Project Bulletproof Eclipse -Phoenix from the ashes:Project Resumed-

Right then, so you all remember how I said I couldnt find the water cooling kit in the UK, or any of the additional components that I need? Well, after literally months of waiting (Ive been after one since christmas!), I have finally got my hands on the whole of the water cooling loop. The main problem was that no company would stock the apex ultra plus kit in case it never sold, due to its massive price tag. Shipping on the item from the US to UK was 150-199 everywhere I looked. Eventually though, tekheads kindly supplied me with one, along with a waterchill single 120mm radiator from asetek. The repack reservoir was bought in new condition off ebay. The whole thing actually arrived last Thursday, on next day delivery from tekheads. They offer a great service imo and I would deal with them in the future. Here are some (drool inducing) pics of the new hardware.

Repack reservoir

Res with barbs installed

Res’s Plug fitting

The mighty meaty mcw655 pump (already sleeved it)

Its got a little potentiometer on it to adjust speed and thus flow rate…

The apogee CPU waterblock


MCW 60 Gpu block (Ill need another one of these eventually)


MCW Chipset waterblock


The supplied reservoir that came with the kit…


The hydrx fluid that comes with the kit… Wont be used, its green UV reactive. I need red!

The heatsinks for the graphics card memory modules…

Mounting hardware/ Bags of barbs, pipe clips, voltage reduction cables etc



The MASSIVE 7/16 ID (5/8 OD) tubing that comes with the kit…

Coolsleeves that are supplied with the kit. They go around tight bends in the tubing to reduce strain/ kinks in the tubing

The barbs off the extra 120mm radiator that I got… Theyre redundant (too small). I need advice/links on what barbs to get for it. Tubing size posted above ^.

A PCI bracket supplied with the kit that allows routing of the fan cables into the PC

The dual 120mm radiator


And that’s it… No pic of the single 120mm rad… dunno y must have forgotten it. Ill update with that later, along with the first installation pics of the WC system.

 

Dual Radiator Install...

Ok so its been a hectic couple of weeks for me hence no time to work on the mod or update... The place that I work at had me in quite a bit lately so ive been busy there and on top of that my CSS clan's leader is away on 3 weeks hols so im taking over organising matches as well as my usual duties of running the public and match servers/ teamspeak/ ventrilo/ forums! Phew anyway, here is the first of the work to cram that WC kit in that big eclipse! Enjoy, as usual all comments, advice and otherwise are very welcome...


This is what the back of the case looked like before I started work... The little barbs at the bottom are a PCI bracket pass through kit that I bought for the dual swiftech radiator, as it will be mounted on the outside of the case at the rear.


Once I got the kit and the tubing, though, I realised that the barbs are far too small a diameter for the massive tubing, so I had to come up with something else... the idea was to cut two holes for the piping in the motherboard tray and put the pipes through there. I fitted the rear mounting bracket for the radiator, attached the radiator along with some small pieces of tubing on the barbs as guides, marked the holes, and got my Dad to hold the tray while I drilled it. My hole saw wasnt up to it, though, barely denting it. With my Dad and I holding and drilling at it neither of us could get through that stainless steel tray! So, I got a brand new metal bit (nice and sharp) and drilled a sall pilot hole in both circles. Then I shoved the whole motherboard tray in a vice after taping up that precious chrome finish... Much later, Dad and I had the two holes FILED out of the tray, using a range of different sized and shaped files. That was stainless steel people! its mighty tough stuff!!

Tray in vice...


One hole filed and finished, one in progress...


The two holes cut out and the rubber grommets in...


viewed from other side


The radiator mounted with the holes aligned with the barbs... The left hand one was offset to stay away from the rivets and the I/O plate mounting...


What its looking like so far with the radiator installed...


Tell me what you all think! Please dont call me a ***** for not internally mounting it, I couldnt see any feasible place to put it!

 

Roof?

 

Floor?

Okay, just kidding, looks great!

 

[offtopic]
Holy forum-overload, Batman! What a reply... Why in the earth should you (you know who you are) quote all his worklog images? Your post is next in line, wouldn't it be quite self explanatory which post you would be answering to?
[/offtopic]

 

Is your rad secure? Looks like it amy snap off. Really like the choice of case though. don't see it much.

