Dear Bit-Tech Modders I´ve been a silent reader over the past years and now I think it´s about time to post some things. I´ve Started casemodding at the time of S775/P5B-Deluxe time at the start of Intel´s Conroes chips. It wasn´t modding in a big way, I´ve only painted a solid Rebel9 Inside Black and tried to figure out how to sleeve some cables. That´s where I failed about big time. Next on the road to the actual A05 build was watercooling the Cpu and finally the complete system followed by a complete internal watercooled build in a 800D. This case was massive while it was simply too huge to fit into my car at that time. It also wasn´t the best choice for a case when traveling to a Lanparty which I did quite often... Things had to change again so I did what I allways wanted to do, go mAtx and go Lianli Obvious a V351 had to be the next one, which I allways had a soft spot for. So I shoehorned a fully watercooled X58 System into a V351, Based on a Rampage 2/3 Gene over various stages. My trustworthy companion over the years was a Mora 2 which did me a good job over the past years and is keeping my actual system on good temperatures the moment I´m typing this. Some Pics of the V351 in it´s final stages before I went A05 Rampage 3 Gene @ LiquidExtasy, I7-970@Hk3.0, Dominator GT@EK, GTX580@Heatkiller+EK Backplate. GPU Side : CPU Side : Sound/Storage/Drain : Aquaero/Laing/ Dominators Then I was happy for some days... But there where some flaw´s included. I still had to use an external radiator for lanparies, and I got bored of the actual watercooling loop. Bitspower Barbs and Tygon was the way to go. After I got my hands on one of the last A05NB off Amazone, it was clear for me to do a build on this case with internal emergency radiator.
The A05 Story, Part one Changes in Hardwarespec where planed as only minor modifications or better said upgrades Starting Specs where Rampage 3 Gene with Liquid extasy Plexi-Nickel cooler I7-970 with Nickel-Black Heatkiller, replacing the HK3.0 LT which I had since S775 Dominator GT 2000C8, now back on Aircooling GTX580@Watercool and EK Backplate Enermax Infinity 720 Crucial M4 120Gb replacing 80GB Postville G2 Scorpio Black 500Gb for Games and Scorpio Blue 1Tb for Data X-Fi Titanium Pcie Watecooling was done by a Laing Pro with Alphacool Plexi Top and a EK ResX instead of the Xres Top/res out of the V351. Fans where still controlled with my good Friend Mr. aquaero4 and a flowmeter from the same make. Black Bitspower Barbs in 10mm with Tygon 15.9 OD/ 9.5 ID and DP Ultra in Red was still the weapon of choice. The Mod : First I tried what mostly all the others did, take 360 rad with a nice cover, loose the Top IO ports of the A05 and be happy. Didn´t like that by the looks and loosing the only external ports isn´t that what I´d call a feature. By the time I build my homeserver to replace my old SS4200 NAS on base of a A05NF which had a 140mm Fan in the top, and that gave me a great Idea. So I did a bit of research, ordered some parts, and finally I think I was the first one to shoehorn a 280 radiator in the top of a Lianli A05. Best side next to that, was that I could keep the Top IO Ports, Drive cages and I could even fit a HUGE 60mm thick Radiator. Webfirst (until proven to be wrong) 280 Rad in the Top of a Lianli A05NB Saying that it was a tight fit might be a slight understatement when looking at the gap between the Motherboard and the radiator Finished Loop : Running system, First attempt with T-Line : The Idea with the T-Line made a special look, quite clean but a PITA to bleed the air out of the system. The connections behind the fangille go to my Mora, connected with Koolance VL3N´s So I had a running system but it was not the stage of a Build I wanted to end the process. Improvements : I changed the PSU to a Fully Modular AX650, ditched the T-Line in favourite of a Xres, and moved the SSD/HDD lot into the Drivebay next to the Aquaero. If you like red/black, you can´t beat this combination
Part 2, the Remake I wasn´t quite so happy wíth the decoupling of the Laing, and the sound it made, so I cleaned my bank account and ordered a brand new PWM Laing, more BP awsomeness and a Aquaero 5, to controll the Pump too, and finally get the a display. While Shopping I made a lucky catch in form of a Window Kit for the A05, Searched quite a long time until i found a shop havin one in stock While making Plans for a rebuild it turned out very soon that my ideas need some custom fabbed parts. The first Problem to solve was a stylewhise one, as the case is on my table, the viewing angle to a Drivebaymounted Aquaero is not perfekt, so I had to make design a sideblade cover from the drivebay to the PSU Sideblade CAD Sketch : Lasercut and bent Part : Testfitted : Didn´t like that, looked too much TJ07 A little bend later After various attempts in try&error manner to improve the decoupling of the Pump, I finally voided the warranty of the PWM Laing, changed Tops and ended in this loop The res shrunk a bit, too Next improvement in the loop was to move the flowmeter, so the drive bay had to go. It was out of use since the first day, but hey, you have to learn and improve
The A05 Story, Part three , The rebirth So the loop was ok, Temps with the internal 280 where not that bad, and soon I got bored again and some ideas started to flow.... First of all I needed to find a solution for the tight fit between the Mainboard and the Radiator. Second to that it should also solve the problem that it was a pita to bold throug the RAdiatorgrille-CaseTop-Fan into the Radiator. So I came up with this sketch : A Radiatorbraket which bolts into the Motherboard tray, and a slot cover and holds the complete weight it. Also Gives me the option to move the Radiator up to the highest point possible in the case. The fans are now screwd into the radiator and the case cover can be removed as an additional piece. The Final design : Painted Part : Testfitted and working While writing this log, there is one thing I´ve found out in the last year. Your Imagination is the only limit you have. If you have an Idea follow it, don´t let loose. If you can´t design, learn to do it, use simple sketches to show someone what you are thinking of, but, don´t let loose. If you can´t fabricate, find someone, don´t let loose. This part only took me half a year from the first idea I had about a free floarting Radiator, the design of it took about 20 stages, and it was great to hold it in my own hands, after the delivery. It had flaws, and still has.
