P-160 Blowhole

I'm toying with the idea of putting a blowhole fan in the top of my Antec P-160.
But it's so pretty, the idea of a hole worries me, and I want to be sure it will help.

I have Evercool 120mm's front and back and a Panaflo M1 on the SP94, all my wires are hidden and/or wrapped, and my cpu temp runs at about 42° under load. I am NOT yet overclocking, either. The combination of 4 hard disks, a 3.2 processor, 9800 Pro (with Silencer) and a 510 watt power supply really produces heat! The psu blows the heat out the back of the case effectively with its fan (heats the entire room, too), but the other components still produce lots of heat. I do not want to water cool (yet).

Has anyone else cut a hole in the top of their nice, new case?

Im getting mine on monday, and I will add a blowhole on top as well as one on the side, along with a window. It might take me a bit though as Im new with a Dremel and want to be extra careful not to mess up the case. If you wait a couplle weeks I should have mine fairly finished so I can show you how I did.

try a hole saw. makes perfect cuts as long as you know how to use em.

I will be getting a p160 in the near future and using a hole saw to cut holes in the side and the top of the case. Now you may need to go to an automotive parts store to find a hole saw big enough for 120mm fans.

I modded my P160 with a dremel and a sheet metal cutting Snips, I cut are smaller hole with a dremal and slowly nibbled out the edge to make it a bigger hole.

http://www.sfu.ca/~achanx/Image20.jpg

Kar said:

I modded my P160 with a dremel and a sheet metal cutting Snips, I cut are smaller hole with a dremal and slowly nibbled out the edge to make it a bigger hole

Click to expand...

Pic looks good, Kar. Neat holes, look like factory-additions.

Questions, if you have time to answer them:

1. Are those all 80mm fans?

2. Fan Details? Are you using a fan controller?

3. How much of a difference in cooling did you note when you added the blowhole(s)?

4. It looks like your side fans are over both the cpu and the video card, right?

5. Which fans are intake and which are outtake?

Thanks again

Delta 120mm 32mm tri-blade 125cfm side intake
Delta 120 mm38mm 130cfm top and back exhaust
Delta 120mm 25mm 115cfm front intake
92 tornado side intake
generic 120 blue led 74cfm top back exhaust
8c drop in temp.

yup right on top of cpu and vid

BTW all control by Vantec nexus

Wow, you're moving some SERIOUS air there, Kar! I imagine that your noise level is not too bad with the Nexus turned down -- but if you turn up the controls, it must sound like an airplane runup!

Where did you get all your Delta fans?

it is not as noisy as people think when they are running at low. it has a low pitch humming sound, very ear friendly.

I got these fans for $4 each at
http://www.excess-solutions.com/12vdc_fans4.htm
but u would have to buy them at large quantity.

Kar said:

I modded my P160 with a dremel and a sheet metal cutting Snips, I cut are smaller hole with a dremal and slowly nibbled out the edge to make it a bigger hole.

Click to expand...

This is almost excatly what I did. Except I didn't have a dremel so I used a smaller hole saw to make the first cut. (Didn't have a Hole saw bit the right size and didn't want to buy one ) Then I used a tin snips to cut the hole to the right size. It wasn't perfect, but when I put a grill on the top of it it looks great. On a side note, I also cut out every other wire in the grill to open it up a bit for more airflow.