Project: Silent Overkill

Cenedd

Cenedd

Cenedd

Soldato
Joined
4 Jun 2007
Posts
2,761
Location
Watford, UK
Edit: A quick index for various phases of upgrades
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Having recently succumbed to the upgrade itch, I thought it was all over for a few years. Then I got involved in building a complete new build for a friend and started looking at all the shiny new cases. New toy syndrome took hold and some half-baked ideas were hatched. You guys know how these things are :D
So I've been chatting about it with OJ46 by polluting his excellent build log (see page 9) and he's either inspired me or led me astray - we'll see which as this progresses. Basically OJ, it's all your fault ;)

So what's the plan and why? Well, I've got a relatively old case that's entirely unsuited to watercooling but has been bent to my will. It started off with eight Alphacool Cape Cora's mounted externally and then had an EK 3x120 rad mounted unceremoniously on the outside of the roof on stand-offs. Now with a 980Ti and a 4GHz Skylake it gets a bit hotter than I'd like when gaming and I'm too stubborn to ramp the fans up from relatively silent :D

I'm drawn to the Phanteks Enthoo Evolv ATX. My local storage is all M.2 SSDs and any more is iSCSI so I don't need the entire front of the case lined with disk cages. I want a bit more space in the case and I want it clean and tidy. Currently I have lit stuff like the res, GPU and CPU blocks....but I have no window so it's kind of pointless.

I know this case only has room for a 3x120 and a 2x120 which isn't really an upgrade....but I reckon it'll have room to slap a Mo-Ra 420 on the side if I'm lucky :D

I don't really have any pictures of anything at this stage and I'm more of a suck-it-and-see style builder than a sketch-up artist so it's entirely possible that this whole thing could just fail horribly....but such is the way of things. OCUK will be getting an order for a case in a sec so I can start there. Once I have it I can assess (read make wild assumptions and hope it pans out) whether I can mount the rad on the off-side side panel (the one without the window) or even whether it's possible to mount the rad in place of the side panel without making a horrible mess of it.

So the to-do list is this:

  1. Will it blend hang? The weight of the rad could just be too much.
  2. Is it possible/better to mount the rad instead of the side panel?
  3. Could some hybrid side-panel/rad door mash-up be made so that the rad is hinged onto the case but the front of the side panel is bolted on the front so the case looks right?
  4. How to get QDCs installed so the side-panel/rad can be opened?
  5. Should it be 9x140mm fans or a conversion plate to mount 4x230mm beasts and if so are they too thick to then mount a fan guard?
  6. Would it be a crime not to take the opportunity to go hardline? OJ46 thinks so....so that's my easy life out the window! :D

Spec:

These are pics of the current rig back and front. I'm not sure why it won't embed the smaller image but it is clickable to a full-size pic. If someone can tell me why it won't let me display the image I'll sort it out - it could just be referencing an http image on an https page.



Well, hope this is of some interest. It's rather wordy at the moment but I'll try to get it more picture-oriented once actual stuff starts to turn up! (and I work out how to get it embedded properly).

Gareth
 
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Now this is a build I'm looking forward to! Haha that radiator is going to look crazy if it actually works, going to look like a computer attached to the side of a radiator :D

Not sure I deserve ALL of the blame for leading you astray / convincing you to go with mad ideas, but thanks for the kind words and adding the link to my build log :)

Judging by the craziness of your current build I reckon you'll pull this off quite easily as long as the door turns out to be strong enough. Good luck with it anyway mate, will be following it closely for ideas to steal ;)
 
Cheers. Already researching acrylic vs PETG - think I'm going with acrylic - and the tools necessary when they're in stock!

A computer attached to a radiator I can live with. The danger is that it will tip so it could end up as a computer on top of a radiator with fans oriented for carpet chewing :eek:

Hope you're on-hand for vocabulary assistance when I run out of colourful language!
 
If it did get a little wobbly because of all the weight on the one side you could always plonk a block of lead / other heavy metal on the floor the other side to balance it out... As long as you don't plan on moving it around too often obviously! With no mechanical HDD's there'd be plenty of room for a few kg's of lead hidden out of sight :)

Always happy to help with the dodgy language, could even swear in Welsh if you want to stop it all turning into stars :D
 
Well, that's an OCUK order placed for case, 2x DDC pumps, DDC heatsinks, hardline, tools (pre-order) and fittings. OCUK have one EK 12/10 fitting for acrylic in stock....that'll be enough, right?!

Also ordered one length of the Mayhems Hardened Glass tubing to play with. Even if I can't bend it, if I can cut it, it would work for a straight section or two.

Once the case is here, I'll measure up before ordering the rad....just to make sure I'm not forced to get the smaller rad. I think it'll fit according to the quoted dimensions of case and rad.
 
don't suppose you could do me a massive favour, could you? Is that the XSPC multiport DDC top V2? If so could you measure it for me please? XSPC say it's 27mm, a competitor says it's 25mm tall, so I'd like confirmation from somebody who actually has one!
 
