[GTFouts]

Well, I have been putting together this new build for many many months now. Slowly buying things and waiting and waiting and waiting. I designed a custom UFO case with all the things I wanted in an ultimate, future-proof W/C setup and Mountain Mods made it for me. This thing is a monster and I LIKE IT! Some of you may think this is ridiculous, I know I kind of do, but the cooling bug bit me hard, and this was the only way I could scratch it. I know I will never need another case or cooling setup again....EVER! At least I don't think so. Not even with Skulltrail, it is Skulltrail right?, I'm not even paying attention to it really.

Here's whats in the setup right now:

Case - Custom UFO designed for 4 W/C loops
CPU - QX9650
M/B - ASUS Maximus Extreme
P/SP - Enermax Galaxy 1000w
Video - 2 x HIS 3870X2
Memory - 4 x 1 GB Corsair Dominator DDR3 1800
HD's - 2 x WD 320 GB SATA2, 1 x WD 200 GB SATA2
DVD - Plextor PX-810SA
Monitor - HP LP3065 30" Flat Screen
Keyboard - Ideazon Merc Stealth
Windows - Vista 64 Ultimate (sitting here waiting to be loaded)

CPU W/B - Apogee GTX w/ copper top (I love this block)
Video W/B - 2 x EK full coverage
N/B W/B - built in to M/B from ASUS
Fans - 12 x Panaflo 120x38 FBA12G12H1BX
Fan Controller - 3 x Nexus Vantec NXP 201
Rad - 3 x PA120.3, 1 x PA120.2
Pump - 4 x D5 constant speed
Res - 4 x Icebox Dual Bay UV Blue
Pump RPM & Water Temp monitor - Scythe Kazemaster KM01
Fittings - Bitspower compression fittings
Tubing - 1/2" Tygon all the way

I put a lot of thought into the plumbing because I wanted ease of fill and drainage. I also didn't want a jumbled mess of tubing so pump and rad orientation was kind of important. Since I had this case custom made, I added a few inches to the depth, so it's now 20" instead of the standard UFO 18" (if I had it to do over again I'd make it 22"). It's also 24" tall instead of the normal 18". This gives me a bit more room for tubing and such without the video cards or M/B tray getting in the way. It also had to be 24" tall for everything to fit since I went with the dual 5 bay setup. In my current setup I was tired of having to pull tubing off of things to drain it, so I put in Koolance universal nozzle bodies. I then drilled 3/4" holes in the bottom of the case and installed Koolance fill ports so I could drain it without removing anything. I just set if over the kitchen sink, take the drain cap off of whichever loop and open its corresponding fill valve on the res. The whole loop drains out in about a minute, very sweet indeed!

Because I have bays on top of each other I had to figure a way to fill the lower bays, so I drilled holes in the top of my res's, tapped them G1/4 and installed 90 degree Koolance swivel fittings with a shutoff valve for filling. I just screw in a barb to the valve, connect a hose and then I'm able to pour in water without having anything over the top of the unit, thus eliminating any chance of spillage into the case, M/B or Power Supply. (Done that before and fried my new Enermax 750 a while ago...sigh...live and learn) Well this did not work like I thought because there was no way for the air to bleed out while the water entered, on the bottom res's that is. Worked fine for the top res's because I could take off the fill cap to allow air to escape. Yes, I could have just filled them that way, but remember, spillage. So I drilled another hole in the back top of the res's and tapped them M4 so I could use the spare brass drain screws with gaskets that come with all Thermochill rads. This gave me an easy way to bleed air for filling plus seal the bleed hole. WARNING!!! NEVER pre-drill a hole in acrylic bays. My first 4 bays I did that and when I went to drill the larger hole for the G1/4 tap, the acrylic would chip BADLY and the bit would dig in severely and end up cracking the res, thus destroying the res. Just drill it with whatever size you need right off the bat. It works fine as long as you don't use any downward pressure and stop just before it penetrates the other side. Then use a dremel to finish the last part. I learned this the hard way and had to buy 4 new res's. Well, once I destroyed the first one I had to keep trying since I was stupid enough to pre drill all the holes first.

I had to put the power supply in the top hole above the motherboard so I would have space for all my pumps and plumbing. This created another problem because of the weight of this huge Enermax. It was bowing my case out and I did not like that at all, so I had to figure a way to support it. I had an extra HD mounting bracket from Mountain Mods and after some intense staring and experimentation, I found that I could modify a piece of it and screw it to the M/B tray. With a piece of dense sticky foam on it, it ended up supporting the rear of the power supply perfectly. Since the foam is sticky on both sides it also keeps the top of the M/B tray in place since there is really no rear support for it, at the top, from moving side to side, which it will do. With all the weight and tubing that is going to be connected to it, well, it can't hurt!

Being that I have always wanted to be able to see just what my pumps were doing and what the temp of the water was, I came up with a way of monitoring them, at least I think I have. Since the D5 pumps now come with an RPM wire, I ordered the Scythe Kazemaster fan controller. I had 1 slot left that I needed to fill anyway. I'm not going to control anything with it, but it looks perfect for monitoring since it displays RPM and Temp for each of the 4 channels, AND, it's blue, so it matches perfectly. I went to Koolance and ordered the temp sensors and fittings for them so I could put them in the universal blocks and monitor the water temp. IF it works, I will be able to see the pump RPM and the water temp of each loop, which will give me piece of mind. I'm just not sure yet if the temp monitor will operate properly with the Kazemaster. I'm pretty sure the pump RPM will, we shall see.

