Project Stealthlow

[Waynio]

This is looking amazing! Are you going to do anything to keep the copper shiny, like a clearcoat?

Thanks mate yeah I've been brushing a coat of metal lacquer on it all & it's prevented me needing to re-brush it over & over I lost count how many times I had to re-brush it so the metal lacquer really helps keep it nice & clean & most importantly will prevent the copper from tarnishing .

Looks awesome bud. Things are going very well for you.

Cheers Fuganater it's good that you brought up about MOTM over on bit-tech as when Antony sees people bring it up he usually sorts something out, I'll put a word in also for an extra nudge .

Looking awesome!!!! Love the detail work on those fans.

Cheers msmrx57 I nearly added more but had to say to myself no, no more lol .

Last fabrication update I think depends on how the sata data cables are if they need a clamp piece adding to keep them tidy or not.

So I added all the required mounting holes to the mobo tray to support the cable holders.

I also decided to make a cable clamp holder also, I added the mounting holes for this before making the part & took the cable to be clamped & took measurements off it with the digital callipers & got to it on sketchup to design & print the needed piece complete with cut/bend lines & excess length so it could be trimmed down & rounded, couldn't be bothered setting up my basic bending brake & just did a quick setup with plywood & the vice & manual pressing which is easily doable when material isn't very wide.

Held the piece where I wanted the piece to be & marked where the mounting holes are & then drilled the holes in the new piece, needed an accurate drilling with me not being able to clamp this down so the drill press came in handy as it sometimes does .

All done for this piece & all the mounting holes & that's all for the fabrication of this project, now it's just the power/hdd activity switch wiring & a molex cable & installing the lighting .

So might not have completed the project yet thanks to me using the wrong adhesive for quite a few parts & having to re-stick them with epoxy resin but all the challenging stuff & slightly challenging stuff is done I'd say . Hmmm actually I have a mass of cabling to pretty up & it has to be done with windows being on both sides it's the sata data cables I'm unsure about looking tidy but if they are a nightmare I could make a couple of clamps like I did for the 24 pin extension.

[Waynio]

You seen that braided copper/aluminum sleeving they make for automotive racing?

could look sweet in that computer.

They even have chrome, gold, metallic and color changing (cystal pearl) finishes.

http://www.wirecare.com/Braided-sleeving.asp

Cheers Twigs I added to favorites for possible future projects I just don't fancy pulling cables apart again I don't enjoy doing sleeving at all .

I did a test run of the cabling & it doesn't look so bad until the sata data cables come into play so I will make something to keep the data cables either hidden or clamped in place.

[Waynio]

List of things to do in order of which I'll tackle first on the final final steps now.


Make extra clamp for the lower part of the 24 pin cable to hold it closer to the mobo panel & stop it bulging out.

Make a set of clamps & casing to hold or hide the sata data cable mess & let the modding community decide which is best unless I come up with a sweet cover that doesn't need feedback on .

The LED strips in the fan holders I need to change the molex to a fan adaptor or to work with the fan cable = half done

Lay gap filling material next to all faint gaps where there will be light.

Fix light strips to curve bars.

Do night & day photo shoots of it up & running which will rely on weather as I want to do them outside .

[Waynio]

Freshly thought of, designed, printed & cut pieces for the sata data cable casing, now it's time to bend them .

[Waynio]

Wooo hooo got the epoxy resin, I went for 1 I've used before & has proven it's worth (araldite rapid steel) since there was no JB weld at B&Q lol I almost bought a tube of liquid metal but I figured with such a huge amount of adhesive for only £3 more than the araldite which you get a tiny amount in comparison I figured it wouldn't be as good.

Anyway on with this sata data cable case update, it's a mix of 2mm alu as a 5mm strip with extra ears with mount holes in to attach to the mobo panel which goes from near the bottom of the 2nd level to just below the 8 holes I made for the pass trough's so it bolts on when all the cables are plugged into the mobo & 1mm alu & 1mm copper bent to make a nice cover to hide the horrors of the sata cables had to get my bending brake out for these though for the 5mm ends was too much for the weak ply wood & had to use the brake in a conventional & unconventional way to get all the right bends.

Here's what it all looked like after thinking, designing, printing, sticking & cutting & before bending.

All laid out waiting to be stuck.

A kind of half arsed jig it was the middle piece that cut me, simple basic piece like that compared to all the other bits & that cuts me lol .

Couple more shots of the pieces.

And the extra copper details that I nearly put on the fans but scrapped the idea, they look kinda nice on this piece but undecided if I'll stick them on or not, if I do I'll cut some alu pieces to place on the copper bits too kinda looks like some kind of marzipan .

By the time I finished placing the last couple of pieces with adhesive it had already started setting so had to remove the last 2 & clean off the partly dried adhesive & re stick them.

Once things had set after 10 minutes I went all around the piece with a razor blade to take off any excess adhesive & took a few shots, it takes about 8 hours for it to fully cure.

Up next for this is to very carefully brush it as 1 piece & then lacquer it .

[Waynio]

Updated the mobo bios to the latest & got all other latest updates ready for a switch over yesterday, then got started at around 8 PM putting hardware in & getting the cable work done & installing win 7 & finally got it running, fully up to date & fully optimized & made a ghost image, took all night to do it all but I'm now typing from Stealthlow right now & woooooooo it's really nice & quiet & looks really good running, I took a good few photos of it during the night while I was putting all the hardware inside so I'll get them up in a mo , the noisiest part is the GPU, the RGB power cable though I'll need to get a new one, I was slimming it down so I could slip it underneath the hdd platform & I believe I cut an internal cable on it so need a new one so I haven't put the side panels on yet since it needs that last thing sorting but won't be able to get it until next Wednesday, other than that though it's all done & I can finally get stuck into a good game .

