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External WC Case

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TheCor4D

Member
Joined
Aug 8, 2002
Building an External WC Case

After having so many problems with the heat coming from my new C2D, i have decided that i want to redo the system I have. I have no room in my case for much more and it is a pain to get my hands in my case, so i have opted to build an external case to house all my WC gear.

Eheim 1250
Dtek 120mm Pro Radiator
WW LE 1/2"
Tygon 3603

I have decided to go with a simple wood case to sit on top of my case, i think am going to drill a hole in the bottom of the wood case and into the top of my aluminum case and that will be how i get my tubing in. The main problem I am going to have will be the Wye on the WW block. I think it would be easier to go straight up the middle of my case rather than trying to go out the back of it.

So i am going to be purchasing a few things in the days to come. First of all i want to buy a new radiator. I have been looking at the swiftech MCR 220 (http://www.jab-tech.com/Swiftech-MCR-220-Radiator-Black-pr-3199.html), mainly because of the price. 39 bucks seems pretty nice to me. Someone suggested going with the 3 fan version of that rad as well. For like 10 bucks more, i might do that, not sure though. I think that the 2 fan version should be hefty enough, but im not sure how much hotter these C2Ds run that my old 2500+ OCd.

I am also going to be buying about 15' of tubing, that will probably be too much, but i guess it is better to have extra than be short. I am sad that i will have to get rid of my tygon tubing. But it has served me well, lasted for 4 years, but not it is stained beyond belief... Cant even see the UV dye in the loop :rolleyes: I have been looking at the UV tubing (http://www.voyeurmods.com/index.php?action=category&id=2&subid=254) Not sure what color to go with, i have been using green for 4 years, i might switch it up to blue and put an orange dye in the water *shrug*. Pretty decent price at just under a buck a foot.

So new/old parts would be:

Eheim 1250
Swiftech MCP 220 (possibly the 320, or whatever the 3fan model is)
WW LE 1/2"
UV Tubing, possibly the ClearFlex 60 (to save a few bucks)

I will probably make the wood box out of something cheap, i will have a look at Home Depot or Lowes to see if they have any decently priced Select wood to get a little nicer of a finish. I will be staining it so it would be cool to have some nice wood grain.

I will be making the box on Friday-Sunday. I should have it done in a day, but who knows what could go wrong.

I have 1 question right now. I am planning on going pump->cpu->rad I am just not sure where i should be putting my T-Line. Right now my T-Line is in a terrible spot coming off the rad, it is a pain to bleed/fill.
 
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Here are a few pics of the before


comp1.jpg


comp2.jpg

As you can see i basically have no room for anything. I have hard drives everywhere, some just hanging outside of my case cause i have no room. Its a shame that i had to cut up that hard drive holder. I am tempted to buy a bay drive cooler cause they look cool

More to come soon
 
Well the weekend was not as successful as i hoped. I had to go to my friends house to do it and, well the tools werent the exact ones for the job. So we had to work with what we had...

This is not how the case would be sitting. The rad is going to be on a standing side, and the fan is going to be located at the back of the case pushing in air, and the 2 fans on the rad pushing out air. When i clean my room up a bit i will take a picture of the square(ish) hole that we cut for the rad to vent.

DSC_5774Medium.jpg

This was the only picture that i have with me, he forgot his camera at home and that is what we took them with, so i took one with my camera when i just got home.

Ran into lots of snags when it came time to buy stuff from home depot... We were in there for like 2 hours. Back and forth between rows, i would remember something that i needed and we would search for that, and then something else on the opposite side... So some advice for next time is to make a shopping list of stuff that is needed.

I was going to go with ply wood for the case, but i saw some 1x8x10' pine that looked really nice, so i went with that. I think it should look pretty nice when it is all done, but there are a few places where the wood split when screwing it all together. I used a lot of liquid nails along with the screws.

I still have to mount the pump and cut 2 1" holes in the wood into the top of the case and mount the res. I am going to put a few coats of stain on this. I bought some "natural" stain which you dont really notice much of a difference in the color of the wood, it just seems to bring out all the awesome lines in the wood, im pretty excited about the color. I think this is going to be put off till next weekend when i have some time, damn college gets in the way of everything!
 
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1 More reserved slot in case i need to post more pics and what not :)
 
Pine will give you a nice finish once you stain it and is CHEAP and EASY to work with! I have tried stuffing W/C in mid-towers for the last time! I finally bought a CM Stacker and have so much room it isn't even funny!
 
You don't have to use a T-line, homemade res with some bulkheads are cheap and easy.

But for T-line, always put it before the pump inlet. Once you get the pump primed you are golden.
 
I have heard some things like alge is much more likely to grow in a res and what not. I figure the T line cant take that much longer to get started, and it seems like after you bleed the system T would be more closed off to everything. *shrug*
 
TheCor4D said:
I have heard some things like alge is much more likely to grow in a res and what not. I figure the T line cant take that much longer to get started, and it seems like after you bleed the system T would be more closed off to everything. *shrug*


Eh, if I was building an external loop, I'd use a res just because I could. I wouldn't be able to fit a res anywhere in my case (aside from a swifty micro or a bayres, and I don't like the bayres concept).

