Long time no see. Upgrade time.

Jay85 said:
They literally ship things at blazing speed once it's all confirmed! I love them for that too!
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Yup.

Yeah I bought it. @Cenedd is a master with a mill and lathe.

I don’t think it will come to that but if it does then yeah…..

TBH that block was 90% of the reason I can be bothered with the ball ache of water cooling again. I mostly just buy AIO cooled GPUs now. Last three before the 6950 were all AIO cooled (2080ti kingpin on loan to a friend, 6800XT Strix LC and a 6900XT Toxic)

I just want it quiet. Especially now I’m back on speakers it’s doing my head in.
 
OK small update. Block should arrive tomorrow, providing the delivery guy doesn't have to swim here. It has rained all day.

All I can say is thank GOD I bought my NUC Extreme. These are the days where I would be without a PC for god knows how long. Going to order some stuffs from OCUK in the morning. Coolant etc.

I had to change the design of the pump holder. It won't fit on top of the fan in the floor, as the TEC sub ambient cooler I use on the CPU has a pump and it is a pain. It has now been relocated to the bottom, but that means I need to make a "floating" pump holder that is 90'. EK make one for £13.99, but it is fugly as. I don't have the pump and top to get the sizes yet, but I started designing the bit that will hold the upright. It will then have a floor coming out off of it.

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It is designed to go between the bottom fan and the one above. I need to add curves, and then design the "floor" of it and braces to be welded on. Tell you what, this was the best thing I think I ever bought. Been using it again lately.

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I even bought a wee laptop which allows me to sit in front of it and fully control it without running back and forth to the PC.
 
OK. So more stuff ordered. I got two more flow meters to make 4. The straight rotaries are for connecting them together. However, I am going to remove the blades and just use them as a pretty water fall lol. I couldn't get any decent clear coolant, so I went with purple. I won't change the colour scheme as I find it very calming.

I also found a nice RGB plate kit for the unifan I have. At a tenner it was a no brainer. Will possibly mod the other two and put them somewhere in the rig. All the RGB.

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Oh yeah. I got a bit lazy and bought the EK mount. I will, however, make some cover plates for it so it looks less anus. Oh and a extremely cheap Splitty 9. I don't like the Lian Li fan hubs they are flimsy and nasty. In fact, I don't even think they are Lian Li I think I found them in a drawer. That will hook directly into the LT.

BTW RE 3d printing. If I do it will be a resin printer.
 
Also ! I fixed the nasty Lian Li Strimer light tubes.

When I got it it was B grade, and cheap AF. Like really cheap (just like me lmao). Any way, the cables were white. Which looked, well, cack. So I changed them out for black ones (they came with the ROG psu, which was also cheap :D ).

Any way, they are quite fiddly (understatement of the year) and annoying. Last night I found some more cable clips and.. Before...

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You can see what I mean. They overlap and fall back into the black cables. So, feex. This took me two hours :/

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Indeed and that is why I don't have one yet :D

Block has been delayed until Monday. Meh. I reckon there be some serious flooding RN. Just ordered an A3 metallic silver sheet of acrylic and this.

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That will live here.

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And get that annoying hose out of the way of the pump, res etc.
 
So apparently it was delayed until it wasn't. Sitting on the floor removing pieces of it and the intercom went off.

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I've had GPUs come in smaller boxes.

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hah ! how did they know I just redone my desk and didn't have a coaster?

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OK so it was time to see if the block indeed needs machining. However, before that I got some pics. Mostly of its heft. 2.5 slot water block any one?

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OK so before I did anything more I looked at the card. Now note, the arrows pointing to the edge of the PCB. Also note how that PCB sticks out around 2mm from the cooler/back plate itself.

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And so then I am starting to think "ahhhhh, maybe the 6950XT PCB is a few mm taller and thus why it won't fit. However, as soon as I stripped the card apart it literally fell into the block and fits like a glove.

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However !. Note now how the PCB sits inside the block. That's all fine and dandy and all, but what would be there in the motherboard?

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But of course ! a slot :D

Thus, as I predicted, this is NOT a 6950XT problem. This is a problem with the block. The 6950XT is identical to the 6900XT MBA card reference. As such because I am not putting the card into said slot and into a riser? I think it will be absolutely fine.
 
