Imperium

[d_stilgar]

HAF Stacker, I'm drooling.

[blueonblack]

All right time for some old-school modding! Ever since this project came to mind I'd wanted something in it to really draw the eye, and nothing does that like motion. I wanted something that reflected the industrial theme of the build, and something that would stand out from the norm. I think I got it done.

Parts first. Below is a DC gearmotor purchased from solarbotics.com. Those guys have got all kinds of cool stuff like this. The gearbox in this one is a 228:1 ratio so it produces plenty of torque even at low voltages. It starts spinning at 3 volts, turning a leisurely 12 RPM, and goes up to 47 RPM at 9 volts. The perfect range for this piece of the puzzle.

The shaft has two flats on it, designed to turn one of several wheels they also offer. I opted for a small version with no tread or band on it:

With no treads or belts on the wheel I needed a different way to transfer the motor's motion. Enter Lego Technic!

I love these things. These are actually left over from the same project that I had planned to use those hard drive enclosures for. Still sorry to see that one stillborn, but aspects of it are finding their way to this one.

So how to mount that fantastic Lego gear onto my motor? Drill, tap and screws!

That took care of transferring the motion to the subject, but the things I had in mind to turn weren't made for this. (This is why we're modders.) I had to put bearings in the ends for them to spin on, but they didn't have anywhere to put them. A friend of mind just bought himself a CNC mill and has been dying to use it, and since I do not own a tool that will cut or drill them without rendering them liquid I took him up on it. (I never knew these things were made of adamantium.)

After some time setting up we managed to bore a 5/8" hole in the ends of each one:

So now the bearings will fit inside the shafts but I still have to get the Lego gears to center on the bearings. Here are the bearings I'm working with:

These Technic gears are driven by a cross-shaped shaft that presses into the center. Here's one compared to my bearings:

Not gonna work. Thankfully we modders are nothing if not resourceful. I took two pieces of plastic water line of different sizes:

The smaller is a perfect press fit inside the larger one:

And the combination makes a perfect bushing for the axle to press into the bearing:

That took care of the idler end of the shafts. As they spin, they will spin around the axles, which will be staionary. Now on to the drive end, where the power will be applied.

Thankfully my drive gears are the same diameter as the flange at the end of the shaft:

I also needed to build a housing for the bearings to turn in, something that was rigid and spaced properly for the bearings and a place to mount the motor. This whole assembly will be going in the upper 915 section of the case, with a windowed side panel. I did leave the 5 1/4" bay there because I'm putting a fan controller up top also. I needed to free up as much room as I could thought, and my fan controller is very shallow.

This bay is too big:

Thankfully it comes out easily.

Added a couple of boards to give it some stiffness and chopped it up!

Much better!!

So I had plenty of room now. I chopped up some old oak boards I had and made parallel mounts for the shafts and the motor, mounted those to a sheet of 3/16" plywood and mounted the whole assembly inside the upper case.

Obviously the wood and the drive apparatus will be hidden in the end product, I'll build some faux cast iron boxes around them and that drive bay, but the overall project came out great!

Aaaaaaaaaand the requisite Youtube video:



Perfect!! The motor is hooked to a fan controller now to experiment with speed but I think it will end up being around 30.

Disclaimer: I mentioned one of my friends used his CNC mill to help me with the portion of the project and that's true. I also have a couple of intricate pieces being laser-cut right now. I will however keep the professional high-end machinery to an absolute minimum on this build. Everything I can do myself I will.

Thanks again, let me know what you think of the camshafts. Remember, the wood will be hidden and they will be behind a window lit with red LEDs.

[msmrx57]

Droooooool Freakin' AWESOME!!!!!!!!

[TheMainMan]

First thing that came to mind would be hooking them up to CPU usage, the harder your CPU worked the closer to 9V they would get. They look pretty sweet as is, lights and a window will just be epic!

[blueonblack]

First thing that came to mind would be hooking them up to CPU usage, the harder your CPU worked the closer to 9V they would get.

Interesting idea, but the response time is WAY too slow for any kind of real-time difference. I have been thinking of another indicator like that, but not sure it will work. If it does you'll see it in there. If it doesn't I'll never mention it again.

They look pretty sweet as is, lights and a window will just be epic!

