Project: Elegant-Li

Project: Elegant-Li

Hi all. I have been out to of modding game for quite a while now. I try to pop in when I can but it is nowhere near as much as I would like. I come to you all with a new project. Something that I have been planning and pondering for the better part of 8 months now and actually started just before Christmas 2010. I was planning on having this project finished by now but since Uni finished for the year late last November I have had set back after setback. The most major setback being work with a close second coming to a project car I purchased, an AE86 Toyota Corolla Levin :D. Well enough excuses for now, lets start with some background.

Background:
I originally got the idea for this project when one of my friends fathers asked me to build him a new desktop. He gave me $1000AUD and 1 week to bring him a quote and a build running PC, I delivered his request in little under 4 days. When searching for a nice budget case I came across the Lancool PC-K series of cases. For the size and the price the cost was quite cheap and from what I could gather online they were a nice reliable chassis. I ended up choosing to make the build in a Lancool PC-K58 and knew straight away that I had chosen the right case for the job. With tons of space for all the latest hardware, relatively good looks, good cooling and a great price I knew straight away that I had found my next project case but there were a few things that bugged me about it, the plastic and the weight. I knew at the time that Lancool were pretty much a budget version of Lian Li so I jumped on the Lian Li website to find which case they modeled the PC-K58 on, that's when I found the Lian Li PC-P50. I settled on this to be the perfect case for my new project. A relatively roomy case without being too large and made entirely out of aluminum were a few of the qualities that swayed my decision.

Design:
This project was initially going to be a complete white project called "Snow" but after receiving the Lian Li and just seeing the quality and beauty of the brushed black exterior panels I couldn't bring myself to paint it. I then re-named the project "Elegant-Li" and decided to keep the exterior as is while making a few structural modifications and painting the interior white.

In terms of modifications I have a few up my sleeve. I'll be performing the standard mods such as a case window and adding a false floor but I will also be doing a few extra things that I will keep secret for now.

As with my last build (Lexa), i will be incorporating a water cooling system into the design. It won't be over the top and I wont go into the details right now because I haven't finished working out the details yet.

The colour scheme as stated above will be a black exterior with a white interior. I haven't decided between black, gray, or white cable sleeving yet but that's not a major issue. The water cooling will consist of either a single or duel loop (still haven't decided) with dark blue coolant.

The entire interior will be lit with the help of a few pure white LED strips.

For those who followed my previous build you would know that I'm not one to put my thoughts to paper as picture form very often. Here is a teaser of how (I hope) this project will turn out.

That's all for today, call it a teaser. I hope to get some actual progress shots up tomorrow night. Until then.

Happy Modding.

Project: Elegant-Li is sponsored Speedy IT Services!

http://speedyitservices.com.au/
Speedy IT is a local IT group run by a good friend of mine who I met through my Uni degree. Speedy IT Services specialize in PC repairs and website design but also sell hardware, software and watercooling products. I helped Paul (the owner) get things going and it is great to see the busines take off in the local market. When Paul decided he wanted to build his first water cooled PC just under 12 months I helped him get everything organised from the ground up and to repay me he agreed to be my sponsor for this current build.

Gotcha J buddy!!!! Nice to see you working again!! I cant wait to see what you up too!!! Mod on! :) :)

Thanks Alex, I wont dissapoint ;).

Looking forward.

Cheers buddy.

Ok, sorry for the delay in the updates guys but the start of the new University year has kept me pretty busy for the last few weeks, I had a lot of preparation to do.

Even though I have done a bit of work on this project I am going to start the updates right back at the start.

Lets start with the un-boxing :D.

Well here is how the case arrived at the post office for me:

As you can see it was wrapped nicely with no signs of damage.

How nice of them :D.

A shot of the box itself:

At this point I was quite excited to tear this box open and admire the case until I saw this:

They had sent me the wrong case :(. I ordered the bog stock Lian Li PC-P50 and they sent me the higher end model with flashy lights, a black interior and a case window. I was quite angry about this, a simple mistake to make yes because the only differentiation between the two cases is the sticker on the box. The company I purchased the case through dispatched a courier to exchange the incorrect case with the correct one. I have to give PC Case Gear props though, they made the exchange very quickly and hassle free, the didn't complain and they were very apologetic, a great bunch of guys.

Here are some pics of the case as it was straight out of the box:

The entire construction of the PC-P50 is aluminum excluding 1 piece, you'll see it in the second picture of the case, where the Lian Li badge is mounted. I have always heard of the quality of Lian Li cases but never expected it to be as good as it was, everyone should have the pleasure to work with a Lian Li case at least once.

