project M8 (CaseLabs M8 workstation build)

Hello there, and welcome to project M8!

The idea:
The idea came when i first saw a post on overclock.net, where a person named Jim showed some prototype pictures of a new case lineup. The company he started was named CaseLabs, and they specialize in high end enthusiast watercooling cases. I knew that this was a case that was build to house a HUGE watercooling system, and wanted to see how far i could push it. Jim was generous enough to offer sending one of his cases all the way to Denmark for me to play with!

The watercooling:
I will put a lot of time into creating a watercooling loop that is simple, silent and easy to fill and bleed. My latest project PC-Beto had its flaws with the watercooling, one being that it was compact, and components was pretty tight screwed together.

Components:
Case:
CaseLabs M8

watercooling:
3*360 mm radiator
2*laing d5 vario pumps
Bitspower fittings

More components will follow as i figure out what to put in:)

And now, lets get to the fun part! This project is going to progress slow since school and other stuff is taking up a lot of time, but i will try to update it on a regular basis! But on to some pictures, since half of you dont read this anyway:D

Enjoy!

Full review of the case:
http://www.itrends.dk/31638/

First, some pictures of the case itself:

As you can see the case is absolutely HUGE and will have plenty of room for loads of watercooling and hardware!

I will be using this combo of pumps and bitspower fittings, and the first update you will see sometime next week will be the mounting of the two pumps to the radiator.

This combo will sit in the psu compartment in the bottom.

Still havent decided weather to use the EK reservoir, or to make one myself. (am i the only one that think that picture want to dance with me?)

For ease of acces, i will use these awsome QD´s. They are 100 times better to work with than other QD´s you can get, and only spill about 1 drop when disconnected.

And just to give you a clue to what the general theme will look like :D

I hope you will enjoy this project, and i sure look forward sharing it with you!

-p0Pe

A great thank goes out to the sponsors of this project, Jim from caselabs for sending me the case, Vincent from bitspower for providing me a huge load of fittings, and Daniel from Coolbits for providing watercooling parts!

And a update already:D (was a little late on updating the beginning of the log here (sorry!) so actually this is a late update lol)

Remember this? That was the project of the day:)

First, i had to mill down a 10 mm alu plate, since i did not have any 5 mm lol! Then bolting them together, and went to war with the mill.

As you can see, i just printed out the cad drawing, and used that as reference.

And on it went. Luckily this mill got "autopilot" so that I can just set it to move at a certain speed, and comfortably take my pictures.

For the detailed parts, I had to use a smaller bit, and then just fill the edges.

Finished middle pieces. The one on the right have been glasblasted, but will need to have another go.

And this is how they mount on the pumps.

And how they mount on the radiator! I will put some rubber pieces under each end to dampen vibrations. Once all of this is mounted I should have a great pump setup:D

And the finished result. Only need to weld it, and then grind it down again, give it another go in the sandblaster and maybe paint it, yet to be decided:D

I must apologize for the lack of updates, but exams are coming up at school, and there is quite a few things to do :)

That's a sweet case to score for free man!

+sub! :D

Thank you guys:)

Well, as the previous alu stands failed duo to not being "weldable" I decided to make some of 6 mm steel! This will provide better rigity, and I made them look better this time!

A picture of the failed alu welds.

Used the old stands as reference, and then bolted them together.

These are the new ones, with the old alu one to the left.

And again, new versus old.

I am going to make the support rods tomorrow, and hopefully get it welded too! Lets hope second time is the charm lol.

If that case is the kind of thing Caselabs is gearing towards I definitely look forward to seeing/hearing more from the company, will definitely be watching this one to see where you go with this beast.

yup aluminum is hard as @#^5 to weld.

Its amazing what you can do with a milling machine lol.

A very nice beginning here, p0Pe. I'm excited to see where this goes from here. +sub

Thank you all:D The steel welds did go a bit better lol!

And welding and filling done! After my .cad exam I picked this up from the workshop. A buddy had welded it in the meantime, and I went straight home and put the pumps on:D

How it looks in its full scale, mounted on the radiator. Did I mention that it is sturdy as hell!?

A close up of the milling. I also countersunk the screw holes for good looks:)

Had to fill about 2 mm off the Bitspower crystal link to get it to fit, but now its like a glove!

