Case Mod - In Progress The Powerful Pretty Pink Processor (aka, "The PPPP")

what blocks will you get for them ? I think they are not in reference design anymore, aren't they?

I still need to deside which Tis I will choose for my rig. Therefore I try to get as much input as I can

 

man I wish I were your wife! wait...

 

This is an EK sponsored build.....so all blocks will be EK. Which is how it should be.

 

haha!
I've just finished reading your other build log. I think my eyes are now bleeding but it was definitely worth it!

 

Well that is nice to here that Ek is gracies again

Just saw you BBBBB on fb Asus wrote a small article of it over there black beauty

 

That one takes awhile to get through.....congratulations.

I saw that! Probably because they are a major sponsor of the PPPP.....driving a little traffic to it. I'll take it!

 

Trying out a couple of options on sleeving the fans. I'll be using the same approach as the BBBB....where all fans will have the power cord shortened significantly. I like to run custom power harnesses to each fan. It can be cleaner looking to wire all the individual fans together into one cable that runs to the power source....but this creates a nightmare if you have a fan go out or want to take an individual fan off to lube. The way I do it leaves all fans with the option to be removed individually from the build and/or replaced. The custom power harnesses shouldn't ever have to change.....so less chance of rewiring work this way.

The stock cabling on the Corsair fans isn't bad. It's the flat cable type. But naturally I'll be putting sleeve on this while I shorten it.....

Here is a pic of the black Telios on the fans, with wires cut to 4 inches....





This length lets me bend the connection around the corner of the fan....





...as well as around the top. Plenty of options for where the power harnesses will connect....





And of course I also have the option of the custom dyed pink Telios and pink fan connectors...







It really is an almost perfect match for the powder coat on the case. I'll be doing my full dye job on the white Telios sometime this next week.











I just need to decide if I want to keep the fans all black with the sleeving and connectors....or use the pink for some contrast. All black would be kind of stealth mode....since the inside of the case is black. The fan cabling would disappear into the black rads and black case interior. Or.....should I use the pink sleeving and fan connectors for some pop on the contrast.

I'm definitely going to use some of the pink Telios on the 24pin and 8pin connectors. Just need to decide what to do with the fan cabling. What would you do?

 

I definitely prefer the black fan cables and connectors. Good job on the shrink job on both ends, very cleanly done.

 

I'm leaning towards black also. Don't want to over use pink inside the case.

The heatshrink was the stuff from Lutro0 Customs....and I liked it a lot. I prefer both the sleve and the heatshrink to what I've used from MDPC-X.

I can't say the same for the fan terminals I got from Lutro0. Those were horrible how they came apart from the metal connectors. Basically had to trim each one after breaking it off. I'll post some pictures later...

 

Got some work done on my fans today. I like to pick one step and perform it for all the fans, and then start on the next step for all the fans, ...etc, instead of working and completing one fan at a time. Here are the steps I got done tonight.

I started with my stack of fans. A manageable stack......17 of them in all that still need some love. I sacrificed a few to paint samples, and have ended up with the exact number I need of the SP120's, and I have 2 extra AF120's. Although....I may find a spot to use these before I'm done.





Anyway, the first thing I need to do is remove all the stickers from the fans. That white serial/lot number sticker is what caught my eye first. They all were very easy to remove and peeled off leaving no residue.....





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





Next step was was to remove the sticker from the fan blades. I won't end up using any stickers at all on the fan blades. To me, when there is a sticker on a spinning fan blade, it always makes it look off or out of balance. It's almost impossible to get it perfectly centered on all sides...so when it spins it just looks "off". So...my blades will be naked. They like it that way. I used a touch of heat from my heat gun, and then these stickers pulled right off leaving no residue.






Ahhhhh. That's better.





Next step was to remove the sticker from the frame. Again, I had to use a touch of heat....but once I did the sticker pulled right off leaving no reside. Now....I WILL put a sticker on the fan frame. It just doesn't look finished without out. But...just like I did in the BBBB, I'll make some custom vinyl stickers in the build's colors for these spots.





Naked for now.....





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





Next step was to shorten the cables coming out of the fan. I already knew from my sample fan that 4 inches would leave the fan connector at the perfect spot where I could either wrap it just around the bottom of the fan frame, or just around the side. Short enough where it's out of the way....but long enough to go where it needs to go. So I just got a ruler, measure 4 inches from the wire's origination in the fan frame, and snipped them right off.





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





I went ahead and removed the black fan connectors from my snipped wires. I won't use them in this build. For this build, I'm using connectors supplied by Lutro0 Customs. But....you can't ever have too many black fan connectors....so I rescued them and through them in my supply drawer.





Next step was to remove the plastic accent rings from the Corsair fans. I'll paint these all pink, so I just need to get them out of the way for now. Oh...and by the way....Jenn chose the all black fans, with the pink accent ring. So....I think that was fan option #1 when we did the color combinations for everyone.





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





Next step was to cut a piece of sleeve to use on the fans. I knew that if I cut a 3.75 inch piece of Black Telios, that it was going to fit perfect. So, I got out my ruler, and started snipping pieces.





After each cut, I'd go ahead and use a lighter to burn the ends just a little and taper them in. Don't want them start unraveling....