Droooooool Freakin' AWESOME!!!!!!!!

And thank you both!

[blueonblack]

Well, I've gotten some more work done on this thing but the section I'm working on now is detailed and very slow-going, so no work updates today, but I've seen a lot of people with updates to their worklogs showing off their water-cooling parts. I love to look at that stuff as much as the next guy and I finally got all of mine in, so I thought I'd follow suit. Here's what I've got in mind for this thing:

Pumps: Phobya DC12-400 (x2)

Radiators: Koolance 360 copper high-flow (x2). I chose these for their low fin count (11 fpi) and for the straight ports. Those will work perfectly for their mounting position.

I was surprised to find these with the radiators. I'd never seen a mounting setup like this and I love it!

Reservoir: Alphacool Cape Corp Bullseye Pro. I love the fisheye lens on this reservoir.

CPU block: XSPC Raystorm.

VGA block: Koolance GPU-210. I love the multi-port option on this block. I'll have a lot of tubing to run and bends to make, the flexibility will be good to have.

Chipset blocks: Alphacool HF 14 Smart Motion universal blocks.

RAM block: Alphacool D-RAM cooler X4. Yes, I know cooling RAM does no good at all, but I figured why stop?

VRM block: Koolance MVR-100. The board I'm using is now in Rev 4 and the most common complaint is overheating VRMs so I knew I had to cool them. I couldn't find a block to fit them so I ordered this Koolance with the interchangeable heat plates and a plate that was too big and cut it down. (Which explains the bare copper in all that shiny nickel goodness.)

Miscellaneous bits and pieces, including a drain valve with a straight rotary fitting (so I can position the handle however it looks best after installation), a couple of Alphacool T fittings (one for the bottom for the drain and one for the top for a fill/bleed port), and a Monsoon silver bullet anti-microbial plug.

Bitspower visual flow indicator.

And tying it all together, 28 Primochill Revolver fittings. I had initially bought the chain gun fittings but they turned out to be WAY too big. Honestly I think these probably fit the spirit of the build better anyway. More importantly, they fit the smallest blocks I have, though there is ZERO room to spare. When you tighten the second fitting you can actually feel the knurling rubbing on the first one:


I'll be using Primochill 1/2" OD rigid acrylic tubing for the whole thing, and with all of the bends I'm going to have to make I decided to invest in the Monsoon Hardline Pro mandrel kit. This set is an awesome buy at $40!

That should just about do it. Anyone with any input, comments or ideas on this loop don't hesitate to jump in here. The system is pretty basic, I'll be cooling a Phenom II 1100T, a single Gigabyte HD6950 and the onboard components mentioned. Honestly, I think this setup will be way more than I need, even with very low-speed fans but if anyone with more experience in larger loops like this knows something I don't PLEASE let me know before I bend all this tubing!

Thanks!

[Stonerboy779]

This is going to be amazing cannot wait to see the cooling come together. Not that I am really surprised but had no idea monsoon made such a cool product

[blueonblack]

Assuming you mean that mandrel set, yes it is awesome. It's even set up so you can use it to bend your tubing in two axes. Check out their video on Youtube to see exactly what you can do with it. There's a lot of engineering there.

[Stonerboy779]

I saw the bids the performances pcs put up. There is even cutting boxes silicon inserts so tubes keep their shape and adjustable rollers to measure every dimension and of course there are different mandrel sizes. All up it is really well thought out by monsoon and a must for anyone wanting precise and easy acrylic hardlines

[blueonblack]

I got some work done over the last couple of days and I got a new sponsor! Thanks to Cooler Master for their support!

I see a lot of worklogs that manage to convey the process of the work without a lot of dialogue. It's a skill, and when it's done right I like it. I'm going to try to do more of that here and see how it works out.

Today's update is on the completion of the cover for the video card I'll be using. Lots to show so here we go:

The card in question is a Gigabyte HD6950, here it is stock and through its watercooling transformation:

So the card is ready, but I didn't want to look at it in the finished piece. I decided to hide it in a cover in keeping with the theme:

And the finished product:

The copper tube and elbows are for the power to the card, they will run straight through the floor of this center section so none of the cabling should be visible. The other hole in the front of the cover is for the water line coming out of the block. That's going to be an interesting line to bend.

Any comments welcome, thanks for watching!