The B00Mbox, my watercooled cube project, Warning! Lots of p

[Wordbiker]

And the inside. You can see the aluminum thumbscrew fasteners that will hold the front bezel on from the inside.
Edit: I should mention that this is a sub-bezel that everything will be mounted to. The finished bezel will consist of a thin aluminum panel with cutouts for the lights, switches and LEDs with a sticker applied to it, then covered with a final framed sheet of 1/8" clear plastic. I'm thinking of burying another string of EL cable in the frame. The frame will be black like the binocs, and if I'm lucky, bent at the corners. I have to plow a dado slot to accept the front finish bezel, and I'm not sure how that will turn out after it's bent. Once again, I'll just have to experiment til I get the result I want. :cheers:

[DaemonLee]

Beautiful so far, hope it goes well...


Btw, Where'd you get those fans from? O.o

[Wordbiker]

Beautiful so far, hope it goes well...


Btw, Where'd you get those fans from? O.o

They're cheap "UV sensitive" fans from SVC rated at about 40CFM each, but the LEDs aren't UV blacklights, they're green. They did work very well however, because each LED is individually wired radially from the central hub. LED fans are typically wired with a thin mylar PC board or wires covered with tape wrapped around the circumference of the fan body. I have a lot more flexibility with placing the individually wired LEDs. I'm sure you could do something similar with just about any plastic 80mm fan. I have about 5' of the 3" ID acrylic tube left, so I'm sure I'll be doing similar mods in the future, perhaps with clear fans.
:thumb:

[Wordbiker]

Latest update:
I have the cube running and Folding away! :D
The one on the top is tentatively sold to my LAN buddy (Pending him coughing up some cash) and mine is running on temporary hardware.

[Wordbiker]

Made some progress on my plastics. I still ended up with some bubbles where I glued the EL wire in place, but I guess that's just the nature of this beast. The outer wire is red, and the inner wire is yellow, both will be spliced inline to save some connection wiring. Once it's lit up, it's unnoticeable. I'll work on that technique sometime in the future when I don't have so much to put together! I also did half of the grenade, and the new wire matches the plastic even better than the last one did.

This is a partially complete pic. I still have a piece of yellow plastic that will overlay the center section, and show the GPU waterblock. Still remaining is the green mirrored acrylic side cutout, but that one's easy in comparison to these. I chamfered then polished the edges of these pieces before I put them together as it'd be a real pain later. The backing paper is still on the back of the plastic, so you don't get the full translucent effect. I'll see if I can get the EL wire spliced later tonight, and maybe get that yellow plastic bonded and trimmed, and take some pics. Then you and I both will get a better idea of what it's gonna look like on the case. The hole at the bottom of the pattern is intentional, for additional ventilation.

[Andy]

Looks awesome!

Keep going!!! :D

[Wordbiker]

Looks awesome!

Keep going!!! :D

Thanks Andy :D
It really helps push me on to hear such nice comments.
I should have the explosion done very soon for some splashier pics...

[zeradul]

Amazing Wordbiker... Absolutely amazing... :thumb: :thumb: :thumb: :thumb: :thumb:

[Wordbiker]

Had a setback last night....:cry:

I finally completed the explosion to the point where I could splice the red and yellow EL wire together and fire it up for some test pics....the light seemed a lot dimmer than my previous tests, and on closer investigation, I discovered that the wire sandwiched inbetween the well-bonded acrylic has developed a short. The light flickered, complete with sizzling noises. :(
I may have to start all over again.:shrug:

[Pakman{GB}]

ouch, VERY nice work so far.. I love it :thumb: :thumb: :thumb:

[Mista K6]

Damn man, that sucks, it still looks sick to me though :thumb: . Have you considered opening a business and taking orders :?: . Anyways, awesome work, : peace2: Mista K6

[Wordbiker]

Damn man, that sucks, it still looks sick to me though :thumb: . Have you considered opening a business and taking orders :?: . Anyways, awesome work, : peace2: Mista K6

Funny you should ask that....

One thing I have been working on is a case design, but not out of plastic. I'm a carpenter, and I've looked at the cases available in wood for quite some time now, none of them meeting my own standards for quality or overall design. Right now, you can buy a "wood" computer case that consists of a veneer wrapped around a cheap case that would sell for $40, for $400 . :wow:
The other choice is a pine or oak computer "cover" that has no ventilation whatsoever other than the back is open (and ugly). By appearance, it looks like a couple of factory cabinet doors joined together by a couple planks and a tambour door. No style IMHO, and these sell for $3-400. I'll post pics of my design ideas in another thread when I have a bit more to show.

