll fix it when I have the time. Overall, I'm really satisfied at the moment. Unless the solder deteriorates in the near future, I'll just pop some bondo over the solder, sand it down and give the rads a new coat of paint.

 

I had to solder a TINY leak on a car radiator before. It was a pain in the *ss, so I'm really impressed with your work.
-and my radiator still leaks.