Cant decide what color I am going to paint it, but I think that white might be the choice!

Hope you like the end result here:) Now its on to the top!

OK, time for an update!

As you might have noticed by looking at my previous mod, PC-Beto, I like to have tidy cable routing in the case. This will be no different.

The plan is to get a fully modular PSU, and make every cable that have to go to the motherboard, go behind the mobo tray.
To do this, I will be using a 3D printer.

Now, all the haters that sometimes crawl up from their holes yelling "bwuuhuuh CNC machining is killing modding, and it have nothing to do with creativity" better slam their head against a wall and GTFO beacuse this machine is EPIC!

What you see in this picture is the part almost completet with support material at the bottom, and the actual plastic 3d print on top. It is obvious that you cant print into thin air, so it needs some sort of support structure in certain places. Other than that, it works almost just like a normal printer, exept that it prints in multiple layers to give the third dimension.

The finished part, this particular part took 5 hours to print. I could have cut the time down by having set the density of the printet material to 75 percent, but I wanted it to be sturdy.

And this is what I will actually be using it for! Routing the 24 pins cables.

On the backside the cables will run and join with cables from grafic cards and 8 pins, that I have yet to design. Note, this is mearly a prototype, and not likely to look anything like the final version, I just wanted to see if the concept would work, and it most certainly does!

Now, I will have to do some milling into the motherboard plate to make it fit perfectly, and a cover plate will go onto the whole section.

Also wanted to see how it looks when painted black. I need to fill the part down better beacuse you can still see the different layers from the printer. To make it entirely smooth, I have to hit it with some sanding love.

You can also tap it (pun intended)

How the white version would look,

And the black. I think I will stick with black. It seems to fit in the best with the white wirering.

And on another note, I sold my three 360 mm radiators! Replacements should be here within two weeks, and boy am I exited to get them!

Now, back to the drawing board. I have a few cosy hours infront of the computer in a 3d program to kill to finish up the cads to the cable system! And the a few days of printing lol:D

Stay tuned and thanks for reading!

that is a SICK idea! Love it!

I love it too!! very cool!!

as to the question of what color to paint it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9DDpmyPZZA

Another p0Pe mod?! Definitely subbed! Whoo!

Hehe thanks guys:D

Print done!!! Could not wait to get off at work and pick this up:D I had to drive out to the school this morning to start it up beacuse I did not trust that the guy before me had startet the next print in line, and I was right:D

But first of all, I would like to introduce my new psu for this build! Got this one unused from a mate! This puppy should provide plenty of power for the components that will go in, and I highly doubt that I will EVER max it out lol!

Now this is the "not so pritty" part that I want to do something too. Even if sleeved this IMO looks bad.

A thing that I am not to fond of with the case is the round holes in the back and inside. Its a square case, so it need square parts :P

Again, to show the plugs.

But now for the fun stuff!!! Cant tell you how glad I was to see this:P

Parts as they looked in the machine. You can clearly see the brown stuff that is the support material, and the actual "white" stuff that is the plastic.

I printed 6 parts that would tell me if I had all the measurements correct.

Just to show the scale of the parts, here is a picture of some of the stuff. You can see that the printer prints 4 layers per milimeter!

After breaking off the support material, the parts are ready for use! These were easy, but most of the other parts will under normal circumstances need to be put into an acid bath for 10 hours or so.

The two plates you saw before will be put together and mounted here. I need to finish the design and print two more. I have a certain plan to pimp these up further:D They simply "click" together which is very usefull:D

And a shot from the inside.

This is the most important part, so let me show you how I want it to work.
The plan is to take the plugs for the psu, and mount them in this part.

To hold the peices in place, I made a part looking like this to "clamp" into the plug.

This basicly works by keeping the plug pressed up against the other side, where it is fastened in a 1 mm hole as you can see on the pwnzor paint drawing above. The blue part is the "clamp" and the green is the main plug. The black is of course the 8 pin GFX plug that goes into the psu.

This is the place where the clamp goes in, after the 8 pins have been insertet.