Regarding this case, you haven't seen a lot from me as I've been re-working the design a bit. I met a new friend online that is going to an industrial design school, and has access to laser and CNC machining equipment. I am refining my bezel design for the front which will now be not only cut out by a laser, including the I/O ports, the DVD tray door, and the binoculars and front switches, but it will have a laser graphic burned into the green mirrored plastic itself! To match the front, the top and sides will also have a subtle camo graphic burned into it, and some other tricks as well. I wasn't sure what one could do with a laser until I started looking at his work and discussing it with him more, and I've come up with a few things that should really stand out.

Since the beginning of this project I've been planning to incorporate an electroluminescent tracer sign on the explosion side that says,"BOOM!" in five individual letters that the tracer can put into over 30 modes! I was planning to accommodate the panels by either bead-blasting the back of the green acrylic mirror, or removing the silvering with a solvent and using a stencil to define the letters. Well, the solvent works fine, but one thing about green acrylic mirror is....the plastic itself is green, giving me only one color choice for the letters....green. I didn't think this would stand out well enough, especially with the vibrant orange and yellow explosion, so using the accuracy of the laser, I will cut the letters completely out of the plastic, and cut orange or red letters of a slightly thicker plastic in the same pattern and bond them in place. This makes the letters slightly raised and the right color, the green mirror masking any overlap of the EL panels. The tough part is, it all requires a high degree of accuracy, and I've been having a tough time getting an accurate enough layout of where everything goes to create a template good enough to commit to the laser. I'm still learning to use some of the photo and drawing programs I have, so it'll take a bit of time before I'm happy with the layout.

One cool feature I'll be working in is a custom button for the front. I looked at several different button configurations, and all of them interfered with the bezel graphic in some way. Using the nose of the guy holding the binocs, I will be creating a 4-way toggle switch with some tiny momentary switches (donated from another new friend's old joystick) mounted at each quadrant of a laser cutout of the nose. Using a pivot in the center, you will be able to press on each corner of the nose to activate different functions. The switches will be invisible, and the nose will be laser etched with the same graphic as the rest of the front, blending in nicely.

Recent bad news: After removing the power supply to take measurements for some mesh mods, I replaced the PSU temporarily (to keep it Folding) with another 180W unit I had. For some reason, it wouldn't post, so I put the same stock unit back in....still no post :( I tore it down as far as I could without actually removing the mobo from the case, and still have had no luck even getting an error code. There is power, and all the fans spin, but not a peep from the onboard speaker. I'll be working on this as a possible RMA. I'll use the downtime to work on those PSU mods, which consist of replacing as much as possible of the steel casing with what is called "modder's mesh", a steel mesh screen of a fairly stiff gauge and open hole pattern. I'm also planning to mount the 12V relay switch for the watercooling pump inside the PSU enclosure, tying it in with the 120V power coming in from the power cord. The power cord itself is from an Imac, and is semi-translucent. I plan to light it from inside the PSU plug with LEDs.

The downtime will also allow me to work on the watercooling system. I had to cut the tabs off the radiator center, ruining my paintjob so I'll have to do that over, but it looks a bit cleaner now. I've already tested my system and know it works, but all the tubing needs to be shortened and routed through the tight interior of the case. Some of the tighter bends could cause kinks in the soft Tygon, so I'll use some heat-bent plastic tubing to support it on the outside. If that doesn't work, I can just use rings of it in place of zip-ties or interior springs I've seen used. I have designed a flushing system for it that will use standard schraeder air valve fittings, and mount to the top of the case. By removing two bullet-shaped aircaps, I will be able to easily bleed and flush the system later. I should have the caps soon and can show you pics of them if you'd like.

More updates as they come...:cheers:

[Wordbiker]

Pic of the power supply mods I'm doing:

[Andy]

you continure to amase me....

[Wordbiker]

you continure to amase me....

Thanks Andy :D
Here's a better pic, but the best part is what you can't see...
I finished soldering the leads that tap into the power cord coming in. The 12V relay is mounted internally, so I don't need an extra cord for the pump. I'm also replacing the power switch with a military type but turned around so it's always on unless you lift the cover. I'll have a special Molex connector for the pump to remove it for servicing. I'm also planning to use a translucent iMac cord which will be lit from inside the power plug.