Project - Air Cube v2

[RoEy]

Sure .

I have tried water cooling before with a Thermochill PA120.3 radiator & d-tek fusion block but wasn't much impressed to be honest, only a few degrees better than air & taken up much more space, if it was all passive & silent then that would be fantastic

Like what you've done but disagree with you on water cooling. It's much better than air if done properly. My 4870x2 used to get to around mid 80's gaming. Now under water it doesnt get above 38. Core i7 at 4ghz linx doesnt get above 65. This is with fans on really low rpm.

RoEy

 

[waynio]

Wow - hadn't seen it painted. Looking very slick - nice colour as well.

Thank you Monkey Puzzle, the cube is almost complete, just a couple of small things to do on it, just got my new drill bits so I can continue with the xbox & stack .

is that a true cooler on the xbox

LOL yeah , temps barely go above ambient .

Like what you've done but disagree with you on water cooling. It's much better than air if done properly. My 4870x2 used to get to around mid 80's gaming. Now under water it doesnt get above 38. Core i7 at 4ghz linx doesnt get above 65. This is with fans on really low rpm.

RoEy

"It's much better than air if done properly", Well it was my 1st try at water cooling , I initially had it going res, pump, cpu, gpu, radiator with 1/2" tubing & by the time it got to the gpu the gpu was running hotter than stock cooling but the cpu was quite nice & was able to squeeze a bit more oomph out of it so I took the gpu out of the loop, next time I'll be asking for tips from people who know , I even made a huge mistake of using an aluminium reservoir in the loop, I figured if they sell alum res at water cooling shop then it should be fine, doh! , so yeah I have some to learn before I try water again & that will have to be in a future case just to get it perfectly designed for water.

 

[rhysduck]

Oh my days - that's lurrrvvly Whats the dimensions?
Also, is it me or does the blue colour look a different shade in each picture?
Lovely looking blue though - would go well with my light blue walls.

 

[waynio]

Oh my days - that's lurrrvvly Whats the dimensions?
Also, is it me or does the blue colour look a different shade in each picture?
Lovely looking blue though - would go well with my light blue walls.

Air cube dimensions with feet.
461mm high
387mm wide
364mm deep


About the different shades.
The rear & front are matisse blue metallic
The inside of the rear panel is matisse blue metallic
The inside of the front panel is a light metallic blue
The top & sides are haze blue metallic
The lighting makes a big difference on the shades you see though, looks awesome in the sun or a light shining on it, I'll get some pictures done on a nice day .
The fan frames are a dark metallic blue, the blades are light metallic blue.

Got the fan frame for the xbox properly mounted to the chassis now, tapped it earlier so it's ready for painting, nothing new visually so I'll post pics when it's painted.

I made a start on the stack today, marked up where to drill, drilled all the mounting holes for the bottom level & was going very good, maybe too good lol something bad had to happen & it did.
Ran into a problem while tapping the final layer of the base of the stack, the tap snapped off while doing 1 of the holes, can't remove it at all, tried all known methods, just nothing to grip hold of, so my best bet is to file down the parts that stick out & relocate the hole & body fill over the failed hole or redesign the base a bit, ahh the joys of modding lol , it's all worth the effort in the end though , anyway the stack is going on hold again until I get a couple of new taps, oh well, got other bits to do in the meantime .

Got some colour changing LED's coming tomorrow, should add a nice subtle light effect through the windows & front grills, looking forward to installing them in the right spots .

 

[Bully_32]

Some real sweet fabrication work here to make a great job overall, well done

I must say though, visually, i like the rear more than the front!

 

[rhysduck]

Sounds good Wayne
Blue being my most favourable colour - you've kind of struck gold there for me
Really want a Blue V351 case, but may have to settle for a Sugo - oh well.

Gives me idea for an Xbox mod of my own though!

Good work mate - looking forward to the picture updates!

 

[waynio]

Some real sweet fabrication work here to make a great job overall, well done

I must say though, visually, i like the rear more than the front!

Thanks Bully , I am thinking about sanding the front grills to get them perfect.

Sounds good Wayne
Blue being my most favourable colour - you've kind of struck gold there for me
Really want a Blue V351 case, but may have to settle for a Sugo - oh well.

Gives me idea for an Xbox mod of my own though!

Good work mate - looking forward to the picture updates!

Hehe , the v351 looks nice, the xbox plastic is so easy to cut, infact I just drilled a hole in it & filed away, so easy after working with aluminium.

I would go for the LED strips if I wanted a lot of light, but I just want subtle bits in cirtain spots, strips are too long for what I have in mind.

Heres what I've done while waiting for the new taps.

Grinded the stuck tap so it's level, relocated the holes, ordered some new taps, got them today.

Received the changing LED's, wrong version, sent back, waiting for the alternative which looks better .

Put a bit more work into the right side panel grill, lots of filing & sanding so no more wonky lines & put some mesh behind the grill & painted it haze blue with a light mist of matisse blue .

Removed the window & it took a whole load of elbow grease to get the white mounting tape off, painted the inside upper half haze blue on both sides, need to order 2 windows, thought I had a couple spare, thought wrong lol, so I'd expect to receive some time next week, also buffed up the inside top panel so it's better than it originally was now.

Very tempted to sand the front grills to get really nice edges like I did with the rear, but would probably require painting again so I think I might pass on that, once the windows are installed the air cube v2 is done, but I think I'll always wish I sanded the front grills, so with that in mind I think I should lol.

Painted the xbox, I'm especially pleased with the hdd , done it all matisse blue & the power button is haze blue because I ran out of matisse lol, doh!.

On with the pictures of the finished sides, buffed inside top & the finished xbox, just wish I made enough space to add some meshx for the back fan, it's already a tight fit once the top piece is on so no room for it, oh well.

Now I can fully focus on getting this stack put together, so more soon .

Don't know if I mentioned it but the air compressor went faulty, won't go above 53 psi out of 150 & the motor doesn't turn off automatically , should be able to get it fixed though .

 

[waynio]

Walked into a wall with the stack build.

The taps I got seem to be the wrong pitch size thread, not only that but the guy I bought them off on ebay also only sent me 3, was supposed to be 6, so thanks to the ebayer I bought them off the stack build is fubared for the time being.

So I'm quite unhappy with how the base is turning out, all tapping related, the pieces for the 1st base are turning into swiss cheese, making me think I'd be best off making another order of aluminium to get it right, 1 bad hole was bad enough, now there is 4, if I do order more aluminium I'll make the postage worth while & order enough to do another project at a later date, I would like to do a mini ITX media case at some point, was also thinking of making a desk, I was a little short of flat bars anyway so maybe this was supposed to happen, I also wanted to add some trim bits to the stack to give it a little flair .

So other than putting windows in the air cube, noting more to do until I get the right bits & new aluminium so it could be a couple of weeks before the next update, sigh.

 

[waynio]

Wow, was nearly 3 weeks since my last pictured update, many problems with the rrod xbox's leading me to just say the hell with it & buy a new late 2009 one (jasper) to put it in the modded case so had to mod the hdmi bottom half & the internal metal case again, I should have originally known getting a new one without previous problems is the best way to start off an xbox's life inside a well cooled case, anyway it's now a green 4 life 360 .

Had various tapping problems with the stack & problems marking the chunky angle bars accurately which has made me decide to use black rivets on the corner angle bars, the levels are fine, just the main corner angle bars, not all the mounting holes line up perfect but at least every levels corners does by at least 1 bolt which will enable me to rework them easily to take rivets instead.

Got all the base levels put together without nuts .
Made another temporary jig for getting the marking done on the chunky angle bars, was a real pita to mark accurately & took quite some time before I figured out a good method, then it went quite smoothly, but still a few holes don't fully line up which is why I'm going to drill the holes with a 3.2mm drill bit & use rivet washers & black rivets.

I decided to do away with the 0.7mm aluminium sheets on top of each levels frame base & instead get some clear polycarbonate sheets & paint all the frame work so you can see through it all, should be pretty sweet, The sheets of aluminium became too messy with failed taps causing me to need more sheet aluminium which I didn't have.
Any polishing I do on this stack will be given a coat of clear so it keeps the polish.
The end of the framework is close to finished now, phew, was a bigger mission than I anticipated .

Not been taking my camera along to the work space & instead just been pushing forward so it's straight to the form which gave me a cheesy grin .

More soon .

 

[waynio]

Update time .

OK, painted the levels, cut the angle bars to size & smoothed off the top edges by filing & sanding & spent today polishing the angle bars, the plastic sheets for the 1st 4 levels needed a smidge filing off the ends & trimmed little corners out to make way for the rivets & then started fixing it all together, at last .

Still more to be done like little extra support bars, guide rails placed inside, switches, but the main effort is now done, phew, was a mission & half lol .

I'm also going to put some more effort in on the air cube by sanding the front grills so they are nice round & smooth edges.

More soon .

 

[Gepetto]

For one split second, I thought "lime green and blue.....yuck"!

Are you going to start a new thread for The Tower? It's going to deserve one.

 

[Ryan-3]

Looks good, personally I'd have went with a more cuoid appraoch, but the cube looks very nice

+ Whats the airflow like, and wheres the dust filters!

 

[waynio]

Lol, Thanks Gepetto, yeah I probably should make a new thread for the stack, could start 1 when I start modding it, should be soon, need to get some liquid metal adhesive for fixing some extra support bars & more primer.

Thanks Ryan-3 I almost went for black or white plastic sheets but thought it'd look pretty sweet if I paint the frame work & make it so it's visible all the way through, I'm quite chuffed with it, felt like cracking a bottle of bubbly when I put the last rivet in & jumping up & down going wee hee, but I have none so I just did the jumping up & down wee hee part with a crazed grin lol .
The airflow is perfect, dust is an issue but luckily I have a compact but good short burst air compressor so I can take the cover off & blast it all out every few months, just takes a few minutes .

 

[misterPK]

The lime green tape on the uprights contrasts well with the blue, in a modern ikea-ish kind of way. Maybe you should start making more furniture!

PK!

 

[waynio]

The lime green tape on the uprights contrasts well with the blue, in a modern ikea-ish kind of way. Maybe you should start making more furniture!

