Project Anticipation

[Emakcin]

Hey,

I started working on this build for a school project together with two friends who also made a case each (similar but not identical to mine).

The school project this was made for is something every student in Sweden needs to do to graduate from the Swedish version of high school. We chose to design and build a computer case and make a website on which we have build logs, a few video logs and guides on how to build a computer. 

 

Computer Components:

CPU: Core i7 4790k @ 4.4GHz
GPU: 2x HD7970 Core @ 1170Mhz Memory @ 1620Mhz
Motherboard: Asus z97 Gryphon Armor Edition
Ram: 8GB Corsair Vengeance LP 1600Mhz
SSD: 1x Corsair Force GT 120GB
HDD: 1x Seagate 1TB
PSU: Corsair RM750W 80+ gold
Sound Card: Creative Soundblaster Z

Water cooling:

Radiators: 1x Alphacool NexXxos ut60 360mm
1x Alphacool NexXxos xt45 240mm
CPU-block: EK-Supremacy – Acetal
GPU-block: EK FC7970 - Acetal CSQ
Pump: Alphacool VPP655 + EK-D5 X-top CSQ
Reservoir: Phobya Balancer 250 Svart nickel
Tubing: Monsoon akrylrör 16/13mm Clear
Fittings: Monsoon Hardline 16/13 – Economy white
Monsson rotary 90° - White
Alphacool L-connector 90° - G1/4 revolvable – 2x inner thread
Variable SLI/Crossfire connection nipple G1/4" - 1 Slot - matte black
Fans: 5x Enermax Magma 120mm

 

CAD:ing started in Mars/April last year and building started in August by cutting the aluminum profiles.

Side view of the CAD model I made.

Same as above but without the side panel

Seen from the front at an angle.

Pretty much all the profiles needed for all the cases (only one of the piles is for mine). 

This is the pile of aluminum for one case, mine was a little different however because i wanted to make the front, top and little part in between as a single piece of aluminum

To bend the aluminum, I would have ideally wanted to use tools, but because I didn't have access to any I had to saw half-way through then use a short plank to get even pressure over the bend

Before I started bending it, I made radiator templates from our CAD in solidworks and sawed out the holes 

The sawed out fan holes for the radiators.

Bending the front/top.

The front/top combo bent.

Hole for the windowed side sawed out.

The windows piece itself sawed out.

These are the first holes I made for the magnets. The plan was to use magnets and hinges to hold the side panels in place, unfortunately we couldn't think of a good way to make hinges look good and we used too few/weak magnets to be able to only use magnet so I had to make a little piece that holds on to the profile at the bottom so that the magnets aren't affected by the force downwards. For the new design I had to place the magnets in an upside-down shaped U instead of the sideways U like in the picture.

Riveting has begun, relly started to feel like everything was coming together at this point.

We 3D-printed several things, one of which is this cover for the rubber feet. It's just for aesthetics, the rubber feet themselves are a tiny bit higher than these so the case doesn't stand on these.

We bought the motherboard tray, because without a CNC router or any other precision cutting we didn't feel like we would have the precision to get all the holes right. The other piece in this picture is the extender that I made, it will hold the HDD, SSD and reservoir. They are connected using a few pieces we also 3D-printed.

How it looks when test fitting it in the case.

The case without the motherboard tray and extender.

How the front looks after having riveted everything (mostly) together

I 3D-printed a holder for the HDD.

Cable routing hole behind the motherboard tray. 

I used some special nuts that worked kind of like rivets to be able to use screws to fasten the other side panel.

Sleeving has finally arrived

All the cables I need done. 2x 6-pin PCI-e power, 2x 8-pin PCI-e power and 24-power. I chose to not sleeve the 8-pin CPU power because you can't really see it.

Test fitted most of the components to see if I had to make any last tweaks before painting (since paint would most likely be ruined if I had to make changes afterwards).

Spray painting the fan frames, handle for the side panel, and some more of the small things that I wanted to make white.

One of the Enermax Magma with its frame painted white instead of stock black.

Case spray painted and covered in white vinyl. 

The final assembly can finally start. 

I placed the SSD in the top corner behind the motherboard.

The first piece of acrylic tube heated and bent to fit between the CPU and GPUs.

Tubing mounted between CPU and GPU.

There was a smaller leak before this one, but this one was terrible. It came from the GPU block itself (not from where one of the fittings were attached. I brought this on myself. One of the graphics cards (the one that had the leak) didn't have a reference pcb which I thought it did when I bought it. When I then tried to attach the block to the card, it didn't fit as good the reference card I had from before. So I tried modding the block by milling some of the acetal away. What I didn't see at this point was that I milled too deep into the block so the water could leak out. This meant that water had leaked all over the card but fortunately I hadn't powered on anything but the pump while filling so nothing got destroyed, I only had to dry the card off and fixed the hole in the block with 2-part epoxy glue. 

Final computer without the windows sidepanel on its shelf above my monitors.

Same picture but with the side panel

Front view at an angle.

Overview of my setup.

Final picture, used a longer exposure time all LEDs look way brighter on the picture than they really do.

 

 

Thank you very much for watching, and good luck to all contestants =)