Timpelay

Sounds like it will be the front picture, you know for public vote and such. But that's my guess.

I'm really happy with the result, that's for sure! Yeah, another chance next year mate. I got on really late but with this idea there was all in or nothing.

Finished! Final words. This has been so much fun to build! Other than hardware and water cooling, I've added a total of 10 screws and with that I've created a desktop sleeper/killer gaming PC. Only by removing material at key places, this organizer is transformed and will live a new life serving happy gaming experiences. I've built "found object mods" before but never like this. Beeing able to focus completely on reuse and to try my very best not to add any extra material has been awesome. I hope you like it, my collegues will probably think I'm fooling them with just a bunch of PC parts stuffed away.

Hello there my little friend! The drawers can of obvious reasons not be pulled out one at the time from the front side of the organizer. But slack in cables makes it possible to get them out a bit. Middle drawer with the pump/res combo located in the front is reachable. This means I can fill from here if nessesary allthough my plan is to use the dedicated port at the top connected to the radiators. Soft tubes in smoth radius bends is appealing but also key to keep the drawers movable You can't even tell from an angle like this that it's a gaming PC hidden inside. Incredible! Lets fill it up and get it running some games to try how sufficient the cooling actually is!

Another benefit with reusing hardware or as in this case, an entire system. Just power up and Windows is ready (except some updates due to months of downtime..) All I have to do with software is updates and tune in the fan controller for my new pump and fan setup. Wonderful with only a couple of days left to deadline! Super easy to test the PC outside the organizer frame before mounting the drawers. Final assembly may seem a bit tricky but coming from the back I can just make a tower with everything connected. Then carfully sliding all drawers into place. Took at most 10 minutes to wire the drawers and get them in. Final work is to do some external tube routing. Sweet to work with that with alot of space! One sneaky...

Top drawer - Cooling unit Dual 240 mm slim radiators and x4 120 mm Cooler Master Masterfan. Fulling air through the rads. Added an extra pass through to get a fill port from the outside even when the system is installed in the organizer frame. Will probably make filling alot easier as I'll have limited access to the hardware later on. The drawers rest on shelves inside the frame which does not cover the entire area. However, I modified for better airflow and easier routing of cables, especially the riser coming from bottom to middle drawer.

Middle drawer - Pump/res combo and Graphics card This pump/res combo is a super tight fit but clears just about perfect. It's not the best way to have it laying down but with quite a large tank and filling ability through radiators way above it there should not be a problem with air. Got the large hole hidden under the GPU for riser pass through and power cables. That Lignum block on the RTX 2080Ti FE is just gorgeous! Mounted it with bolted riser at the back of the drawer and enough space to connect display cables at the far end. Using shims under the fittings to support the weight and hold the GPU in place.

Bottom drawer - Mobo and PSU Placed the motherboard where I wanted it, marked holes and mounted it with spacers and screws. As the hardware is reused from a previous project, CPU, RAM, SSD and waterblock was already mounted. So I just removed the CPU-block and replaced the termal paste with new fresh one. Black rotary fittings, black ZMT tube and black Torque STC 12/16 soft tube fittings. Looks perfect together with Lignum block. PSU installed. Sits perfect next to the mobo and the shorter cables provided with this SFX is spot on in length. It's a bit tight at the back of this drawer and I had to place the pass-throughs between the hardware. By using a longer tube for the lower port I will give acces for the riser to the PCI-e slot.

Middle drawer will be home for graphics card and pump/res combo. As the grahics card is too long to fit on the "short end" without having the I/O ugly sitting on the outside I will place the entire card in the drawer and just route the Hdmi cable out to the screen through a hole instead. Pump/res in the front of the drawer and GPU at the back. Riser going to mobo through a hidden hole under GPU. Top drawer got holes for water (at the top right corner of the picture) to and from radiators. Middle drawer got two holes aswell. Perfect use of the 90 degree addon when drilling from the inside. Drilling from both sides gives clean holes. Allthough I'll use pass-through fittings for all water holes. Mobo and PSU will sit at the bottom drawer with I/O and connectors in cut-outs Now I'm getting somewhere! I've removed the back board which acts as a stop for the drawers. I will actually mount all drawers from this backside keeping the separating planes at the front. Giving it the total original look. The planes will also give me gaps between drawers, which will (according to my experience) provide large enough area for sufficient air flow.

Finishing post! Made a couple of (IMO) important details to add to the finished project. Tried two sizes for my logo but decided for the small one. It's laser engraved gold plastic. The CM logo-bar will be the front emblem and here I decided for the mirror instead of the gold. Protective plastic is on, that's why they look crappy. I matched my logo size to fit perfect to the pattern. Showing this is a Timpelay build! One thing I haven't mentioned earlier is the back section of the side where the hardware is visible. Here I just got a 15 mm frame mounted leaving the section open air, which is how I want to try it out and how I will take photos of it. But I've also designed a window with a 15 mm painted frame to replace this open frame and seal off the hardware and control the air flow precise. Again, super important. Last leak test with the loop now complete. Air tight! Also attached this power cord extention for the photoshoot which makes it easier to route the cable when moving the PC around for the photos. EK Cryofuel going in! I always use premix cryofuel and never been dissapointed what so ever. Thank you guys for following the project and stay tuned for final photos!