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





Next step was to cutt a small piece of heatshrink to use on the end that attaches to the fan motor. So I got out my Lutro0 Customs jig, and started playing with it again. But even after trying multiple blades, I still couldn't get nice straight cuts the majority of the time.





But then I switched over to using scissors with the jig....and it worked perfectly for me. The jig still was doing the measuring for me, and I just kept pushing the shrink up so it was flush with the edge....and then cutting with scissors. Very easy. I now love my jig.





I ended up with a pile of perfectly sized and exactly the same size pieces of shrink to use on the motor side of the cable...





....and I went ahead and slipped on the sleeve and the shrink to each fan cable. I didn't use any heat because I didn't want to shrink the heatshrink yet....because I knew I would be wiggling the sleeve around a lot still while I put on terminals.....




Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





Next step was to put the fan terminals on.....so first I took the fan cable and separated the ribbon style cables into three distinct pieces.




To strip the insulation, I first tried my handy dandy Knipex wire strippers I got from Lutro0 Customs. But alas, even though the Knipex strippers work perfectly on the 16 AWG wire I have....they don't work on this thin 26 AWG fan wire. Too thin....wouldn't cut the insulation all the way through. I think the take-away lesson here....is that strippers work better on chubby things. Wait....that didn't sound right.

So instead, I used my old fashioned wire strippers. Still worked just fine. But not as fun....





Then I attempted to put on the fan terminals. Before I go any further, I have to point out the issues I had with the female fan terminals I got from Lutro0 Customs. I don't know if you can see it in this picture, but zoom in and you'll see that the terminals are attached to the metal strip up by the tips of the terminals.





So....when you break them off of the strip, it leaves a portion of the strip attached to the fan terminal itself. It is absolutely unusable in this condition. The terminal won't even fit in a fan connector with this much extra stuff hanging off the sides. To get these to fit...I had to use a pair of flush cutters, and snip off the excess material on each and every terminal. Clearly I wasn't going to do that for long. Not sure what's up with these terminals. I'll ask Lutro0 and see if I'm just missing something....or if this was a strange batch that he purchased. But I couldn't get them to work.





So....I opted for some old fan terminals I'd gotten from Frozen during my last build. They worked just fine.





The Lutro0 crimper does work flawlessly and is an excellent tool. Perfect crimps almost every time....





Then I slipped a connector on the terminals....





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looked like this.





Time to use the heatgun on that little piece of shrink I had initially put on down by the fan motor end of the cable. After this, I went ahead and tucked the sleeved cable underneath the plastic tabs on the frame....designed to hold the cable in place.





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





Next, I needed some larger pieces of SATA size shrink for the connector end of the wire. Got out my jig again, adjusted the size, and used my scissors to quickly create just the right number of pieces.





Then I went ahead and slipped the shrink over the connector end of the wire, and applied some heat. The Lutro0 Customs shrink is really nice and shrunk down in a real nice way and looks very attractive.





Rinse. Repeat. And now my stack looks like this.





I'm done for the night.....but don't have much left for the fans. All I need to do is paint the accent rings pink, and then make the custom vinyl stickers. Should get to that this week.....

 

Diggin all the photo's Chris

nice work on the fans

 

Really nice sleeving Job.

Sometimes I hate Sleeving. I just sleeved all of my 24 Fans for my rig and never thought on using big shrinks for the connector side :facepalm:

Well it looks allround but yours look way better, prob will redo my ones agian

 

Thanks Fuzzy! Do you spend more time here, or on OCN?

Hate to be the cause for more work....but hope you enjoy. As long as you have at least 3:1 shrink ratio, the SATA shrink does a nice job at covering where the fan connectors and sleeving meet.

 

such a cool project chris. That color is just awesome.
love the photo work.. fantastic presentation.

 

Thanks Hanoverfist! I still don't think the wife-y knows how great a machine she is getting here....

 

Did some work on painting the fan accent rings today.....

Started with two light coats of this plastic primer. About 15 minutes inbetween coats...and then waited about 2 hours before continuing on with the paint.





For the paint, I'm again using the Medium Magenta from Liquitex. If you are trying to match a certain color and need rattle cans....definitely look into Liquitex. Sold at Michael's. Tons of colors and the finish is incredible. I'm going to alternate coats between these two colors. The medium magenta is real close to my case color...but it gets a little dark when multiple coats are applied. To counteract this, I'm going to use a slightly lighter color inbetween my medium magenta coats.





First coat of Medium Magenta....





Second coat of the lighter color (Magenta 6)....





...and a third and final coat of the Medium Magenta.





I'm going to let these dry overnight, and then I'll do a light coat of clear protection on top tomorrow.

 

you are so patient and meticulous! it's quite impressive

 

This is the sealer I put on this morning. Just one coat.





They looked pretty darn good out in the garage.....





....but I took some pictures of them on the computer so you could see how close the color match came. It's darn near perfect!











I was also quite pleased at how flexible the paint stayed. The rings have to flex a little bit to get them in and out of the fans. Since the Liquitex is acrylic paint in a spray can....it's finish is very flexible. Suffer through this short 7 second video for proof on the flexibility.



http://youtu.be/G6SqrktgFSA



I'll finish up the custom vinyl stickers shortly....and then take some better shots of the finished fans.

 

Package from Solvenia! The new EK Ascendacy!!














Sample unit that I'm going to play with and push it to it's limits. Should be fun.....