Since I wanted each card on it's own loop, I used the Koolance Swivels again, for 3 reasons. 1 - it allows me to connect the tubing from the side of the card without it getting in the way of the other card. 2 - I can remove the cards individually without having to drain water because of the crossover tube. 3 - it allows me to swivel it for ease of tubing routing and stress on the card from the tubing. I have them on my current 3870's and they work like a charm, don't leak either, which I was very concerned about simply because it was a swivel.

I'm not finished yet, pretty close tho. I still have to order the video waterblocks and that should complete all the parts I need. I will update this with more pics when I get it put together and finished. Pretty crazy isnt it?

[GTFouts]

Heres some more pics

[GTFouts]

And the last for now

[EmAn]

JEeze that thing is nice

:subscribed

[nd4spdbh2]

i dont make it over to the water fourms much... but

HOLLY BLODDY ****ING CRIST, that is one hell of a setup.

[masakabassist]

Holy S*** batman! Awsome set up. I think im going to the classies now, I have yet again been bitten by the upgrade bug

[meionm]

The mother of all watercooling overkills

[Elluzion]

O M G!! That is insane..... !!!

4 pumps, 4 res and 3 rads!!! HoLY ****

[EmAn]

how long did it take to leak test and bleed?

[SolidxSnake]

I can't think of a single reason to ever use two PA120.3s and a PA120.2 cooling one computer.... or 4 D5s.

You have too much money. Give me some.

[JamesXP]

More pics and more explanations are wanted.

[GTFouts]

No, there are not 3 rads, there are 4 rads, one for each loop. Thats why its called Quad Crazy, 4 of everything, cept hard drives.

Just ordered my EK 3870X2 waterblocks, should have them Wed. Frozen CPU had them delivered today. They have 5 left as of right now for those that want one. I think I see this up and running this weekend for sure.

EmAn - It doesn't take long to bleed it because I have res's. They do wonders for removing air. Takes about 10 to 15 min per loop to get 95% of the air out once you get the pump to kick in properly. The little bit thats left will work its way out when it does. Understand that each loop is a tad more than 1/2 gallon. As far as leak testing, I use blue shop paper towels and let things run over night and the next day with just the pumps plugged into a old power supply I have. The blue towels will show you the slightest bit of water if it drips on them. I also turn the case all ways so trapped air in the rads will be forced out.

SolidxSnake - I can think of alot of reasons. I personally do not like it when my res's get warm to the touch, but thats just my personal preference. Like I said, I did this so I will never have to set up a case again. Think about Skulltrail and it's possibilities. 2 CPU's, 4 video cards. Thats a lot of heat for 1 loop wouldnt you think? With very slight modification, I can have each CPU on its own loop and 2 video cards on each of the other 2 loops, keeping heat to a minimum, thus allowing maximum OC, which is important to ME. And thats all that matters now, isnt it? I feel that this case will be able to handle anything thats thrown at it for a very long time, longer than I will be around I believe.

JamesXP - I will post more when I finish it this weekend. If you want things explained, please feel free to ask what and I will explain it as best I can

[EmAn]

you're a madman...

when you have it totally set up... put it on a scale so we can see how heavy it is....

I am banking on 100+ Pounds

[Charr]

Everything is very clean, it looks really nice.

Also, I can't imagine how much that weighs :P

[GTFouts]

Weighs 72 pounds without the water or video cards and video blocks. So your probably right, about 100 pounds. But thats cool cause it doesnt go anywhere and its on the Mountain Mod casters. I can push it around with 1 finger, rolls easy, sits right under my printer desk and is totally out of the way. Pretty quiet too because these fans are very high flow fans, so they push plenty of air turned all the way down to 7 volts. Thats why I picked them. I really didnt need the fan controllers, but I had them and had the space on the case for them and they look cool as hell when its all light up, so I put them in. Gives me the ability to crank them up if I really need some serious cooling, but I dont thihnk I will. Gets a bit loud then tho.

Charr - That was also very important to me, keeping things neat and clean. I spent a long time sleeving all wires, modifying all the power supply wires, changing connectors on the fan controllers to color code them so I would never hook them up wrong. Let me tell you, it was a pain shortening the main MB power connector, but it was worth it. Everything in here is replacable without having to rip out wiring, cept for the hard wired power supply wires of course. Since the case is black and all the sleeving is black, it makes it very hard to see the wiring, plus its all run along the bends in the case which helps hide it too. It will look alot better when I'm done.

[EmAn]

hurry up and finish up

then send me some money

[narcotis]

You must have payed as much for your compression fittings as i did for my entire setup lol
How many of those are there?

[jason4207]

I'll be watching this one!

Good work man! Looking forward to your results!

Edit: Only thing missing is the (6) 500GB 32MB cache Seagate drives in Matrix RAID0/5.

[voigts]

Where in the world do you people get the money to do this stuff? This is some serious overkill. Man you make me feel poor.

[pak]

are you sure that case is a "custom" ? It looks like the ascension. Some shots further back of the loops would be nice.

--pak