PK!

, next time I get the urge to mod I might just do that .

Update time .

Skip to the pictures if you're not interested in the details on what's been done .

1200mm high
400mm wide
380mm deep

Weight air cube v2 empty ??? very light but won't be known until I upgrade to a i7 or amd hex core rig or given the speed of new tech these days & my money flow being slow & low maybe something far more awesome once I have enough.
Weight air cube v2 fully loaded ? I'll update soon
weight empty stack ? I'll update soon
weight fully loaded stack ? I'll update soon, it'll be heavy

Since last time where I got the main basic structure done, I have been busy getting the trim supports made.

The front & back of level 2 & 3 I put 1/8" polished angle bars for a support for the various sized flat bars to stop dvd's falling out, I gave the flat bars a simple brushed finish, also put 9mm x 6mm flat bars for a dvd stop & psu slot, put a flat bar with switch mounting holes for turning ps3 fans or xbox fans on/off, upper 1 is for the ps3, lower is for xbox. All the extra trims are put on with araldite rapid steel adhesive, very very strong 2 part adhesive.

Cut solid square aluminium bars to the size of the ps3 with extra for a slope on both sides, cut angles & super glued them perfectly aligned to the ps3 base to keep it easy for putting it on the level how I wanted it, this doesn't void the warranty btw as I can easily remove the bars if needed , so the ps3 has very good ventalation now above & below so the side vents should be able to take new air in, much better than just having it on my desk, I no longer have to worry about it having a melt down so now I can get really stuck into red dead redemption .

I was thinking of cutting solid square bars to size to put in the corners of each level to give even more support but I'm not sure it needs it to be honest, it's very rigid all over, I'll have to think about this.

The braiding could have been done better, I'm a n00b at braiding, but I'm ok with the result, they're out of sight , the psu wires are folded over & over & wrapped with cellotape to keep them in a compact bunch with a paper clip in the green & black pins to run the fans, the switch cables I chose the lazy route & bought 2 off ebay, 900mm long though so just folded the cable to the length I wanted & wrapped tape around them so no cables interfering with the games/dvd's area, hmmm nintendo wii in the bottom space, hmmm probably not, currently or planned to play games/films, ohhhhh yeah .

The xbox wouldn't fit into the level, so it was either refabricate the top piece or cut the rear off so I could slide the top on, I cut the rear off for the time being, after the amount of space left over with the air cube & wanted it all to be a good fit, must be less than 1mm spare above it, the missing rear piece can only be seen from behind so I can live with that.

One problem I've come up against is the floor in my room where I want to have the cpce (Console PC Entertainment) is not flat so I'm going to cut a wooden piece to size, put something underneath the wood at the front so it makes a level surface to keep it on, need to do this asap as it's a bit like the leaning tower of pisa, keep expecting it to collapse all of a sudden, so yeah I need to do this asap .

This stack project was something I was not very sure about, mostly needed something to keep me busy for a while & was a bit of a spare of the moment kind of design, but man am I glad I went for it , I mean I'm sat here & I look to my side & I'm surprised it's me that made it lol .

There will hopefully be another update with quality outdoor daylight pictures once I've sanded the front grills to a nice finish & repainted, it'll need it since it'll be taken back down to bare metal, then I believe I can call it a 100% finished for sure this time woohoo .

With it being summer & I like to keep a good overclock with nice temps the quiet small fans have a hard time keeping things really cool, so just for summer warm spells I will use a desktop fan on the lowest setting with the top & sides off, the results are better than peak winter & temps barely rise when gaming & pushing the pc hard.

OK I think I've covered everything about what got me from my last update to now so I'll shut the hell up & show a pile of pictures in it's 99% complete state, enjoy .

 

[waynio]

Continued.

Wow, took about 4 hours to do this post lol.

 

[PaulGreyhead]

Brilliant! Looks great.

 

[Orcvader]

That is amazing... great job!
Just noticed, aren't the PS3 games covering the 140mm fan on that PSU?

 

[waynio]

Brilliant! Looks great.

Thanks Paul .

That is amazing... great job!
Just noticed, aren't the PS3 games covering the 140mm fan on that PSU?

Thanks Orcvader .
Yes they are, but there is a 10mm gap between the dvd's & psu so it still gets new air thanks to the open design + gap plus the psu has vent hole mesh all around it so it will be fine .

 

[waynio]

Complete for real this time.

Final update .

Took some new pictures earlier today, the yellow light was nasty I think you all would agree .

Now, back to my unlevel floor, I just took some scrap ply wood, placed the cpce on top of it, marked around the edges, got busy with the saw, filed the corners round & edges smooth, took it back to see how bad the unlevel floor was, was off by near 10mm, so I had these furniture slide pads & placed 1 underneath the front of the board, not quite, tried doulbling them up, spot on, luckily I have a bunch of others at a smaller diameter so I stuck them to it & thats my floor sorted, it stayed fine all the way to the top of the air cube, phew .

This shot shows how close the top of the xbox is to the next level, I'd say 1mm spare, talk about cutting it fine lol.

And so, the rest of the pictures are just to show it off in natural light .