Project Log - Valhalla "Heavenly Metal"

[rebelbrethren]

Hello lovely WizD members - welcome to my first project log, exclusive to the Wizard Designs Forums!

This project was a little backwards from the beginning - the case came to me before the concept did. The case in question was given to me by my old employers, an old server tower case they had no use for with their new shiny rack systems. To me however, it was a beast of a case, easily the biggest I'd seen at that point in my career (but nothing compared to Dell PowerEdge server I have got my hands on. A future Behemoth of a mod to be sure).

Was it ugly? Well, yeah, not that the beige bothered me at the time; I was to busy being hypnotised by the possibility of ten 5.25 drives, four hard drives - a huge range of expansion options.

For a while it sat under my desk (only just fitting, mind!) housing an early prototype linux server, one of my first brave forays outside of Windows territory. At that time it still housed the original dual PII motherboard with 2 x 350Mhz chips and 256Mb PC100 RAM. And a CD-Rom. And a Floppy Drive. And a Zip drive, a SCSI 5 CD-Rom multi-changer, a 5.25 inch floppy drive, two removable hardrive racks... the list just went on and on.

But as with all crudely thrown together "play around" systems, it was eventually dismantled and the parts redistributed to other machines (the mobo currently resides in my linux gateway, running ClarkConnect (http://www.clarkconnect.org/)) or to friends and family. But the case remained, an ugly, empty behemoth, sitting quietly beneath my desk....

...just waiting to be modded, of course!!! :lol:

[rebelbrethren]

Just a coupla of early pics to grab your interest - more after the weekend, with some proper progress reports and guides. As normal, click for full resolution pics.

A before shot of the whole case, with the plastic bezel removed:

http://rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_fullcase_thumb.jpg (http://rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_fullcase.jpg)

Its huge!

A 'sneak preview' of the installed heater core at the rear.

http://rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_heatercore_thumb.jpg (http://rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_heatercore.jpg)


(Yes, I know, I know. At this point it looks a little crude - it needs some more cleaning, then some painting... thank god, the ghetto look doesn't last!). The fit is beautiful though.

Thats it for now. Next time I shall show you some of the modding that already been done, and show of some of the shiny watercooling goodness, including a (AFAIK) waterblock's first showing on WizD forums.

Stay tuned, and feel free to ask questions, request pics or just chat about the mod log. The more the merrier!

For now,

rebelbrethren|out

[Darv]

Woah!! That case is huge!! :lol:

including a (AFAIK) waterblock's first showing on WizD forums.

Interesting :blink:

[scopEDog]

Whoa...thats a big motha of a case. What are your plans for it? (besides the watercooling of course). Looks like a cool project :)

[Nexxo]

That's a nice skyscraper... no wait, it's a PC case! :D

[rebelbrethren]

Thanks for the nice responses - keep 'em coming! Feedback, advice, suggestions and (light constructive) criticism are more than welcome in this thread. :lol:

Ok, I'll give you the scoop on the some of the mods planned and in progress.

First off, the overall look is an 'industrial' metal theme, lots of brushed steel and bolts. The title 'heavenly metal' refers to that (valhalla is actually the 'windows' name for the PC; all my PC's are named after norse gods - e.g. Odin (current main pc), Thor (my media pc, a VIA Epia mod), Freya (my linux server/home gateway). No particular reason, just like having a theme!)

The main look for the case comes from stripping the bloody horrible beige powdercoat for a brushed steel effect (its a steel case by the way, and bloody heavy too!). While I'm on the subject - any advice on the best way to bring out a good shine on brushed steel? e.g. Brasso? :huh:

The bezel is being replaced by bolted-on steel panels, for a nice clean look, and I have started to fabricate the additional panels for the rear (a new upper panel to mount the PSU, and one to mount the custom circuitry (much more on that later! They'll be some new variants on popular ideas that i've not seen tried before).

Of course, theres they obligatory acrylic side window (which i'm considering tinting) and cold cathodes, but with a twist (wait and see!)

*Everything* is being modded - there will be no standard drive bays/bezels, buttons or LEDs in sight. I've got a lot of inspiration from Sir ZapWizard on drive button/LED modding.

The internals are partially purchased, some still waiting on finances, but the plan is:

Abit IC7 (watercooled N/B, hate the noisey little 40mm fans)
Pentium 4 2.8c (watercooled)
512Mb 3500/3700 Geil Golden Dragon (1Gb if finances allow)
Radeon 9800 Pro (will be BIOS modded to XT with any luck) (also W/C)
Tagan 380w PSU
Wireless LAN

More info on the the H2O loop and other specifics soon, including a removable drive bay mod that I may be the first with! (I will probably post it as a separate thread, as it's a little modyssey in it's own right)

[scopEDog]

Hmmm...i came back to look at the size of this case, and came up with a unique sorta idea (something different and radical). Why not cut out a 2" section from the middle of the case and use round stock to bolt on the top half to the bottom half? Not sure if i'm making sense...lemme draw it out:

http://www.scopeworks.org/images/skyscraper/skyscraper.jpg

I dont know the exact dimensions of the case, but you get the idea. The case might be big enough to do something like this. Just playing around with ideas...dont mind me :)

[Risky]

This is the what my steel case looked like ofter a set-to with a orbital sander and a good few corse sandign sheets
http://veryrisky.co.uk/webimages/stripped02.jpg
I'm not sure if I'll bother to go back and do it with fine as I quite like how it looks so far.

[Starbuck3733T]

Unless optical drive housing are aluminum (can't say as I've done the magnet check) I've polished them up before using mother's alumium polish (mother's brand, not my mother's :blink:) and they came out nicely. I'd dare say you'd have to shoot it with clearcoat.

If you can get it nice and shiny, a powdercoated clearcoat would preserve it nicely.

[rebelbrethren]

@Starbuck - Powdercoating's unfortunately a little out of my budget, lol. I do intend to do some kind of clear varnish though, if only to cover the bare metal with something a little less electrically conductive. Mother? - I'm guessing thats a US brand... anyone got suggestions a little closer to home?

@Risky - Hey, nice! :lol: I like that look! I'm going for more of a brushed texture, so so far I'm using a combination of brass and stainless steel brushes on my powerdrill to a) take off the tough powdercoat, and b) give it a directional line to the texture. I want to use some kind of abrasive polish to then really give that texture some shine.

@scopEDog - Heh, nice idea - I like the skyscraper name - plus it reminds me a little of a Lian-Li with a vapochill unit! I'm not going to split the case though (need it to have a little structural stability) - but the front design does look a little like that... I'll upload some of my concept scetches on Monday when I can get my hands on a scanner. Have a really rough "txt-sketch-up" for now :huh: :unsure:

Front view:
_________
| ____ .| <-- DVD-RW
| ==== '| <-- removable HD mod project (coming soon)
|.......|
|.......|
|.......|
| .'.'. | <-- vent
|_______|
|______O| <-- rad fan speed pot in recessed panel
|.......|
|.......|
|.......|
|.......|
| ..... | <-- vent
|_'_'_'_|



Hope that helps, lol!

rebelbrethren|out

[Starbuck3733T]

You'd be surprised at the cheapness of powdercoating. Local co. about 5 min from my house did the whole chassis and a few other bits for $80 (about 44 quid)

[Risky]

@Risky - Hey, nice! :lol: I like that look! I'm going for more of a brushed texture, so so far I'm using a combination of brass and stainless steel brushes on my powerdrill to a) take off the tough powdercoat, and b) give it a directional line to the texture. I want to use some kind of abrasive polish to then really give that texture some shine.
rebelbrethren|out

The think is to get the right grade sandpaper - bosch do three grades - wood, wood/paint, wood/paint/metal and I was on the last one.

what were you going to finish it with? I have a bottle of "Clear Metal Lacquer" which might help as the raw metal really picks up finger prints.

[rebelbrethren]

Well, I took yesterday off work to do some more work on the case. Still mainly stripping some more of the powdercoat and sanding down, but also took some time out build the mount for the pump. B)

Some more pictures in a bit (tonight / tomorrow) - showing the evolution of the grubby copper heater matrix into a nice looking PC radiator. I'll shine some more light on the water loop components as well - it's a mixed bag, and I'm sure I'll recieve some interesting comments on my choices!

A couple more teaser pics till then -

The untouched tower, fully dressed:

http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_fullcase_with_bezel_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_fullcase_with_bezel.JPG)

The tower after :mellow:

...erm, after dismantling:


http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_dismantled_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/intro_dismantled.JPG)

Lastly, minutes into the first attempt to remove the the powder coat from the base of the tower (a good place to start if you're not sure of how well it'll work!). It's not going well, but I changed methods after this, and it began to look far better...:

http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/strip_powdercoat_1_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/strip_powdercoat_1.JPG)

(sorry about the rubbish light - some of these early photos have no flash. later ones = better!)

Thats it for right now - better stop slacking here before the boss notices...

rebelbrethren|[b]out

[rebelbrethren]

Rightio, time for another update. ^_^

Heres the heater core as I first got my hands on it. Grubby, with some greenish water residue inside (which I promptly poured on myself ::duh:: ) :o

Definately in need of some good cleaning, but the pipes looked about 1/2" ID - great news there.

http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_1_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_1.JPG)


After taking off the crappy foam, and measuring up against the case (I initially planned to mount it inside the top of the case, this was changed to the back panel after better planning of the plumbing).

http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_2_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_2.jpg)

After removing the pipes, which were just screwed on with a rubber seal, I spent some time trying to flush out the insides. First, a mix of plain tap water with a little washing up liquid to clear the majority of green gunk. Later, after it had dried, a mix of ketchup, a little vinegar and water. I'd read that the vinegar in ketchup was excellent at removing corrosion from copper (can't remember where I saw it, just remember a picture of someone scrubbing a DD Maze 4 block with a ketchup covered toothbrush!). I corked this mix inside there, shook vigorously, left to stand for a minute, then shook again and emptied, along with a bit more green gunk. I then flushed it properly with tap water and left to dry. Much better :lol:

Next job - adding a couple of brass 1/2" ID, 1/2" BSPT thread barbs. Well, once they arrived (along with the pump and tubing, yay!) I gave them a test fit - 1/2" BSPT was just a little too large too fit the heater core!

Simple - time to mod them. Out came the dremel, and I lopped off half of the thread so the barb wouldn't extend to far inside the heater core and restrict the flow.

http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_3_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_3.JPG)

(bad pic, i know, but the best I have - sorry!)

Next job, to grind down the thread so the barbs would just fit. For this I got a largish drill bit in my power drill, wrapped it in a rag, and jammed the barb tight on the end. I then spun this against some sandpaper I had taped down to my workbench on a piece of wood until the thread was little more than a texture.

http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_4_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_4.JPG)

The barb now slid in under a little pressure! ^_^

The final step in turning this heater core into a PC water cooling rad was to actually attach the barbs. For this I used some quick drying Araldite. Araldite wil bond metal to metal very well, is water proof and can be filed and sanded when dry. And quick dry because i'm impatient!

I roughed up both surfaces with a little 600 grit sandpaper, wiped the araldite mix on, and twisted the barb home. Ten minutes later its a permanent, water proof seal.

http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_5_thumb.JPG (http://www.rebelbrethren.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/other_images/heater_core_5.JPG)

Hurrah, mission accomplished!

More in a later installment of how I mounted it in the case, and on the salon "makeover" it gets to beautify this ugly hunk of copper!

rebelbrethren|out

[Pug]

They'll be some new variants on popular ideas that i've not seen tried before /me sits up attentively. :D

rad fan speed pot in recessed panel Hmm, *brain whirrs*, I just had visions of frenched recesses with pop out knobs. If that ain't what you mean, I think I need to do it myself.
Now where did I see those pots listed?...

Looking forward to updates. :)

[rebelbrethren]

Hey, Pug's a-reading my thread! ^_^ :lol: Cool!

Always a good inspiration when the forum owner himself is looking forward to updates. Thanks Pug! I'll make an effort to keep up my posting schedule.

Thanks to all others who've commented so far, love to hear more from you all. Cheers!

<schedule>
More later today on the water cooling loop and planned mods.
Tuesday booked off work for much more moddage and photo taking.
</schedule>

For now,

rebelbrethren|out

[Starbuck3733T]

Now where did I see those pots listed?...
You better friggin tell me!!! :rant: :rant: :cool:

The only place I've seen them was in the stock radio for my 88 vw fox... I was thinking of gutting them out since the car is not retired.

[rebelbrethren]

Its been a while since I posted an update, so here goes:

[Unfortunately, this is not a image filled update as I don't currently have access to a digital camera, something that will be fixed soon!]

The heater matrix modding is complete, bar the duct. The rad itself has been cleaned up fully and given a light coat of black enamel spray paint. Both barbs are installed and it's both watertight, and airtight to "blow-testing" (thumb over one barb, blow hard into the other). The 120mm Alu Panaflo has been lightly sanded and rigged up with its standoffs (four 40mm M4 bots on sticky pads to reduce transfer vibrations. I've tested it with a temporary duct (made from duct tape, no less!) and a temporary 7 volt mod to approxiamate the variable control I'll be fitting eventually. Its very quiet! Unfortunately, its far less quite when I put on the nice shiny radioactive symbol fan grill - so I'll have to rethink that. It just causes far too much turbulent noise, so I'll probably have to just go for a standard (read: boring) grill. Its internal anway so thats not a huge problem.

I'm starting to wonder if i'll need an intake fan now. Only fans currently planned are the 120mm on the rad and the two PSU fans (PSU wil be a Tagan 380w I think). I'd love it if people could advise on whether I'll a) you think I'll need a intake fan, and b) the best approach for (near) inaudibility. I want as few quiet fans as possible really

The case is polishing up nicely. I had to purchase a cheap electric sander, as it was taking far too long doing it all by hand. The finish is ok at the moment, but if anyone would care to suggest an abrasive rubbing/polishing compound (thats availible in the uk!) that would bring a really gleam to it, that'd be great. Wet sanding just isn't bringing the finish up enough.

The sheet steel for the custom front bezel has been ordered and I'm due to get it Wednesday. If I can get my hands on a scanner, I'll upload the concept pictures. It's going to be a single piece panel, but will be bent into a streamlined shape gently curving into a recess about 2/3 of the way down - this will be used for the fan controls, front usb, power on etc. Of course, it will be poilished up to the same finish as the rest of the case. The drawings do illustrate it far better than 1000 words, so I'll do my best to get them uploaded soon.

W/C loop is complete bar the replacement barbs for the NB block (its a modded Asetek block, the pustfits had to go) and and L-shaped intake for the pump which should arrive Monday or Tuesday.

Thats about it for now, happy modding all.

rebelbrethren|out

[rebelbrethren]

Hurrah! <leaps for joy>

The sheet steel for the front panel has arrived this morning. Tell you what, 100cmx23cmx2mm stainless steel weighs more than I would have expected...

The next big challenge I face is how to bend this thing into shape, so...

Does anyone here have any experience, direct or indirect, of shaping metal? I really could do with some advice on this one...

The electronics for the pump relay and... special project... arrived to, along with the barbs needed to finish the water loop, and some invisible UV dye too!

The main purchases (the computer itself) is due to be purchased very soon (just waiting on payday!). For those who are interested, it will be:

Abit IC7
Pentium 4 3.0c (Northwood) (but then you know it will never be running at *that* speed :lol: )
1Gb of Geil Value RAM (Not the best overclockers RAM, but then I intend to use the IC7 bios to run the memory at a factor of the FSB speed)
Tagan 480w PSU

Most of the rest of the kit will be stolen from my current rig (i.e. hard drives, DVD-RW, wireless etc)

Booked tomorrow off work to really get to grips with the case, especially this front panel, so if anyone can give me advice on the above before then, it would be greatly appreciated!!! ^_^

Till the next,

rebelbrethren|out

[Pug]

Does anyone here have any experience, direct or indirect, of shaping metal? I really could do with some advice on this one...
/me holds hand up hesitantly...

I used to work for a firm where we hand fabricated body panels for classic cars such as Sunbean Tigers and Alpines (Alpine West Midlands) after I left Old Station Workshop (where I did the bikes for the NMM).

We did have access to manually operated machinery of sorts but made our own jigs out of fibreglass, concrete and square section steel tubing for the final forming and shaping.

What do you need to know?

Your first step should probably be to look for a decent set of planishing hammers and dollies... (I picked up a bargain once with three variations of each for about £7 but that was many years ago now (and was probably a bit of a fluke tbh - I'm sure it was priced up wrongly :unsure: ).

[rebelbrethren]

Thanks Pug. (Cool CV btw! :D )

Ok, heres the deal. I have sheet of stainless steel 100x23cm, 2mm thick. The idea is that it will be formed into a front (and smaller rear) bezel.

The intention is something like this, view is from the side:

....|....top
....|
....|
....|
....|
....|
....|
..._| <- 90 degree bend
../ <- gentle curve
..|
..|
..\_ <- gentle curve
....| <- 90 degree bend
....|
....|
....|....base

Compare this to the text-picture earlier in the text for a front view.

My intention was to do this via means of blocks of wood to keep the two straight bits flat, g-clamped down hard, and knock in the first 90 bend, then turn over to do the first curve the same way, only this time over a preformed wooden template/mould to get the curve right. Then the same again for the lower two.

I was looking for advice on whether this was the correct way to go about it, which tools to use, whether its worth heating the metal first, and anything thing else i may not have thought of! Please note - i really didn't want to strike the metal directly, only the wood blocks, the steels already got a nice finish to it - I'm not going for a battered or hammered finish here!

Thanks in advance for anything you can tell me. :mellow: <crosses fingers and looks hopeful>

[Starbuck3733T]

At 2mm stainless you'd probably need to have a die made and have it stamped. Big bux there I'd suspect... pug will correct me if I'm wrong.

What about those pop-out pots? where'd you get them *cough* needs to know NOW *cough*

[rebelbrethren]

Hey Starbuck,

Sorry about not replying about the "pots" before. Um, i'd love for it to be otherwise ('cause they'd be cool) but I have nothing like that! :unsure:

My mention of recessed fan controls was due to my case design, where the control (fan knobs, switches, etc, etc) are going to be mounted in a recessed part of the front panel. I think it'll look pretty sweet, and save them being knocked by accident/inquisitive hands.

Sorry to disappoint you! (@ Pug too)

[Starbuck3733T]

Eh no problem. if you want to get some (i have no idea there ohm value) check junkyards for 1980s era VW stock radios. They exist for bass, treble, and balance on VW stock radios. With additional circuitry im sure you could use them for whatever you needed to (THERE IS ALWAYS A WAY!!)

[rebelbrethren]

Hmm.

I learnt a good lesson yesterday... the lesson being, that any modder, beginner or experienced, has to occasionally admit when he's beat!

Pug, Starbuck, you were both right - that steel will not budge with the tools I have. Not even a little. Christ, I couldn't even dent it! So, like the title says...

I have two options. I know I can do it with 1mm steel (I've made a test piece from an old 1mm AT case side panel), so I could purchase some 1mm steel and try again. However the downside is that this project is like the scottish paraliment building... already way behind and way way over budget (notably why stamping/machining/powdercoating etc are all out for now).

Second option is to modify the design in favour of a more 'lian-li' style flat front, just cutting the steel to shape, no bending - though it pains me, as the curved front was intergral to the look-and-feel of the whole project.

The in-between option is to make the curved segments from some spare 1mm I have kicking around, and bolt that behing the main 2mm panels... certainly not the smooth streamlined look i was going for, but maybe near enough. I could filler the gaps, but that would destroy my ability to have a bare metal finish...

Compromises, compromises...

rebelbrethren|out

PS - Today is payday! Hence, more kit being purchased soon = more updates for you guys.
PPS - Lastly, I'll once again have access to a digital camera (as of tomorrow), so progress pictures coming very soon.

[Starbuck3733T]

instead of shaping steel directly, why not do a flat front lianli style as a substrate, then get some styrofoam and shape the bit you want, then lay it over with fiberglass and integrate the whole thing with bondo? Not as durable but probably easier to execute.

[rebelbrethren]

Sorry about the lack of posts lately. Works been continuing on the project as planned, but my update schedule has been thrown by a combination of being made redundant and having to move house soon (neither of which are really conducive to moddding... :wacko: )

I have some more progress pics, and will try to upload 'em tomorrow.

All I need now is some time to finish the damn thing!

Cheers everyone.