It'll pay off in the long run with bleeding and filling. On the wood case, you could have it set up with the pump at the rear wall mounted outlet facing down, inlet facing towards the front. Res would be front-center, attached to the top (where you'd fill it), and the rad would be directly behind that. Then you could drill two holes in the case, have the pump outlet go to cpu, then the wye returns to the rad, rad to res, back to pump.

Just a thought :beer:
 
TheCor4D said:
I have heard some things like alge is much more likely to grow in a res and what not. I figure the T line cant take that much longer to get started, and it seems like after you bleed the system T would be more closed off to everything. *shrug*


I'm not sure if a res would cause a higher rate of growth but just use the right solution and it'll be fine. Zerex + distilled. Or if you are lazy, skip the fluid xp and buy the koolance solution. I never had growth when I used it.
 
Looking at the sizes of the radiators, i am going to go with the MCP 220 since it is 11" long compared to 16". My case is only 18" long and i wanted the external box to sit on top of the case.

So the dimensions of the case are going to be:

18"L x 8"W x 8"D

They are going to be set to that since that is the size of the case, and i have 8" from the top of my case to the bottom of my desk.

I think that should be ample room for me to get my hose from the top barb of the pump to bend and get to the middle of the case. I think so atleast.....
 
TheCor4D said:
this res here (http://www.voyeurmods.com/index.php?action=item&id=1112&prevaction=category&previd=2&prevstart=0 is a pretty nice price at 10 bucks. I have no clue about a res, so im just shooting in the dark here, i like the price and i think that might look cool sticking through the front of the box, not sure if it is easy to fill though, doesnt look like it would be...

If you add a length of tubing to a funnel, that res is very easy to fill. The funnel is outside the case, and the tubing runs into the top fill hole in that res.
 
Just ordered the swiftech 320 rad, and some blue uv primoflex tubing. I only ordered 10', if i need more, i still have my tygon that i can use for inside the actual box that will be hidden.

When i have some time, i am still planning on quickly putting up a rough sketch of what i am thinking about doing for the box design. Now i just have to hope that i get all the parts. Im paying through the teeth in second day shipping, i hope they all come in time....

I am going to contact swiftech tomorrow and see about ordering the micro res directly from them as all of the sellers that i could find were sold out. Plus they are in CA so standard shipping should get here by the 15th (this friday).

I am thinking about putting an order in at voyeurmods for some red dye to go along with the blue tubing, but im not sure if i want to spend more on the shipping than on the 2$ dye... I might just use some zyrex in the system and leave it uv free, i have some yellow/green dye left over but it makes a nasty color with that zyrex
 
Problem with the order, the rad and the tubing did not go through. They denied my credit card and would not call to verify that my shipping address was on the card (listed as a second). Now i might be hosed for this project.

I got the res coming, and i already have the tracking number and it will be here on time.

So i guess that i will be making this without the rad. Maybe i can use my current rad now, and then cut out a bigger hole for when the new rad comes in. I guess i will go to home depot and buy some cheap tubing that i will use until this new rad comes in. I am so frustrated right now...
 
TheCor4D said:
Problem with the order, the rad and the tubing did not go through. They denied my credit card and would not call to verify that my shipping address was on the card (listed as a second). Now i might be hosed for this project.

I got the res coming, and i already have the tracking number and it will be here on time.

So i guess that i will be making this without the rad. Maybe i can use my current rad now, and then cut out a bigger hole for when the new rad comes in. I guess i will go to home depot and buy some cheap tubing that i will use until this new rad comes in. I am so frustrated right now...


ack...just outta curiosity where'd you order your rad from? anyways, that's a nice reservoir. If I didn't wanna go with T-Line I'd prolly give that a try. I'm waiting for my case, pump, and fans to come in. I still haven't decided on a rad.
 
I ordered the rad from jab-tech. Personally i think they gave up on the problem instead of calling the credit card company, but its fine, i will have to probably go with the 220 from newegg since they can get it here for sure next day even with standard ground :)

If all things go well with the rad order from newegg, i will be doing this this weekend and posting pics.. Need to remember to bring my camera home :) Cant do it down here at the college apt, no tools...

Since i did not get the tubing, i will order the primoflex from voyeurmods, since they had a better deal, and wait for standard shipping which will probably be next wednesday. But in the mean time i will probably go to home depot and buy some of the reinforced tubing that they have (the thick stuff) and make sure that i can get everything to bend and curve the way that i want to. Then when my good stuff comes in, i can upgrade it fairly simply. I am getting quite anxious for this project to start!!

Update: Ordered the rad from newegg, and they have shipped it out today, and i will be able to tell tonight if it will be here tomorrow. *crosses figers* My other package (res) is still planned for tomorrow as well. So i will make a trip to home depot and pick up some cheap tubing for temp, then upgrade it later
 
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Radiator came in today as well as the resivor. The red UV dye came in too, but the dye looks freaking lame. It is so pink. I have tried all sorts of different combos with light pink to semi dark pink as the outcome. I mixed a little bit of my yellow/green with it and it gives it a semi cool rust color. I might do that, or might try some different color dye. I guess i could go with my original green inside the blue uv tubes, that might be pretty cool looking.

Anyways, I should be starting this project tomorrow morning and i will be taking lots of pictures along the way. Hopefully it comes out ok for being a budget, quick fix :)
 
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