And this is how it looks insertet. I can tell you that it will NEVER come out.. And how do I know this? Beacuse this is a test piece, and I need to get that plug out again-.-

And last but not least, This is a preview of how it will look on the psu itself. Please note that this is not how the final version will look! Final version is much bigger, much smarter, and very clever if I have to say it myself:D

Just need to go back and readjust the tolerances on the drawing to make some more room for the plugs. They were not exactly easy to get inthere:D

Hope you enjoyd this update! Stay tuned for the finished part soon!

nice! those look sweet :D

Thank you mate:D

3 more photo´s because I just got it fittet:D I need to take 0.25 mm off the "clamp" plates. But that is already done, and the main part will be printet tomorrow:D

I will be back tomorrow morning:D

Another update :O

Parts as they looked pulled from the printer!

Again,

And as they look with the support material. You can partly see a little "easter egg" I made here:P

After getting the worst support material off, it looks like this

And this:P

And this xD The more support material I can "break" off, the less the acid have to melt away.
And yeah, I really need to cut my nails!

A little size comparison versus a hand that I found lying around.

And then drop it into the acid bath! Looks tasty right? It aint, and it DON'T smell good lol... Like getting a hedgehog shoved up your nose.

Now lets fast forward 15 hours, and the part is ready to take out!

Clean as a whistle:)

Pics of the finished part. You wont really see the "Made by pope" inthere, but I thought it was a fun little thing to do, even tough it will be covered up:P And if anyone should steal the case i have proof its mine trololol!

To cover the hole thing up, I cut this plate. The plan is to cut some sort of pattern in it, don´t quite know what yet. I might print this in 3d instead to get a consistant look.

Last but not least, how it sits on the psu.
"But hey, somethings missing?"
Yup, the lower part will be done seperatly. And why this?

The top part house only wires that will run to the motherboard, and the lower part is going out to everything else. Why this is a good idea, I will show in a later update, since its hard to explain:D

Hope you enjoyd! I have more parts in the printer, so another update is on the way!

dude that is an AWESOEME idea!!

Thank you man! Glad you like it:D I LOVE to make something noone have seen before:D

This will be the last update this week, and its just a little tiny one:) I am curently waiting for some parts that should have been done in the 3d printer, but it is broken again... This time it was a little bit my fault :P But lets not tell that to anyone :D

This is my humble workshop:D Or, when I need to do something, I make that table there lol... This is also where I take most of my photo´s:)

I took a piece of scrap acrylic and cut out a square,

This fittet right into the psu hider (lets just call it that for now:D)

And then the top plates goes over. When a pattern is cut into this, you will then see the acrylic behind:) This will of course be backlit:D

Bump for update? + your pics are bbbbbroke

need some plants in that green house.

Pics were broken duo to server swap:D And I am not really a "plant" man:P

Finally! My package arrived:D

But first, lets have a look at some other stuff I did:

First of all, I will be swapping the EK D5 tops with other ones, since I do not want to be told that I used the wrong fluid if something went wrong with them -.-

I also made a top for the printed part. Dont know if this will be the final one yet, but I think so.

Under UV, it looks like this. When painted black it will not shine trough this much:)

Also made another plate for the back holes with M8 printed into it.

And a go trough thingie - will show more of this in a later update:)

And then these! 390 Euro worth of radiators from Aquacomputer!!! These puppy´s are the BOMB!

Multiple in and out points - will come in handy later when routing hoses!

Since these things are build as 140 mm radiators they barely fit! With barely I REALLY mean barely.

As you can see here, barely means that there is less than a mm to the wall :D Because of this, I have to modify the motherboard tray.

Thats all for now fokes:) Next up - Makin two radiators connect without hoses!

Pictures are still broke dude... please fix.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

Pictures are still broke dude... please fix.

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pictures are fine here

Ditto...

Time to clear out your cache?

Sorry must be the work. They don't like the host your using.

My server was down duo to a server swap:D So I dont think you are going insane bro:P

Time to get on with this, so it will be somewhat ready to S7 Lan at my school:P

First of all, I have been busy with some other stuff that I will post tonight, or tomorrow:D But i will give you a teaser:

Anyways, on to the big and expensive thing that I am about to cut holes in :D

So, as mentioned earlier i had to cut off a piece of the mobo tray to make it fit with the radiators.

Also had to cut off the two thingies that I think is supposed to hold some feets for the mobo tray, if you want to use it as a bench table :D

Like a glove! Fits lovely in there! :)

So, got my hands on some raw material! From this,

I made this. But what is it? I will show in a min.