Always a huge relief when nothing goes crack and it boots :D

DPD are coming within the next two hours with the OCUK order. So I got up at 7 and have been doing the housework and washing.

Tell you what though cleaning off that graphite pad was a nightmare.
 
Stuff has arriveth.

Before I get into that though I worked out why the GPU was sagging. The screws that go through each port through the IO plate were hitting the plastic block and making it twist. Did some measuring, and it seems the screws are 5mm long. I need 3mm. M2, like.

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Will be here soon.

OK. So at first I did not have long enough screws for the bracket. Amazingly I found some. This would have been annoying, as they are not M3 and thus harder to locate. Any way, I also fitted together those Lian Li end caps.

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Now weirdly I thought they were for my one Unifan. IE, they clipped on and had edge connectors. They don't. Gawd knows what fans they are for, but check this out.

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So all I need is this.

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They literally slot straight into my fans. Splitty 9.

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And the story so far...

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However. I have one tiny issue. The way they are designed the openings for the fittings are tiny, so that you can use those flush caps. So, I need to grind out the inlet and oulet to allow more flow.

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I will cover that when I do it. I also bought these.

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Because you can never have enough .8mm bits.
 
OK so as you can see here the covers are flush. They also appear to be too small. They don't screw in.

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So how do they stay in?. Well, there is a locating slot in the hole. This piece here locks into it.

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When you tighten it it squashes the O ring (it is two piece). That then seals the hole. Genius right? sort of.....

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So as you can see it restricts flow a bit. Now if you are using a single one as a flow meter? it works fine. However, as a cascade? pretty awful :D
I just need to "port" it. And only where the water line comes in, and goes out, and where there are straight rotaries. I am not milling it. I will stick one of those die grinders in the dremel and open them up. Kinda like port polishing an engine. I won't go near the threads...

Any way, I also did a thing.

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M2 x 3MM sorted that. The 5mm ones were hitting the plastic block inside and pushing it skew whiff.
 
Think like they do. Dare I say it, like a genius.

Without the offset hole to lock them into what will happen? It will twist and won’t tighten. So the idea itself is genius but the practical side not so much.

See, on the large hex res which I will also be using it uses almost the same thing. However on that it is just open G1/4 holes. So how does it work?

Well, instead of using the small offset locators the hex res has an Allen key hole each end. You take the face off of the res and you put an Allen inside, then one in the outer hole and tighten.

You can also link those large hex reservoirs too. With a link locking tube.

And this is why I love Bitspower. The Rolls Royce of cooling. Who also own all of their own CNC machines unlike nearly every other company on the market.
 
Oklies, Sunday funday.Not.

I was so annoyed by how badly the RGB cables looked I took them out completely and then spent another two hours rebuilding them. This time evenly, and most importantly properly.

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This is not easy. At all. They are so tight you need to yank them with pliers, and honestly I would rather depin and braid cables than do this, that is how much it sucks. I also forgot I put them directly onto the cables that came with the PSU, which just made it even harder. Still, I am happy now.

Other things done. Removed a ton of wiring I no longer needed.

Moved the 8 pin PCIE power wire for the TEC unit. I remember I could not get it through the hole at the top first and foremostly, but also that it did not look long enough. It literally was, but by around 2mm. Stoked with how much cleaner that is.

Cleaned up and modified the pump adapter. IE the one I made for the AIO/TEC's pump which is not in the block on the CPU as that is where the TEC is. The pump was perma wired to 12v and by god it is so noisy that I could hear it with headphones on. So I made a 7v patch cable. Which was ketchup and mustard, and now isn't.

So yeah. A lot done really, even though it doesn't look like much. You will, however, note how much cleaner it all looks in there.

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Problem is when you fit normal caps it makes it look like an old alarm clock with the two bells on lmao.

Off over to mum’s today. Let the design stage begin in earnest. She’s going to a Tina Turner thing in London on Thurs and will be gone til late night, so I shall spend the entire day making lots of racket :D

I’ve also come up with a great name for the build. More on that soon but it’s sure to make you laugh!
 
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