Still a night with lights & day photo shoot to do on this also .

[Waynio]

Righty oh then .

All done except for the RGB lighting which will have to wait, (knackered the power cable for it) but I can finally relax knowing that's the final bit, everything molex or fan related cables is nicely stashed underneath the hdd's so with the mass of wires going through the small mouse holes I had to make them bigger because of the switches for the lights on the fans so this pile of shots in bad lighting will be the last picture update until I get the RGB lighting sorted & then I'll put some effort into the photos at day & night, so I'm gonna get the weight back on & enjoy some good games until I can resume this, been feeling starved of some good gaming .

32 photos so might have to do 2 posts in at least 2 forums I post at.

Like this under both hdd cages .

Old

New

In use finally .

I love the unique light the fan holders project .

So, a little wait for the new RGB light power cable & then final shots, these are just to show it's now in use, mostly crappy shots I know but it's 99.9% complete now yaaaaaay I keep getting random big grins knowing it's in use now :hehe:.

When I walk into my room I can't even hear it & it's sat right next to my monitor so it's awesomely quiet, just the gpu that I can hear & that is with the side panels off , time I got around to completing alice madness returns at last but I'll have to start from the begining again since I'm on a new os install on the super duper corsair force 3 120GB or the Yin Yang 120GB as I'll call it, here is a quick bench I did on the reads, veeeerrrrrry niiiiiiiice .

Oh yeah the temps are better than air cube to my amazement, was expecting warmer temps but it out does the air cube by a few celcius which had much more air flow but this I really thought about the flow on how to make it work best & I'd call this my first perfect design .

Forgot to weigh this beast so I'll weigh it when it's done .

[Waynio]

The more the side panels were off & it being right next to me the more I started disliking the lighting lol I think all the fan holders need are little covers for the tops to cut off the excess light but only in the slot for the fan where the bare led strips are, anyway I put the side panels on to get a better feel for it all & glad I did .

I actually thought the temps might be even better with the panels on because of the design but noted temps are about the same, not better not worse unless you consider 1 or 2c warmer as worse , I also had the iffy RGB strip working but I really couldn't figure out what I was doing right when I had it working so was completely hit & miss but should have no probs when the new cable comes, I took it to the scroll saw instead of grinding it slimmer on the disc sander (lesson learnt on that now ) think I'll keep it set on orange light as it's closest to the copper & it also creates a very cool effect on the fan spinner pieces I made but I'll have the option to pick quite a nice bunch of colours or even have it slowly fade into all the different colours which is quite nice or switch them off if they get irritating, the apollish fans I enabled the rear 2 the front one is too bright & makes the front look wrong so this makes it look nice with just that one switched off.

I've also ordered white led strips to see if I prefer them in the fan holders, the uv is quite overwhelming to be honest & not really a part of the colours I had in mind but felt I should experiment so might end up with all white or uv or a mix of both, would have been nice to use RGB strips in them but the control box would be very difficult to hide to keep cables neat but I'm going to take apart the faulty one I have to see if I could make a slightly smaller box for it so it can fit under the hdd cages, if I can then maybe it will be RGB in the fan holder stick pieces .

Took a few more pictures since I put the panels on, also disabled the mobo led's, got some nice shots 53 taken 21 shown.

Glad I did this photoshoot as it's reminded me I need to place the windows better so they reflect everything correctly .

Let me know if I'm over doing it with the photos, just it looked good when I put the panels on & couldn't resist .

I think I should make a big sturdy lazy susan with alu/copper marquetry for easy maintenance & better photos after making that optical tray & the yin yang 120 I know I can do metal marquetry with the scroll saw wooooo with 2mm upwards I can do it nicely, 1mm it's surprisingly more tricky probably because it cuts faster & easier. I like to do a side project after a big one to ease myself back to normal so I slow down the modding withdrawels by not having a sudden stop lol.

[Waynio]

I agree about the lighting. Deff need something inside there to show off all your good work.

Cheers Fuganater it'll all be RGB lighting now so controllable colours .

No such thing.

Cheers mate .

I took apart the RGB control box to see if I could make a more compact one for going underneath the hdd cages & I will be able to so it'll be RGB lighting all around this case system side, cable side & storage side so the 3 white & 3 uv led strips will go in the mod bits box for another time so now I have to design & make the new slim boxes. Already had 1 30cm RGB strip so just had to order 2 more & another control box (it lets you run 3 strips through it) so if I push myself I should be able to call this complete by the end of the week .

[Waynio]

Another hefty all night session of modding a trip to Blackpool & then back to modding I redesigned the sata hiding piece with a little reinforcement & extra length for a complete cover & 3mm extra space for depth & did my best to make sure all of the pieces are the same as each other but that sheet metal bender is difficult enough to line up 1 piece ready for bending so had to do 1 at a time which is why they lack perfection, anyway now I'll be able to have the cables fully extended & fold up excess length inside the piece & finished designing & making the new slightly slimmer RGB control box so up next is sleeving the visible parts of the sata cables then put these parts back to use again .

I seem to be able to design in 2d quite ok now, wasn't too sure if I'd manage making a slimmer RGB control box but have & it's an awesome fit & just about the right size for the 19mm space underneath the hdd cages as the new box is just short of 19mm , the only reason the original box was too big is beause of them cramping the cable work so could have been a good bit slimmer but because of the bad cable work inside these things I had to make it longer but at least I can cram it under there now & have RGB lights in the storage section also I also placed a cut to size piece of 1mm foam board for under the pcb so it doesn't get any contact with the alu.