First, I cut a hole in the case :D This hole lines up with the radiator in the other side. You see, instead of connecting the two radiators with tubes, I will just connect them with the piece shown in the previous pic.

So just put it in, make it go into the radiator on the other side aaand...

Mount radiator number two:) Saves me a couple of fittings, and it looks darn clean!

Here you can see it connected to the two radiators:)

That was all for now fokes. I have some dye coming in, so that I can hopefully colour the 3d printed stuff in a real black, and not some brownish like the last dye I got :(

I've been hoping for an update on this. I wish we had LAN parties when I was in school :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

I've been hoping for an update on this. I wish we had LAN parties when I was in school :(

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Me too :(

The closest I had was playing Midtown Madness with friends in computer class instead of learning HTML lol :whistler:

I almost got suspended for installing Half-Life on all the computers in school and playing during class with everyone. Haha we had a great time.

Well I meant a sanctioned LAN party. We installed CS: Source Gun Game on VM's and played that all the time.

Billygoat, you BAAAAD boy.

Sorry for not keeping this log up to date guys! Will not happen again, I promiss! :)

First of all, a youtube video of a test reservoir I made



And Just to show how good my measures is on this thing:P

Just wanted to show you all how this thing works, as it really is not a reservoir lol.

This is how the water will flow, coming in in the bottom and exiting in the top.

And for the connections - The main reason to make this thing was because I thought it would look cool (lol) and because setting the pump and radiator together by itself would look dumb.
So how it works now is that the pump pumps the water into the, lets just call it the showoff reservoir for now, and then into the radiator. The acrylic tubes in the picture will of course be replaced with some longer ones:P

The main reservoir will sit in the front and occupy the three 120 mm fanslots there (did anyone say 40 mm POM?)

Wasnt quite satisfied with the old interioir, so I came up with a new design. Pictures say more than words so enjoy these renders:)

It is done!!! Just need some finishing up with some sandpaper:rock:

Old prototype versus finished version:)

And the back. The two bitspower stop fittings will be replaced by some LED plugs of course:D

Finished the big reservoir! I apoligize for the pics, I need to clean it with destiled water and sand it some more:P

And here you can see the slot for the water filter:D

Enjoy:) Next up is the cover plate, and finding o-rings :D

And here we go. Cant cheat you guys can I now:P

The two babies together:)

Here you see half of the filter in place.

And a picture of the countersunk screws on the small reservoir.

And in its full state. I still need to sink one of the holes, but I need a smaller countersinker (spelled?) for that. That should be found tomorrow:D

And the filter. I wont put it together yet, since it will "click" together. The plan is to put a filter in between the two parts, and then click it together.

And PC-Beto standing in the corner watching my every move :D

Dont think I mentioned it, but I bought 3 noiseblocker fans to reduce vibrations from the pumps:)

For these I also got these stickers, so they can look nice and neat! :)

Milled the edges of the showoff reservoir so the top acrylic plate and the res itself is 100 percent flush.

Got holes drilled for input and output.

And got this milled:D Setting up the 0-point for the mill was a pita! But it turned out great:D
An o-ring will be placed here, so I can swap the filter out without trouble.

And the filter will slide in like this^

For the harddrives, I plan on setting them up like this^

And how the thing looks like in the case, and a little hint about how I will route the hoses.

Again, how I plan on placing the harddrives. There will be some 3d printing pwnage for these too:P

Over and out xD At least you got a BIG update this time then:D

Remember, Christmas is near! :santa:

nice work! The res should feed the pump though (usually does anyways) not the other way around :D

loving the detail on this one pope :) ill re read it all right now :) hahah

wow... thats all.. just wow.

Progress!!! :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SXRguyinMA

nice work! The res should feed the pump though (usually does anyways) not the other way around :D

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Not sure about what you mean here, but the pumps are fed by the BIG reservoir:P The small "showoff reservoir" is just in place to look good, and make connections easier:banana:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DonT-FeaR

loving the detail on this one pope :) ill re read it all right now :) hahah

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Have fun doing so:D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by OvRiDe

wow... thats all.. just wow.

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Thanks ovride! :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

Progress!!! :D

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And about time:D

If you want to, the mod is nominated for Mod of the month on bit-tech:) So go vote on your favorit mod:P
http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=220591