Well that's the un-boxing out of the way, now we can look at some goodies I purchased for this project :D.

Soon after receiving the correct case I received a few bits and pieces that I intend to use in this project:

What we have here are 5x 120mm Noiseblocker PL-2 1400rpm fans, 1x 100mm Scythe 1000rpm fan and 2x Scythe Himuro drive bay HDD coolers.

A shot of the Noiseblocker fans:

A shot of the Scythe fan:

And a few shots of the Scythe Himuro coolers:

Well the fans are pretty self explanatory, to move air but the amount of them is due to them being on sale :D. That's also why I settled on the Scythe Himuro, it looks awesome and does what I want it to do, it was also 2 for the price of 1 lol.

Next up i'll be stripping the case.

When stripping a case I find it best to pretty much remove everything that is held in by a screw first before grabbing my drill.

I started by removing the the drive bay dividers/supports as well as the HDD caddy.
Before:

After:

I then removed all of the body panels including side panels, top panel and front fascia along with anything else I could remove from the interior. Here is what it looked like after I was done:

I then took the case with me down to the shed and let lose with the drill. The first thing to come out was the drive bays:

A picture of the removed drive bays:

The next thing to come out was the motherboard tray:

A picture of the removed tray:

The last thing to come out was the PCI retention plate:

Now I'll explain why I removed these three key parts of the chassis. Because I intend to make a false floor so I can house the water cooling gear unseen these three pieces of the case had to be removed. The drive bays have been sacrificed so I can make my own to suit my needs, something smaller and something that looks a little bit nicer. The new drive bays will house both the optical drive and HDDs hence the need for the Scythe Himuro bay coolers. The motherboard tray was removed once again so I can make my own. The stock tray is too tall and would interfere with my radiators. It is also not long enough to cover the entire length of the case. Because I want to keep the project as clean as possible a new tray is needed to suit my needs. The PCI bracket was removed because it will be in the way of the false floor. This card has 8 PCI slots, most conventional motherboards have only 7, the extra slot is needed space so I am going to modify the original to suit.

Now that the case is a skeleton I am ready to start work on the case itself.

When it came to tackling the case I decided to work on the front fascia first, mainly because I knew it needed to be done before I started the drive bays. Also I didn't have any sheet aluminum yet so this was all I could really do lol.

Due to Lian Li's design, the drive bay covers that aren't in use clip into the stock drive bays. Because I am not using the stock drive bays and because all my bays will be covered I need a way to attach the covers to the front fascia itself rather then the case.

Here is the front fascia and drive bay covers:

I started by marking:

Cutting:

Filling:

And bending:

And was left with what you can see above.

This is how the bay covers look when installed into the front fascia.
From behind:

And from the front:

Perfect fit :D.

Now obviously the masking tape will not stay there permanently, it was just to help the plates stay in place as I made minor adjustments to the bends to get them all to sit flat. I will eventually replace the masking tape with either a strip of black electrical tape or a gel strip just to ensure the plates aren't moved out of place by accident.

Well that's all I have time to post up for today guys. I promise I will have more for you soon. Until then.

Happy Modding.

You have an incredible attention to detail. Subbed :)

Thanks Blibbax, glad to have you on board :D.

I really like what I see. Can't wait to see where it goes. Subbed.

Thanks DynamoNED.

Somehow I missed this when you started it. :( Looks like it should be awesome! I love Lian-li cases. :D

Cheers mate, I should hopefully have so progress up over the next few weeks.

Well I'll give you guys a sort of teaser update because it's been so long between updates. Well as some of you may know it was my birthday on the 7th so using some money I acquired I decided it was finally time to bite the bullet and go shopping. Here are the specs of my new PC that will be housed in this build:
CPU - Intel i5 2500K
Motherboard - Gigabyte GA-P67A-UD5-B3
RAM - G.Skill Ripjaws X F3-12800CL7D-8GBXH (2x4GB)
GPU - Zotac GTX570
PSU - Corsair AX850
HDD1 (OS) - OCZ Vertex 2 60GB
HDD2 (Games) - Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB
HDD3 (Media) - WD Caviar Green 2TB
Sound Card - Auzentech X-Plosion Cinema 7.1

That pretty much covers everything. I'm buying everything brand new for this build except the Samsung HDD and the sound card, I salvaged those from LEXA.

I'll leave that to sit for now. I should be getting all my orders by the end of next week so I'll have some pics for you all. Starting next week I also have some time to work on this project so keep your eyes peeled :D.