No problem.
From the mating face (where it joins the DDC) to the:
Top surface: 27.5 mm
Top of bolt on top surface: 28.5 mm
Top of G1/4 blank in top port: 31.5 mm

If you're after slimline, the Aquacomputer AquaCover for DDC is lower profile at 20.5, 22 and 24.5 mm respectively. However, if you're wanting to attach a DDC heatsink as well, I believe the EK supplied bolts are too long and not threaded far enough. I had to hacksaw the ends off and then make the thread longer with an M4x0.7 die. Or at least I'm hoping that's right as I'm assembling the heatsink to the cover without a pump - I'm mocking it up to work on the loop for another build .
 
I've had problems with my pump choice after messing up some measurements. My loop order is very specific and can't really change and was relying on the original XSPC acetal multiport top but that's now discontinued. This new one is too tall, but the Aquacomputer one (my reserve choice) doesn't have the same crossflow design.

I did have a pump top coming in from China, but some idiot has delivered it to an address in Surrey of all places, and it's nigh-on impossible to get this sorted.

Cheers for the measurements, I can no officially strike the XPSC off the list :(
 
Hmm. The cross flow has been useful. Don't suppose you have the space for two 90 degree bends (or two double/triple 45s, or a 180 snake if it exists) instead?

Personally I like the clear acrylic because you can see it's working and not full of 'stuff'.

Worst case, could Parvum do something custom for you? Probably not cheap but I think they've cut them into larger sheets of acrylic for JR23 before so they probably have most of the model for them already.
 
The back-up plan is to use the 2 edge ports on the Aquacomputer top. The inlet is the top port connected to the res and the outlet port will essentially 180 around the pump. Most of this will be hidden underneath the GTX Titan, but it still feels messy.

This is what happens when you try to make an In Win 901 do things it wasn't intended to do!

I've already spoken to JR23 about another part (custom EK Terminal) and sadly Parvum can only do "2.5D" milling of their acrylic, so they couldn't do me a pump top even if I asked. Same with E22. Diamond Cooling say everything I've ever discussed with them would be expensive and I should just buy something else instead.

Because the modding community is ALL about buying stock parts that fit perfectly *sigh*
 
LePhuronn said:
The back-up plan is to use the 2 edge ports on the Aquacomputer top. The inlet is the top port connected to the res and the outlet port will essentially 180 around the pump. Most of this will be hidden underneath the GTX Titan, but it still feels messy.
Click to expand...

Titan, nice. If you're going in the top and out a side, could you spin the entire pump 180? Failing that, a single hardline segment to let you get the required curve in without kinking?

LePhuronn said:
This is what happens when you try to make an In Win 901 do things it wasn't intended to do!
Click to expand...

But isn't that the point?! If we stuck to the intented uses, we'd all still have beige towers with a plastic front and a hairdryer attached to the cpu!

LePhuronn said:
I've already spoken to JR23 about another part (custom EK Terminal) and sadly Parvum can only do "2.5D" milling of their acrylic, so they couldn't do me a pump top even if I asked.
Click to expand...

Now I could be wrong here but isn't it just the bottom part that's difficult? If they can do that - the weird elliptical part that sits over the impeller. The rest is just a hole drilled and tapped for the outlet and the same for a top-mounted inlet. A side mounted inlet you'd have to have enough height to drill in from the side as far as the top inlet shaft - but you wouldn't necessarily need to drill the top shaft all the way through to the top. It's possible but the additional height required for a horizontal channel above the impeller chamber is probably why the XSPC unit is slightly taller.

I know Bitspower do a lower profile 90° bend but it's not revolvable so it would be hit and miss as to whether it points the way you want.
 
Oh believe me, I've done a LOT of measuring to try and get a DDC to work. It breaks down like this:

I have 45mm from the outside of the case to the PCB of the Titan (original Kepler version, don't get too excited :p). Standard DDC pump top + heatskin-clad pump unit (minus decoupling standoffs) is 45mm. So, the pump will be mounted on its side, and means that any "top side" ports will either stick out of the case or clash with the GPU PCB.

Originally, the crossflow design allowed me to enter pump on one side and exit on the opposite, thereby keeping the overall assembled height (and therefore installation width) to 45mm. Since the XSPC top adds 7mm to the overall package, it won't fit.

The Aquacomputer top keeps the package the correct size, but to keep the tube routing tidy I can only orient it in 1 way, and that's to have the pump top facing outwards, and therefore the side inlet port as the upper of the 2 side ports. This then means the side outlet port comes 90 degrees into the case, then another 90 degrees round the underside of the pump and then into the bottom rad. So most of that 180 degree routing will be hidden underneath the Titan, but it's nowhere near as clean as the original plan to go in 1 side and out the opposite.

