Project: EVGA Classified SR-2 Case

[Spotswood]

I've been commissioned to build a very large wooden case to house his upcoming watercooled EVGA Classified SR-2 rig. This case is designed and built to run cool, quiet and be ultra-flexible for future upgrades.

Note how the side panels are constructed as air ducts for supplying cool fresh air to the front and sides of the case:

The walls will be constructed of 1.5-inch solid oak face frames with 5.2mm oak veneer plywood "panels" bolted to the inside of the frames and with aluminum "adapters" bolted to the front of the panels. The openings in the panels are sized to the largest pieces of hardware envisioned to be mounted in a particular location. The adapters could be exchanged with different adapters depending on what particular hardware is to be mounted in a panel opening.

Here are the specifications and some of the features of this case.

Physical Characteristics:

• External dimensions (HxWxD - inches): 44 x 26.5 x 35.5

Materials:

• 3/4-inch solid red oak, 3/4-inch and 5.2mm oak veneer plywood.
• .100-inch aluminum sheet and 1/8-inch aluminum angle, channel and rectangular tube.
• 1/8-inch clear acrylic.

Features:

• The side doors act as air ducts to supply fresh air from the bottom, top and back of the case to the front/sides.
• Unique modular panel construction provides flexibility for the placement of drive bays, fans, power supplies, etc.
• Mounting locations for two power supplies.
• Air flow is: fresh air enters from the side/front and exhausts out the back.
• The bottom case has two custom radiator holders for mounting up to four 140x4 radiators.
• The case is actually two separate cases bolted together.
• Removable ten slot motherboard tray.
• Motherboard tray can be mounted in a horizontal or vertical position.
• Powder coated aluminum.
• Wood finished with black water-based stain and polyurethane.

The bracket to hold the two Black Ice GTX 560 radiators is a simple affair, consisting of some aluminum 1x2-inch square tubing and channel.

All of the pieces are held together with two long 1/4-inch threaded rods which act as clamps to hold everything together. The ~4mm tall acrylic bumpers get compressed down to ~2mm to keep the radiators in place:

All of the aluminum bits will eventually be powder coated gloss black.

[Spotswood]

Some serious real life events have kept me out of the shop most of the week. However, I did manage to create a couple of patterns which I'll use to router out the holes for the 5.25-inch drive bays:

And I built a jig to guide my plunge router to router out the 3/16-inch slots in the 5.25-inch drive bay rails.

A full size drawing is taped to the .10-inch thick aluminum to guide the placement of the jig.

Two sets of stops are used to accurately position the router at the beginning and ending of each slot.

[SXRguyinMA]

lookin good! this should be neat

[x88x]

I missed this when you started; looks sweet! I gotta admit, when I saw 'EVGA Classified SR-2' and 'cool, quiet', my first thought was, "well, it better have an awesome watercooling system in there, or that's just not gonna happen. Those dual 560's look like they should be up the task.

[msmrx57]

OOOOOOOOO! Nice I like wood cases. I'll be watching this for sure.

[Spotswood]

The case can hold four 140x4 radiators, but he's only installing three.

[x88x]

The case can hold four 140x4 radiators, but he's only installing three.

pff! Stupid clients.

[Spotswood]

Fabrication of the 5.25-inch drive bay rails continues. After breaking all 3 of my 3/16-inch woodworking router bits I ordered some standard end mills and they have performed awesomely. Because they are run without any lubrication I needed to keep the feed rate really slow.

After many hours I managed to complete 28 out of the total 35 rails for this case.

[billygoat333]

looking good so far! +rep

[x88x]

Great work on the drive rails. That jig worked out perfectly!