Project: Dark Carbon

[The boy 4rm oz]

Just revisiting your last update. I think the HDD coolers look very nice in the silver, I don't think you should paint them red.

[rendermandan]

Just revisiting your last update. I think the HDD coolers look very nice in the silver, I don't think you should paint them red.

Thanks, I had thought about leaving them silver. they kind of go with all the silver washers I have everwhere. However I plan on anodizing some more things. In addition to the back pci panel, I plan to anodize the silver metal bracket that holds down the cpu waterblock. Its steel, so I will have to paint it. I also plan on doing the heat spreaders on my OCZ ram. I haven't gotten them yet, but they are ordered. So, I'm not sure what I'm going to do just yet.

[The boy 4rm oz]

Ah ok, hope all your painting turns out.

[jhanlon303]

I have a small project log over on Bit-Tech where I am building a case for my H2O cooled Jetway C7. I have been following this log since forever and have a couple questions that might make my project better.
1.) Has the epoxy you used really held the alum. angles to the CF well? Langer is sponsoring the CF panels for my log and I'm working on a couple new ideas after reading your log.

2.) With the Krylon paint did you use the 'reflective base' paint on the alum. or just the top coat? I see you used several coats and mentioned it tends to flake and scratch. Was the alum. that went against the CF painted or left bare metal?

john hanlon jhanlon303 on several forums
my log on BT:

http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=159236

Yes we made MOTM on Bit-Tech.

[The boy 4rm oz]

Glad to see you finally surfaced John.

[rendermandan]

I have a small project log over on Bit-Tech where I am building a case for my H2O cooled Jetway C7. I have been following this log since forever and have a couple questions that might make my project better.
1.) Has the epoxy you used really held the alum. angles to the CF well? Langer is sponsoring the CF panels for my log and I'm working on a couple new ideas after reading your log.

2.) With the Krylon paint did you use the 'reflective base' paint on the alum. or just the top coat? I see you used several coats and mentioned it tends to flake and scratch. Was the alum. that went against the CF painted or left bare metal?

john hanlon jhanlon303 on several forums
my log on BT:

http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=159236

Yes we made MOTM on Bit-Tech.

Glad to see you are following my worklog, And welcome to TBCS, by the way.

To answer your questions,

1. In regards to the epoxy holding to the CF and Aluminum. I am using 2 hour ultra strong epoxy. Not the 5 minute stuff. the shorter the curing time, the less strong the bond is. So the longest I could find was 2 hour. -As for adheasion, If you scuff the surface of both the aluminum and CF. it holds pretty good. I've been using 60 grit sand paper to scuff the surface, as well as a dremel grinding bit on the aluminum. It gives the expoy somethign to bite too. I've only had a couple brackets break off. but that was because of a dumb move I made. I set the case its side and basically pryed the piece off.

2. In regards to the krylon paint. I did not use the "Silver" base coat since the aluminum was already shiny silver. -The can's instructions state to use the base coat for non shiny or non metal surfaces. So I figured I didn't need it. And yes, it does scratch off easily. Someone recommened using a clear coat over it. -And yes the side that goes against the aluminum is bare aluminum. If any overspray got on that side, the sandpaper and grinder took care of that. I don't think it would hold very well if it were painted, since the paint leaves the surface very smooth.

Hope that helps you out. -You should consider posting your worklog over here as well as Bit-Tech. We are always interested in anyones work.

Later,

[TheGreatSatan]

+Rep and PM coming your way!

[KiLLERMAN21]

Looking great man, really liking how the HDD's look is the sides, very nice.

[rendermandan]

Thanks again you guys.

TGS, -PM sent back.

Here's a small update for you.

I had to make a few support brackets to hold the hard drives against the back side of the panel. So I cut a few aluminum angles and painted them.
I'm going to use some felt pads to press against the hard drive. I don't want to have any vibrations transfered into the case.

Then using some clear 3M Double sided tape. (which does work good by the way). I attached them to the motherboard tray.

I also got my shipment from Newegg. Take a look at the goodies!

Now, if this isn't a kick in the ass. It fits. -Barely.

You can see there is no clearance.

-the problem is, I had to remove some bolts to get it to fit. -When I designed this case, I made the length for the video card long enough for the card, however, I did not figure in for bolt heads that stick out 1/8". So What am I to do????


Well, I did some major surgury and moved the back wall of the interior box forward about 1/4". This gave the video card some more breathing room as I see there are vents on the end of it. It took me about 5 hours to complete. but its done. I didn't take any pics because the result is exactly the same as where it started, its just 1/4" shorter.

I did do some modifications to the CPU water block and Memory though.
I'm using a Swiftech GTZ block.

I pulled the steel chromed bracket off so I could paint it.

And here it is all put back together. The red will match the rest of the case.

I also worked on the Memory. 4gb of OCZ DD3 2000 chips.

I taped them off.

and here is how they turned out.

Not too bad...

Tomorrow, I'm going to be dropping my PCI backplate and hard drive cooler frames off at a Plating company. They are going to do some True anodizing on them in red.

[jdbnsn]

I am truly impressed with your engineering abilities, especially since I have been struggling to put together a simple square box I can't imagine trying to get all of those angles to mesh! Awesome work as always Dan!