Fractal Design Project (no name yet)

I had a few idea's on how I wanted to proceed, but with limited funds, I decided to do a little piece at a time. I look to have it all completed by February.

First time using sketchup, so...it's not very good, but gives an idea of what I'm looking for. The front is only red here, so it's visible. The front on the build will be black.



The top portion of the case will be 2 x Fractal Design XL R2's riveted together and a lot of cutting done. The floor will be removed entirely and the front and back will be replaced. The cases arrived and tear down commenced.





Toying with an idea here...I didn't like it, so went back to my original plan.



Mocking up the motherboard with some cardboard so I could get some measurements and have the sheet metal cut and pressed.





The radiator arrived. I stood it up in front of the case to demonstrate just how big that monster is.



Added the fans.





Had a buddy of mine at Apocalypse Tables make the base and motherboard tray for me. Rough, but I can work with it. This is with the polished stainless steel casters already attached.



Fitting it all together. The motherboard ended up being about a half inch too long, so I have to shave a bit off. At this point, I still have a LOT of cutting to do, but it's starting to come together.









That's all I have for now. I'll post more in the coming weeks as I get more pieces in. The motherboard tray is on it's way from Mountain Mods, and the DemciFlex filters are already in hand, I just haven't put them on yet. Once the motherboard tray arrives I can cut the front and back out, and get everything cut and placed for that portion of the build. It's still pretty rough at this point.

The final build will be all black and chrome with an MSI X99 SLI Plus, i7-5820k, 32GB DDR4 3000Mhz RAM, and either 2 EVGA 970 FTW's or 2 x 980's. I haven't decided yet on the GPU's.

Looks like it will be an interesting setup. Good luck.

going to be SWEET!!!!!

The project got put on hold for quite a while, for various reasons. I finally got back on track about a week ago and started working on it again. I changed the way it's going together, ever so slightly.

Mocked the rad on top of the cases, so I could get an idea for cable management and coolant tube routing, so I could go ahead and order the water cooling parts.





All the watercooling goodies.



The really important stuff. I went ahead and went with the 5820k, but decided on the ASUS X99-A motherboard, after I saw some pretty bad reviews on the MSI SLI Deluxe, and then seeing it go on sale...big sale....just smelled like trouble, so I went back to Asus. Love the looks of that memory.



Just a quick test to make sure I didn't need to RMA anything, as the build is still a month or so from being completed.



Now the fun stuff. Got the back of the case cut out, still need to cut the front out. I have the sheet metal ready to go to replace the front and back panels, so it's almost ready to tear down, strip and get ready for paint.



Havin a bit of fun with the fans, cause...shiny...

Newest update: Took a while to get the case all stripped down, as I ended up having a couple of business trips I had to go on. Finally got it done, and have made headway on getting the sheet metal cut for the front plate. I decided to mount the radiator directly to the front of the case, instead of the top, so.....had to change some things around.


All the paint stripped and ready to start piecing it all together with the replacement front and back panels:




This is the inside of the case. The holes need cleaned up a tad, as the plasma cutter stuck in a couple of spots. Easy stuff though.



From the front. The MO RA3 420 will mount directly to the front sheet metal with 4 230mm fans on the inside.




And with the rad sitting in front. Just rechecking to make sure I had enough clearance for fittings, stop plugs, etc. It's tight, but it fits up perfectly....with a self adhesive rubber seal around the outside edge of the rad, it'll seal up quite nicely.



More updates next week.