Project Stealthlow

[waynio]

Haha I couldn't resist waiting for the crimp pins & used the final 8 female pins for an extension lol.

I took the pictures first under my daylight bulb & then with a shade covering the shine & it gives a dramatically different look, looks blingy under direct light & like awesome shoe laces without .

So thats the CPU & ATX cable done .

 

[waynio]

Ahaa just when I thought I'd run out of things to sleeve with the bits I have I thought I'd make a start on the sata power cables, next up is fan sleeving I used nothing but the scrap stuff I have for doing these so I reclaimed all the black wire & put all of it to use & I'll be able to finish these off easily with the waste sleeving & still have plenty for shortish sleeving jobs, I'm now quite confident I'll be able to sleeve everything .

Only got 1 WIP pic of this bit & it's pretty dark.

Couldn't take this any further as I need the female crimp pins.

Plus I already have the left angle sata cables & they are sata 3 .

 

[waynio]

I feel your pain

Fish Tank in the background or just some weird cool lights?

kd

My monitor, had the case where my keyboard usually is while doing the sata power cables , does kinda look like a fish tank or lights in the pic though .

 

[waynio]

Liking those SATA power cables Waynio. Done something similar before but not individually sleeved like yours. Those IDC connectors make that job much easier. My current PSU has proper crimp terminals so I am stuck with massive loops.

Thanks Tealc bought those from MDPC too, they are nice & cheap considering how good of a job they do .

Got the package from Nils & from ******** but they ran out of black molex wire & spade connectors for the vandal switches so thats on back order.

Just need to find the bunch of ac ryan molex pass through adaptors I have laying around somewhere but in fear of not being able to find them I made an order from America (***************) as that was the only place I know that sells them now which is odd as they are awesome molex pass through plugs, I chose the ceapest delivery option so might take some time for them to arrive.

The 9 fan splitter cable is perfect for what I have planned with it & it looks to me like it uses MDPC sleeving too which really surprised me.

This shot shows the fan splitter next to MDPC sleeving, I'd say it's the same stuff but for taking a wider load.

A few of the sample pieces I have & the red seems to glow I'm already looking forward to doing a multi coloured sleeving job some time in the future .

Load of female ATX crimp pins & fan crimp pins .

Load of fan plugs.

Lian-Li wire kit as I'm sick of not having printed mobo headers for my switches lol & also a psu tester which will be very handy for testing fans/lights but I got this one for using on the stack unit to replace the paper clip I use on it .

And here is a shot of a very rough idea of what I'll be doing with the fan splitter.

So back I go to finish all the sleeving if possible & I won't do another update on the sleeving until it's complete .

 

[waynio]

Is it a bit sad that I could give you all the part numbers for those terminals and connectors from memory? I used to work with these things for 12 years.

Great fan wiring mod though, so much neater to have one soiltary cable and connector to drive multiple fans like that. Might be a bit tricky to stick it on a fan controller though and could blow your motherboard to smithereens if you connected it up. So either you are intending to run it at 100%, are looking at a very high power fan controller or intend to make something yourself.

Like ~REALiTY said you could make money from modding bits & bobs .

Oh the fan wire mod that was a pre-made one by phobya but yeah I totally didn't expect it to be such high quality, could do with making the cables on it shorter really but I'll probably just keep it stashed under the hdd cages , no intention of fan controller or mobo headers with this, I chose very quiet fans .

Open a Custom Mod Shop

Become Rich

The amount of stuff i would buy off you! haha

So true .

Rig it up to a mains light dimmer switch

I wouldn't know how lol but the fans I'm using on this are quiet enough already, any slower & they'd be absolutely silent .

Thats some awesome braiding,

Still can't wait to see the finished product, will be amazing!

Keep up the good work sir!

Thanks Baplad .

Very nice job on those sata cables. I gave up there!! lol

Thanks ReU_VOoDOo .

Lovely braiding. Makes me want to braid from scratch!

ReU VOoDOo - You sig is too big, best change it before the mods see

Cheers Guitarman0 , but the sig does look nice though .

Wow that was a needed change of modding .

I found the sata power pass through holes weren't quite big enough so had to make them bigger, also not pictured here I added 2 10mm countersunk pass through holes for fans close to the corner & also made a mount for an ssd aligned to do another sata power cable that powers the ssd & optical, the cable for that will be extremely short , still need to mod the angle & square bar in the bottom to allow fan cables to go underneath the hdd cages.

The ssd mount is just a small piece of 10mm flat bar that mounts the ssd & a 20mm flat bar that connects to the 10mm one & screws into the panel by 1 bolt, nice & simple .

Also made the mobo panel power pass through holes bigger since I'm using extenders for those.

So now I can continue with the sleeving honestly can't wait until I complete the sleeving .

Watch these if your keen on modding .
Modmen episode 1
Modmen episode 2
Modmen episode 3
Modmen episode 4

 

[waynio]

Just finished all the sata power cables & got some pics of it all including the floating ssd been doing very well at using up the waste sleeving, sorry about the poor quality pics but I'll make up for that when it's all completed .

Oh yeah & so much for no more updates until I finish the sleeving, I'm in a habit of updating as I make progress .

 

[waynio]

Nice job on the sleeving!

Cable management looks like it's going to be very clean as well, also the floating SSD looks pretty damn cool!

Are you going to braid the SATA data cables as well or not? I know MDPC do some SATA braid, so wasn't too sure?

kd

Thanks kd yeah I bought some of the data cable sleeve too.
I've also had a rethink about the atx & cpu cables & I'm going to change the extensions into main cables, there was just way too much wire making a heck of a mess compared to the rest of it, I'll post before & after pics when it's done but wow they are seriously long cables .

Just realised I still need to add sata data cable holes on the tray lol.

 

[waynio]

OK Partial update lol

This shows why I went & had a go at making the sleeved ATX extender become the main ATX cable, it was silly long lol .

Tested out crimping onto 2 wires & to be honest it went fine.

And was also able to plug it with sleeving in the socket.

Snipped all the ends off the extender end I didn't need.

Started on making the 4 dual wires, I used wire strippers near the end of the wire to create an opening where I could join a 2nd wire.

2nd Wire tristed around nice & tight & knotted.

Cut the pre sized heatshrinks in half & applied over the wire.

Covered it completely.

And here with sleeving & heatshrink on & crimped ready for installing to the corsair cable & to merge the custom cable to the thoroughly awkward corsair dual socket.

Then the rest well....

I need a new replacement corsair AX850 ATX cable as I took the wires out of the wrong end & yes I didn't just take 1 out, I took 12 out without realising I was focusing on the wrong end so I don't know where the heck to put the new wires so I emailed corsair explaining my situation & hopefully they'll help me out on this & soon, I don't expect it for free but I just hope they can help.

 

[waynio]

Looks like fun lol

Seriously though, I love the attention to detail in this build, and your skills are neverending! lol

Build me one? I'll chuck you a tenner lol

Fun lol maybe not sleeving is the least fun area of modding for me but yeah I think it's worth doing, once it's done it's done & looks good .

Just a pity I have no idea when corsair will help out on a replacement atx cable, I could risk figuring out where the cables go but that would risk damaging the psu so I won't bo that thanks EniGmA1981 .

Floating SSD is amazing, great idea.

I don't think I would have the amount of patience used to braid all that lot, I think I would end up crying!

Floating ssd wasn't an idea it was a fluke hehe , was just making a simple mount for it & it actually looks pretty cool .

The sleeving is a mammoth task but it's getting there , I'm sure not looking forward to doing the custom length fan cables but I think I should get them done asap to get them out of the way .

 

[waynio]

Lol, that's a heluva lot of cable braid, kudos for you for taking the time, it looks great.

It's a fair bit just gutted I need the atx cable to continue, I emailed corsair yesterday morning asking about a spare cable, then I emailed another corsair guy a little later, today I joined the forum & made a post asking about a replacement cable & no reply yet, wish I chose an enermax psu as I know there service is awesome, there is someone I know who said he waited 3 months for a replacement cable, I've seen lots of people complaining about bad support & I know it's really premature to say this but I'm already thinking I'd be best just buying a different psu, they haven't even acknowledged the email I sent them.

 

[waynio]

Were did you get the 9 fan cable from? Custom made? If so, could you create one of these for me?

Also, did you make the sata power cables yourself? I would love that cable because I have to bend mine all over the place to get them flat

Awesome Build btw. Can't wait for finished product

Can't say on the forum but the fan splitter is a 9 way one packaged by phobya & it really looks like they use MDPC-X sleeving on them I was very surprised by this, I'm used to seeing low quality sleeving on bits like this .

Yes, bought the wire which is all black & nice & flexible & the sleeving is MDPC-X & so is the sata pass through connectors & end connectors, just the sata power cable mods alone are very easy to do & could be a cheapish order from MDPC-X if only doing the hdd cables, I'd say it's easier than normal crimping on main power cables.

If your psu is modular you would have to take the pins out & crimp the new cables & if not modular a snip, wire strip, twist, solder or crimp & snap off the socket part, heatshrink then sleeve.

I first place the ends of the wire in a connector, press it in fully, do this for all 5 wires, then put the cap on & place the plug into the bottom hdd, then place the next plug with cap off into the one above holding the wire nice & straight & push it into the connector & same for the other 4 wires, snap on the cap & just carry on like that, very easy & to be honest you don't have to use sleeving you could just use wire but if you want a nice look then the sleeving helps .

The sata power cables have been my favourite part of the sleeving as like you said there is always a heap of excess wire with standard cables lol like what case hdd rack out there has spacing like the spacing on these sata power cables that come on psu's lmao .

Cheers glad it's liked .

A chap on another forum has helped me greatly on my main ATX power cable problem, he is planning on sleeving his own soon & he made a diagram of where the wires should go & he seen me mention about it on my log & he shared it with me, very very very lucky , saved me waiting for a replacement from corsair which I have no idea how long I could have been waiting .

 

[waynio]

An awesome chap on another forum made a diagram of where the wires go on this AX850 psu & shared it with me so saved me having to wait for corsair to help out which was a huge relief .

Well I completely ran out of heat shrink after completing the main ATX cable d'oh so yeah to keep the sleeving of a consistant quality I had to make an order just for heat shrink but at least this time I will be able to dedicate a good chunk of the week to getting started on the windows , I'd expect any future efforts for doing a sleeving job I'll only need to do the 1 order .

Here is the atx cable , not as neat as an extender as wires cross all over the thing with it having 3 ends but I'll have no clutter around the psu now .

 

[waynio]

They look very nice - must've taken you ages!

whats the patch of about 3 pieces of heatshrink mid way along on the last photo?

Thanks teknokid the patch is where the cable needs 2 wires going into 1 socket, corsair should have gone with a simple 2 end cable but went with a 3 end cable which really complicated doing a sleeving job on this cable, it would be difficult crimping, sleeving & heatshrinking for 2 wires going into 1 small hole so I opened up a wire with a wire stripper to attach an extra wire to them which did a good job of what needed to be done I'm just really glad the most difficult cable is complete .

Also I did the patches closer to the psu end so they should look nice & clean on the other side .

 

[waynio]

I got back to the fabrication side of things since I can't do any more sleeving until I get the extra heatshrink & wow I really thought this would take a bit longer to do but I breezed through all the windows in a few hours & only a few of them needed a tiny bit of filing to fit in lol but it looks like the alu needs giving a nice finish again & the edges of the acrylic still need sanding so they are nice & smooth which should keep me busy for tomorrow .

Of course I'd love to rip the protective backing off to show it off good but I want to keep it all perfect for when the time is right .

So I thought about reducing the scuffs the jigsaw leaves by covering the base of it with masking tape, it worked .

Here is the 1000mm x 500mm x 3mm light tint acrylic ready marked, was nice & simple to do, just plonked the side panels on & traced around the holes.

First panel done.

Both panels done.

At this rate if I go & buy a bunch of clamps this week some time I could do the acrylic curve this week also but I still need to add sata data pass through holes on the motherboard tray.

 

[waynio]

its nice to see a mod of this scale with tools that everyone can get there hands on, keep up the great work!

Many thanks Akempster & yeah I've been using very basic tools on this project, I'd say the most advanced tool I used on this was the 12" disc sander & I've barely used the drill press on this project, 99% normal power drill .

Are you going to cut out the individual bits of light-tint acylic (and if so how're you going to attach them?) or just glue the whole sheet to the back of the side panels?

Not going to, they are individually cut out & in place I'm going to run a quick test to see if the acrylic adhesive shows up, if it doesn't then they'll be stuck to a 2mm sheet of clear acrylic but if it does leave a visible mess I'll bolt them to it on all the ends .

Hey Mate, do me a favor, will you PM me or drop me an email, details in trust, i would like to speak with you but it may be against the OCUK Boards rules with what i would like to ask.

Many thanks darling!

Hmmm the Many thanks darling! bit slightly creeps me out lol but I'll PM you .

 

[waynio]

Hmmm the Many thanks darling! bit slightly creeps me out lol but I'll PM you .

Hmm I don't know how to lol.

Sussed it & sent.

 

[waynio]

Here is a sample of the light tint acrylic stuck to the 2mm clear acrylic, can't say I'm impressed really but maybe it would look better than bolts especially if I only used a faint blob on the edges of the ends of the windows, other option would be to make sure it all gets an even coat of the adhesive so it's all uniform.

 

[waynio]

Is that laying on bog roll?? lol

Yep lol it looked a cleaner background to show the piece compared to the shiny white foam board , my kodak easyshare struggles with macro photograhy.
I'll need to run a couple more tests to see if the acrylic adhesive can be used without being able to see the lines from the edge of the adhesive.

 

[waynio]

How about clear adhesive tape? couple of strips laid out side-by-side to cover the tinted piece, then just stick it to the clear bit... you'll never see the tape as long as there's no gaps or overlaps

Lines would show way clearer than this adhesive even if laid perfect + it wouldn't have much strength thanks for trying to help though mate.

Hot melt glue on the sides?
Very fine layer of clear epoxy on the edges of acrylic to join to ally?

No lol that would look really messy thanks for trying suggestions though .
I'm not looking to fix the multiple windows to the alu, my idea is to fix the windows to 1 clear piece & bolts to mount the clear piece to the alu so it's removable .

Well I'm very eager to get these windows stuck but I'm gonna have to wait for the glue syringes to arrive so I can apply it better, dunking something in the glue & trying to apply it is just not gonna happen as it leaves a trail of adhesive & makes applying it a nightmare lol so instead took a few more pics of the side panel & 1 piece peeled back a bit as a teaser lol & it's in the best lighting possible broad daylight.

Hopefully I'll be able to continue really soon.

Nearly forgot to add the following.
Going off the testing I just done though I'll go with applying a tiny blob of the adhesive to both ends & the middle to fix the windows to a 1 piece clear acrylic internal panel that bolts on from the outside, it will give a slight imperfection to the windows but it'll look better than bolts I think .

 

[waynio]

Its a shame you couldn't get a thicker sheet and routed out the shapes to give a flush fit.

Yeah a nice 1 piece click in window would be great but still need to get around to getting a router & getting a load of practice in with it but this adhesive will still be good, only it'll have a some minor imperfections that hopefully would only be seen under macro photography but to be honest I think routing that would be exceptionally difficult even just for 1 of the windows, I'd say that would be more of a job for a cnc mill.

I noticed with a full coat of the adhesive looking through it it makes things appear wobbly so that isn't a good idea, I considered using bolts but that would look wrong if all the windows had 2 or 3 bolts in each window so I'm making a tiny compromise by adding tiny blobs of the clear adhesive where I'd have used bolts, this tensol 12 is the strongest adhesive I ever come across so it'll hold perfectly well, even after soaking it in hot water & using a thin blade it is very very difficult to separate without breaking it .