Top aluminium cover modified and mounted back on the detachable fan cover. Just like nothing happened to it hehe.. And yes, the fans fit with 1-2 mm clearance for the screws to the radiator

Finally got my last package of Halo fans (last weekend before dealine) so could mount them at the front and route the cables nice and final. Front outer frame also mounted and time for power on! It's alive! A quick power on to se that all RGB lights up as planned before putting it back together for final leak test and filling. The good thing about having a full nickel block is that I can idle in bios for some minutes without even going over 50 C in CPU temp. Middle mesh part of the front back in.

Top radiator needed some decoration so made a grille using the same pattern as for the side rads but cut it from mirror acrylic. This will spread the light from the fans inside the case and reflect those pipes and tubes gorgeous. So I removed the top rad again which is super easy with the hex tool and EK micro 90 degree fittings. Protective plastic still on: Protective plastic removed! Installed at the top. I want this inside to feel lika a luxury hall! With all cables installed as they should at the back I mounted the pump/res combo and the cover plate. It may look a bit stupid and chunky with it sticking out at the back like this. But once the outer frame of the case that goes to the back is mounted (using original magnets) it all makes sense, you'll see.

Both bottom bars mounted, time to sort out all cables. Since there's so much RGB sources I'll feed some from the mobo header and add another powered adapter to run the rest from. All will share same input from mobo to sync. Tieing up power cables at the back of the distro. Gave them some slack length for better routing. The 12 pin PCIe cable needed some combs so I made a few test to get the size right. Wanted to keep them as small and clean as possible but still holding up. Final pieces was laser cut from 4 mm thick clear acrylic. Mmh now we're talking smooth.

I hope to encourage CM to do it! Can't be that hard, just cut their tooling in half hehe

Thanks mate! That's what this project is all about. The layout will ofc show that this is a mod, but the case itself will create a "what the heck feeling" when it looks just out of the box.

Top rad and fans final assembly (I thought so) Look at the clearance. Seems to be made for the case. Or the case is made for the rad It sure looks high with the fans mounted but I'll have 1 mm clearance to the top. That's the differens with having the abillity to go with a 44 mm rad in the top also instead of having to step down to a 25 mm slim.

As the frame has been shortened I could reuse 2 of 4 holes for the bars. Marked up the new ones using the actual bar as template to get it 100%. Just look at this! Frickin EPIC. Doesn't even look strange with the propotions. To shame I don't have one more Cosmos to put next to this one to get a hang of the size difference. I'm not sure a banana will do but I'll have to get one in there

I mentioned the bars early in this log and said I have to go get help to weld them back together at the right length, but I tried something else that I could pull off myself at first! Got all bars marked up and cut with a jiggsaw. Then I sanded the edges flat and 90 degrees. I will use epoxy glue made for metal (including aluminium) and reinforce the bond with a threaded M4 in the middle. Also made some extra dots with the drill in each part to get the glue to fill and grip a bit better. Everything seems alright and I let them stay there for 24 h as said required for full strength. Put some putty on the connection, let it dry out. Sanded and cleand them really smooth. Now with fresh paint! Super happy! Also put the rubber feet back on to the lower bars and placed them directly under the points where the bars attach to the case frame. That will put a minimum of stress to the bond with the bars not want to twist with some load on them

I've been thinging back and forth what to do with the middle front aluminium piece. Then I figured, just make it gold! I got this thin gold plastic at home that I'd try to bend and fit nicely to the front. That would turn out to be a fail.. Got the parts marked out and the plate with thin double sided tape. Just have to bend the gold to fit the radius. Well this plastic, no idea what it is, was not meant to be bent. I heated it but as soon as it reached a temperature when it lost it stiffnes it deformed. It also stayed somewhat elastic and even with over heating I could not form it correct and when cooldown it lived its own life. Tried with two pieces and all I got was wasted precious time and some burns. After a rage-quit I thought I had to accomplish something this late at night so worked the mesh on the front instead. With some precision cutting and focus this turned out awesome. You can't see the split unless you look close direct at it!

Top cover getting new LEDs and I/O panel mounted again. Superb that with the I/O coming from a large case the cables are very long. This means I'll be able to route them down and under the internal layout and keep them totally hidden. Last cable to finish was the 12 pin and here I used the original cable from the PSU together with the Nvidia adapter included with the graphics card. Then I used my multimeter to find the correct pinout making my 12 pin Nvidia to 2x 8 pin for the PSU. Better to be safe here than gamble!

Front fans of the original case is attached using a steel frame. Instead of modding that one I made my own custom panel with the fans lined up perfectly with the fans on the radiators. No grille, just holes will optimize air flow and supply from the front. This panel will aslo give me a bit of space between the side of the radiators and the front, where I can route front I/O cables, fan cables and RGB.

Change of LEDs continues with the front piece. New strip in original place. I also reattached the push pin contact at the bottom which aloows the front to be removed completely without disconnecting any cables. At this time, I'll go with the standalized a/dRGB header but I wanted to keep the connector if I decide to change it later on. Only thing needed then is an adapter cable from strips to connector. There it is, 170 mm shorter and glued back together.

CPU tubes in! Diagnoal lines and the logo in the middle The shape of the tubes will also make it possible to change RAM without draining. Something that happens to be a problem while going over the slots.