Part 3 Rebirth continued As I write this, pls don´t blame me for my mod before September 18th, It might take the whole evening to write up a "quite" complete log Thx Mike The case got cleaned out to the bare frame and I made additional holes for cable routing and a nice place to store my Harddiscs in their mini Himuros. So cute they are... New location of the connections outside to the external Mora WIP mounting picture of the radiatorbraket and the Powerplug for the Mora Fans Metalwork was done, so it´s time to paint Flat mate black was the weapon of choice Not so bad for a spraypaint job, but the problems came up later, and at the moment I´d say, I should have had the case Powdercoated. I guess, the next build will be sprayed propper, or powerdercoated.
Part 3 Rebirth continued, Assembling and cableworks First there was a Lianli internal Power extension cable, then came the wirecutter, a solderiron, more wire and some sleeve. Finished, extended internal Power cord my Mike : Gray-Red-Black MDPC-X Awsomeness External Fans need Power too, why not make that a pretty cable : Internal Radiator fans, well you can guess what. Custom cable love too : Custom length Laing wires : Assembling : A new home for the laing and with a hybrid decoupling by Noiseblocker and Laing : By the time typing this lines, the loudest and annoiing noise comes from a Noisblocker pk2 running @ 7V in my server case. These new Laings are a silentfreaks dream, running at 60% power it still makes 65l/h , full power makes it louder so you can say that there would be the pump but still very silent, and the flowrate is at about 130Liters per hour The front got a painted mesh inlay : Maybe one day I´ll back up on the original plan and do a custom front... Tried it when I wasn´t that experienced in construction and mechanical engineering via CAD so I meesed up the measurements for the lasercutter, and so I got 3 useless custom front covers that are 2mm too wide/tall compared to the Original Plastic covers that hold the Aluminium front. Next time i´ll do better. I foil wrapped the Motherboard tray, as I did with the Traysided side cover of the case later. Mate White this time. Testfitted Powercord I also made me a custom fabbed braket for the mini himuros, and the Aquaero holder shrunk a bit too While working on the custom parts of the case I came up with a creative way to show off my 2 ssd´s 512GB for Games, 120gb for OS Final Parts with the Testfitted SSD´s with the custom power cables for the two HDD´s in the mini Himuros After Paint and with the first set of Sata Power
Part 3 Rebirth Final Pics as of September 2012 Assembling the Build : I fell in love with cylinder head Hex Screws ( don´t know if thats the english term) so I used them wherever i could Finished Front behind the cover : Sadly the SSD Bracket did not fit. Double a simple would not be enough Random Pics of the final assembly : Situation before fitting the SSD´s. The non sleeved cable is the Power supply for the Aquaero, Laing and a spare Molex type one for future Light Ideas or so. wrapped flowmeter to break the blackness : Complete Backside : Aquaero wiring : Window Side : Final shot with rear cover mounted : Well that´s it. I´ve learned a lot, but the final system still has lots of chances for improvements. Finally I´ve the system running next to me, but at the moment I really do not want to disassemble the system only to shorten some cables of the psu. It´s the only system I´ve got, I work and play on it, so there won´t be so many changes on it in the next time. Power is enough, the only chance of getting upgraded is the GPU at the moment, but that´s a different story which includes a 27" monitor. My next plans are going white, itx and well you will see. Thx for reading, and please excuse grammar or time mistakes, as I come from Austria and because of that I´m not a native english speaker. Comments are welcome
This is brilliant! Just got one of these cases to do a build for my mum. Even from the pics you really don't appriciate how tiny this case is for a fulll atx mobo. Brilliant mate mate. Love the ssd mount and the psu cover.
Nice, and very clean for such a small case with so much packed into it. You might be able to hide the cables behind the mobo tray with some cut holes. If you haven't seen this thread, you might be interested in the new reservoirs with integrated flow/fill meters and pump housings. 150mm is large for this case, but the utility is great, and I'm thinking that you might be able to squeeze it into the space directly about the PSU - it might require that the Aquero be mounted in the front panel again.