Oooh, pretty. :D


...you're gonna fold with that, right? :whistler:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by x88x

Oooh, pretty. :D


...you're gonna fold with that, right? :whistler:

---

Maybe occasionally :D.

Firstly I would like to apologize for the lack of updates. Uni last semester was hell and I only got 1 day a week to myself which was usually occupied with mounting homework tasks. I have made some progress since my last update (mostly taken place over the last few days) and I am very happy with where this project is going. Most structural modifications have been made and everything is looking great.

No pics in this update however but I promise you there will be a nice juicy update before the week is out! Also, I smell a sponsor lurking on the horizon ;).

Yay! :banana:

It's Alive!!!!!

Alright, as promised here is an update of what I had completed since my last update.

To make my plans of installing a false floor a reality I had to trim down the PCI slot bracket to give me enough room to clear my radiators. The Lian Li PC-P50 has 8 PCI slots so you can have the luxury of installing additional USB ports or extension cards without giving up any of your PCI slots.
I trimmed the plate down with the Dremel and this is how it turned out:

Next up I made a cover plate for the inside of the case roof. Unusual I know but after you see how the roof looks as standard you will understand why:

Pretty ugly right?

Before I could measure for and mount the new plate I needed to trim away some aluminium tabs from the inside of the case so it would all sit flush.
This is what it looked like before:

And this is what it looks like after I finished with it:

Yes the cuts are still a bit rough but they will be dealt with later.

Now that that was done i cut and test fitted the plate that I cut from a sheet of 1mm aluminium I have laying around.
Here are the pics of the process:

Fits like a glove :D.

This top plate is nearly done. I just need to cut some holes for the twin roof mounted 140mm fans to breathe but I am still deciding on my design of choice for the grills.

Next up I made myself a new motherboard tray. My first attempt at cutting one and bending rivit tabs failed miserably so I took a different route the second time around. The reason for me making my own motherboard tray is simple because the stock one only stretches only 2/3 the way accross the tray and extends too low, getting in the way of my radiator placement. Considering I am removing the drive bays entirely and making new ones, this new motherboard tray will take the roll of structural support.

So I measured and cut myself a nice piece of aluminium to fullfill the role of the new motherboard tray.
Here is the test fit:

Pretty much fit straight after cutting, I did have to file a few edges done to get it perfect though.

I have decided the easiest way to mount the motherboard tray to the case is with the use of some thick right angle aluminium. I have a length that gives me perfect spacing and the tray will sit in its stock location with no cuttting or modifying at all. The angle aluminium will be attached to the motherboard tray using some epoxy and some countersunk bolts. The bolt heads will be covered with body filler and smoothed over so when painted you will never know they are there.

Here are a few shots of how this will work:

Here is how the tray will sit in the case, the top plate is there also for reference:

The motherboard tray is pretty much done. All that needs to be done is for me to cut some holes for cable management and tap some holes for motherboard standoffs, i'll tackle these later once everything is mounted securely.

Now that I have the top plate and the motherboard tray sorted (well cut atleast) I moved onto getting the false floor sorted.

Once again I started by measuring up and cutting another piece of aluminium plate:

I had to notch the two corners of the plate because it wouldn't fit correctly in the case thanks to the Lian Li's rolled edges:

Here is how the case looks with all 3 panels test mounted:

looking pretty good IMO.

Well thats all for now. The next thing for me to tackle is getting all of those panels mounted than I will worry about drilling or cutting any additional holes and things like that. Once I have everything mounted I also need to make up a new set of drive bays as well as make a dummy flate for the front of the case (internally). After that I am pretty much finished with having to make anything from scratch for this project and I will be able to get everything assembled again for a test fit before I tackle the side pannels.

Well I hope you enjoyed this update (about time), I will try to get atleast monthly updates up from here on out. Until next time...

Happy Modding.

Images resized, enjoy.

Just a small update for tonight everyone. I have some nice new watercooling goodies coming my way thanks to a sponsor so stay tuned for some pics when they come in. I am expecting some bits and pieces early next week.

I have made some slight progress with the mod itself but nothing worth mentioning just yet so you will have to wait and see :D.

awesome!!

Thanks mate, I have been doing some work on it recently. Hopefully ther ewill be an update tomorrow.

Stay tuned, update this week.

Well I have been doing a bit of work on how all my newly cut panels will be mounted. Originally I was going to go with countersunk bolts tapped into some angle aluminium but not only was this a lot more work it was unsightly.