But given what I'm doing with the 901 I reckon it's worth the stress :D

Also, I don't need a powerful pump so I have another fallback with a smaller Alphacool unit that has a multiport top that will allow me to do the crosflow routing no problem, but there's a slim chance there's not enough grunt in it to get the GPU and CPU running in parallel (which is also a prerequisite of the loop order).

Such fun times :p

I guess in theory Parvum - or whoever - could do the impeller milling in a custom top and then I just drill and tap the 2 sides, but that's money and tools on a gamble, and I've already blown cash on mistakes so far, can't afford to do that again really.

If I can sort the China pump top then I should be OK, but the Aquacomputer top is a concession I'm happy to make. It is the only concession though :D
 
OK, a small update for you. There's good news and some bad. Everything I order arrived:



But the courier managed to damage the case. It's not massive but it's made the front foot wobbly and depending how the rad gets mounted, that could end up being structural as well as supporting the PC.
OCUK were great and a swap out is scheduled for tomorrow.

While I had the case out, it seemed criminal not to see where stuff might fit!

I instantly spotted somewhere the pump top might be made to stick out of:



It'll need checking once I can dismantle some of the case. If nothing else, to do this would require mounting the pumps on either a raised platform (so the top sticks up and clears the PSU shroud) or long screws like stilts. Another bonus is that both heatsinks DO fit on the XSPC dual top....which I wasn't certain they would. One bonus would be that a fan would be right there to blow over the DDC heatsinks....silently, of course :D

I've got an existing Aquaero 6 XT to mount....and no 5¼ drive bays. A quick mock up shows that where I was thinking of bodging mounting it, looks promising. Have to work out the details when I have more time....but I suspect a Dremel may be involved! :eek:



Now, the obvious question is the rad. Had a quick measure as I wasn't sure on whether the rad would fit with the recess in the side panels. It looks like it will...just. The rad is 47.5cm if mounted with the logo at the front....which seems reasonable. The case is about 97cm. It'd probably be more sensible to be really certain how I'm going to fit the Mo-Ra 420 and if necessary order the smaller Mo-Ra 360....but that's like saying a GTX 970 would be ok when a 980Ti is only £30 more :D So I'm going to do the mature and reasonable thing....and order the 420 and work out how to mount it afterwards! :D
I think it may be possible to get QDC bulkheads through the sidepanel but one will be around the PSU and the other would be in the top rad bay (which would be empty anyway). I may be able to flip it so the QDCs are at the front (and rad logo at the back, but meh!) and that would result in the connections coming through where the bottom drive bays are - conveniently right next to the proposed pump location. It may mean the rad overhanging at the back a bit though. Shouldn't be a massive issue as there's some cabling (keyboard, monitors etc) hanging around the back anyway, so what's a bit of rad joining the party matter? Worst case I'd have to take the connections out the back of the case and then across...but I'd rather avoid external tubing as much as possible.

Had a quick play with the hardline and my solitary EK fitting - OCUK only had one in stock and I only need it for testing at this point. The Mayhems 12mm glass tube fits very nicely. The E22, not so much. Will have to get a vernier caliper out to check the diameter of the acrylic is correct before I try brute force and ignorance!

Next update will probably be when the rad arrives and I post up whinging that I can't make it fit because it's too long or something :p

Gareth
 
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Is the E22 too big or too small? Because I have 14 EK HDC fiitings ready to go with E22 12mm acrylic as my choice, but I shan't bother if it's too small. The EK HDC fittings are supposed to be really tight though, so this may be normal.

Plus make sure you're working them correctly - the O ring that comes out slides over your tube first with a dab of water, then you dab some water over the other O ring and slot it all together. And don't forget the 45 degree chamfer on the acrylic too, otherwise you'll bust the O ring.
 
Too big. I did chamfer it a little but probably not enough. I'll double check it's not a mis-pick and then try chamfering it lots. Always good to have advice from someone who's been there and done it, so cheers.
 
hmmmmm, I have used E22 tubing quite a lot and not had a problem, but there might be an issue with a certain batch or something. I will keep an eye on this thread as I speak to E22 a lot and they are lovelly people.

as for the fittings, they can be tight, especially when they are very cold (I.E just come out the back of someones van!) i found this out the hard way when in a rush, I actually use waterbased lube for my fittings and give them a good chamfer and so far i have managed to make everything fit.

If the glass tubing fits, the E22 should also, so yes, please do check with the calipers and then if there is a problem i will alert E22, if you purchased the tubing from OcUK then obviously RMA would be with them, but at least we can solve the issue :D

Unlucky about the case, that isn't good =( but at least OcUK sorted it for you! Good luck on the build!
 
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