 

The top panel is removable... so no. Plus both reservoirs sit up there so i need to be able to get to em to fill them...

 

Currently planned for the floor is both pumps, and a funky logo design made in clear plexi saying "eclipse"... Itll be illuminated red. So no, sorry.

 

Nope ive chcked it. Four M5 bolts holding it on to that stainless steel? No chance! Thats the way Swiftech suggest you mount it. Its totally secure i assure you... I love this rig more and more every day. Such a cool case. Should be nice when finished.

 

That looks similar to the way I mounted my Rad (when I had one ) But that was only so when I gave it to my brother he could get into the case to fill the reservoir (had it soyou had to stick your arm through the front of the case to unscrew the rad lol)
With four bolts it holds very secure.
Keep it up man

 

Looks pretty sweet but there has to be a nicer way to mount the rad. Maybe bolts covered in plexi mirror maybe. Liek modsquads psu extension on the SG mod.

 

Ive already said it people there is nowhere inside and nowhere else outside the case that the dual can be mounted. All the space is used for other things or simply not available. Its not a discussion, im telling you that the rad has been mounted there, the holes drilled and filed, and thats where its staying. Judge it if you must, but at least not until you see the rig finished please.

Update: modsquad has some sick skills man!! I want him to airbrush EVERYTHING i own lol... Anyway this isnt feasible on my case im afraid... if you had the whole thing planned out in youre head like I have youd get it i guess...thanks for the suggestion though, its pretty cool, although it took me like hours to find!

Modsquads PSU mount extension

 

Thanks man, the system will fill from the top drive bay of the case when the top panel is removed. The repack cooling res is mounted in there, and the plug sits on top in there. Very handy.

 

Next update will hopefully be tomorrow, Ive done some misc electronic bits and pieces since, so ill post those for you. Annoyingly, im waiting for little small things in the post so i can get on with the WC kit install and tests. Anyway hopefully theyll arrive soon

 

im lovin this carnt wait to see it finished

 

I was mearly saying you could cover that area under the rad where the bolts are exposed to cover the botls as they aren't pretty imho.

 

Hi there, I really like how this project is coming onkeep up the good work!

For your information there is a place inside the case to cleanly mount a double rad inside. Next to the cd bays on the opposite side to the window, there is enough space to mount a full sized double rad and fans, and because you have removed the hard drive bay you can place the barbs at the bottom.
And it has been done before with fantastic results (I have a friend who did it).

Hope it all goes well.

 

Yes thats true, and I had thought about that, but there is an airbrush painting going on that sidepanel, so i wanted to keep it intact ... For everyones info, the panel is getting done very soon!

 

An Update At Long Last!

Well I really thought it was time to update this! Its been a really hectic couple of weeks and ive benn that busy that only bits and pieces have gotten done. My A-Level results were out last week, and the good news is that I got into university to study Electronics, Communication and Software. other commitments to work etc etc have also stopped me working on the eclipse, but I got some things done during all this. Here's the update:

Ok, so I was thinking about that front PCI slot, and what I was going to put on there, and I realised that my CCFL colour scheme involves 2 modes: One where the UV light is on, illuminating the water loop, and one where the red CCFL's are on. I realised that I needed a lot of switches for this, as there will be a lot of inverters for all of these lights. So, I decided to drill that front PCI plate and mount some little toggle switches on it. Here are the Pics of the finished plate installed: (I didnt take pictures of the process, as I was only drilling a few holes in a PCI plate )





I also started work on the rest of the water loop, which involved "borrowing" the motherboard out of my current PC to fit the waterblocks and cut the tubing to the correct lengths. After this was done, I removed all of the water cooling cmoponents and reassembled them outside the case, filled the system, and left it running for several hours to leak test it. After about 4 hours of running, there had been no leaks, so I dismantled the kit again. It is now ready to install in the case permanently. (once I get my new components). Below are the pics of the install process...

I needed that msi board out of my current machine, so out came all the components...




Then I removed all the heatsinks from the board and video card:








So once that was done, I installed the waterblocks on the Chipset, VPU, and CPU. Here are the photos of that happening:

Chipset:




Graphics Card:




Processor:




Heress the finished motherboard tray with the motherboard and GPU:







Thats all for now, all this image uploading is making me sick ... Plus its like 2:25am. Hope you liked the updae...

 

We want more.......Please.