This is what I have decided to do.
I start off with countersinking some holes into my aly panels:

Next I drill some holes in some alu angle bar which I cut to size earlier:

And hey presto, rivet the two together:

Now I know it seems I didn't really solve my problem of it being unsightly but I have an ace up my sleeve. When I countersunk the holes for the rivits I made sure I sunk deep enough so the entire rivet head sat below the surface of the alu. I intend to use an automotive body filler to fill these holes and once I sand the filler flat and paint the panels the panel mounts will be unseen.

I am currently in the process of mounting the alu angle bracket on my unmounted panels and once that is done I can start putting everything back together. I will have more pics on this over the next few weeks hopefully. There is still one more panel I need to make but I can't do that until the motherboard tray, and floor are mounted atleast. This panel is also holding me back from making my drive bays. This step has taken longer then I would have hoped but I would rather have everything mounted properly first then having to go back and re-do my work.

Unfortunately that's all I have time for today. I have been kept busy with uni, work and a side project I am working on for my sponsor. Speaking of sponsors my goodies should be coming in next week sometimes, they got held up in customs for a week :D. I will post pics once my stuff comes in. Until then...

Happy Modding.

This is going to look super sharp!

Looks great. Always impressed with people's metal work skills. I don't think the rivits look unsightly either, but the filler will look good too.

@ Fuganater - I hope so :D.

@ Espie79 - Thanks for the kind words.

My sponsor goodies came in today so I thought it would be time to introduce my sponsor :D.

I'd like to introduce Speedy IT Services, a local South Australia stockist of watercooling, hardware and a PC repairer. For more info check out the first post in this thread.

This first lot of stuff is only the gear I had completely made my mind up on. I am still getting a complete parts list together and changing it every 5 mins lol.

First up I have a whole bunch of nice and shiny EK Barbs:

I also got some 90 degree and 45 degree EK fittings as well:

A twin 5mm white LED, also from EK:

The last of this order was a new EK pump top for a second hand DDC I picked up earlier:

Here are some goodies I ordered for myself as well.
I got a Steel Blue dye bomb so I can start experimenting with coolant colours:

A Blue ring illuminated Bulgin switch;

A ModSmart Molex/ATX depinning kit:

2 Bitspower fill/drain ports:

(I will be using these as bulkhead fittings to pass through my custom floor panel.)

And a 120mm black fan grill:

No progress shots for tonight but I did install that nice new EK pump top :D.
Here is the pump as it came, a Swiftech 355:

As you can see it already did come with a pump top but i'm not a fan of the plexi Alphacool tops, not only it is way oversized but it wont be seen so clear plexi is a waste.

And after replacing it with the EK top it looks like this:

Much better IMO.

Well that's it for now. Until next time...

Happy Modding.

That's some nice gear. I like the switch but they are so expensive.

Yeah those Bulgin switches are a bit pricy, that one cost me about $16UAD for a 20mm if I remember correctly, I still need one more, a smaller one for a reset switch, hard to find in Australia though. Thanks for the comment Espie.

they are costly, but they are sooo nice. i used one on my htpc and i was quite impressed with the quality.

Alright I managed to get a little bit of work done over my weekend, not a whole lot but it all leads to bigger and better things. I decided I would try and finish off my custom top plate and this is what happened.

I started with trimming the ugly fan grills from the Lian-Li top mounted fans:

I then marked out on the top plate where the new fan grills will be situated:

I pretty simple design but I believe it will add the the sleekness I am trying to achieve with this project.

It was then time for Mr. Jigsaw to go to work and this is what I got (filed on the right, raw on the left):

While filing I did manage to square off a couple of the rounded corners, this is no big issue however because I can fix this easily with some body filler:

Fits quite well over the fans I must say:

Both holes filed:

And some mesh to go in behind them:

I intend to hammer the mesh into the holes to make it sit flush, the mesh will be painted black to contrast against the white interior.

I still need to do some minor filing but this will be done when I do the final prep before painting. Now that the top plate is done the next step is to rivit it to the top of the case and then the motherboard tray can be mounted. nce I have that done the final location of the floor can be decided :D. Well that's all for now, until next time...

Happy Modding.

I really like the look of the mesh grills when they are flush mounted. Nice clean look.

Nice work ... looking forward to how they come out.

I love flush mounted grills myself so i'm keen to give it a try, the hard part for me is getting mesh, that stuff in the picture is just a little bit too restrictive for my likings. If you look at the picture above you can just see the stock mesh grill through the fans, I want to try and get something like that.

It's gonna look great when you get them in with your attention to detail. :up: