The crate.

[AlienALX]

OK so this part was done yesterday at home. It uses the exact measurements of the stack inside.

Do note I have not put in the connecting pieces yet. I got the dimensions of each piece from Bitspower's site, and yeah we have a copy of the res and flow meters. I need to now make connecting pieces to make it one entire piece. However, before that I designed the areas that will be carved into for the wood and carbon to go. This should make it easier to understand.

OK, so now imagine that piece with the connecting pieces in place (to mimic the water fittings and connectors) in 5mm silver acrylic, with carbon and wood pieces cut to go in the carve outs.


There. I hope that makes sense. What I now need to go into though is that there will be a piece behind that in 5mm opal, connected behind it. In that I will carve out 5 circles for the LEDs to go in. It will then be screwed together from behind, kinda like a plate res. Basically? this is my "dry run" of creating just that. If it is successful then maybe, just maybe, I will finally get around to making "Fake Plastic Trees". We shall see.

 

[AlienALX]

 

[AlienALX]

OK so I just vernier measured the 8 lamp LED rings. Those are now in the design for the opal back piece.

I don't have the 12 LED one to hand for the bottom yet as I only ordered it earlier. However, the job now is to create channels for the wiring to sit in. As I literally want one connector coming out somewhere and that is it. Oh and add the pilot holes for the screws, too.

 

[AlienALX]

3 hours of machine time done. Piece one is finished.

 

[AlienALX]

 

[AlienALX]

Not so good today lol. The white a4 piece now resides inside the bin lmao.

I decided to use a legit end mill in 3mm. Sadly I messed up the positioning and the bit left the work piece before coming back in and getting caught and yeah. Game over lmao.

I have ordered another sheet. Will revise the machining when I get back and have another go !

 

[hmmblah]

Not so good today lol. The white a4 piece now resides inside the bin lmao.

I decided to use a legit end mill in 3mm. Sadly I messed up the positioning and the bit left the work piece before coming back in and getting caught and yeah. Game over lmao.

I have ordered another sheet. Will revise the machining when I get back and have another go !

Good luck with the next piece. I love these custom bits you do. I may have said it before, but if not you're talented AF. It's nice to see custom pieces instead of bolt-ons all the time.

 

[AlienALX]

It was my fault. It always is when it goes wrong lol. I decided to up the bit size to try and make it go faster, and also to move the piece into the middle of the machine to make it easier to vacuum off the dust. Both were new ideas and yeah….

The machine does not make the mistakes. We do

 

[AlienALX]

Talking of new ideas. I am going to scrap the carving out for the LEDs and wires. It just takes too long, and makes too much noise. Even after a nice big hemp spliff it just grates on my final nerve lmao.

So, I am going to cut those areas out (meaning one cut rather than a hundred or more) and then cut a solid back piece. Either out of 3mm plastic or the left over carbon.

I also need to start using the 20k RPM spindle motor at some point. But that needs experimenting as last time it just melted everything in sight lmao. It's absolutely terrifying ! that said it is on a beefy old PSU and has its own PWM controller (manual) so yeah... I am sure I could double the speed of the bugger quite easily. Problem is, as is science, every time you do that you double the noise and mess

But yeah, got tons of stock and scrap bits I could play with. Now just isn't the time.

 

[AlienALX]

Oh bloody heck. I forgot. This is now finished. 3 coats of varnish on the wood and the entire thing has been filed and smoothed a lot.

 

[AlienALX]

OK the revised designs. White opal 5mm. Says 59 minutes, that is less than 1/3 of the time it needed to pocket cut.

And then this will go behind. Might do it in carbon, might not. We shall see. If not it'l be solid 3mm white (not opal).

The benefit of this way is that it will be way more solid, stronger, and IMO better looking (more heft).

 

[AlienALX]

OK. So I went back to the old sharp AF 0.8mm bit. And.

So that is the back piece done. It has a bit of poke out where I have had to file the silver due to the mess up I had with that, but I can live with it..

I will file it when I return. Off out for lunch tomorrow then home home after.

 

[AlienALX]

 

[AlienALX]

OK so where have I been? sick. I went out with my mother and her twin for their birthday on the 22nd October and got dropped off home.

I then caught Covid. Which absolutely wiped me out for 5 weeks. I thought I was going to die, and I never say that lightly. It was truly awful. I went to mum's at around 80% full health and then caught the flu. And of course, the NHS let me down again and I had neither vaccination. So I was sick for another 3 weeks. Was finally all better for around two weeks, now I have a cold.

All I need now is the norovirus for the full set ffs. I am tired of being snotty and coughing. Seriously two fuggin months? ugh.

Any way I clearly needed some retail therapy. So.

They do not make EPS Strimer. However, with my now vast experience of taking them apart and putting them back onto other cables and a good technique I am going to make my own. My board does indeed use 2 EPS, so yeah just need some cheapo black extensions and fit them on that. Sadly my cables are not long enough to just fit to, but I don't mind.

The screen? not sure yet. Well, whether inside or outside etc.

 

[WYP]

Looking forward to seeing how this all comes together.

 

[AlienALX]

Thanks Mark. It's nice to be back in the land of the living ffs.

Always liked that screen. Really tempted to put it on the front of the case. It'll depend on the cables. I know they make thinner more flexible hdmi cables so I'm hoping to do that, with my RGB feature thing below it. Due to the somewhat open nature of the case I may be able to hide the cables too.

 

[AlienALX]

OK finally some more done. My screen and the cable (Strimer) arrived. I bought some extensions but they are too thick for the Strimer LED things. I need to make some cables no doubt.

Any way, for now I am back on the "feature" LED RGB thing. I have now finished the middle piece, and drilled tapped and countersunk it. The back is now removable.

Quite terrifying but I basically clamped the two together after marking out the 3mm back (lots of clamps) then drilled through both to 2.5mm, then removed the back and drilled it to 3.2mm and countersunk, before finally putting a M3 tap in the drill and tapping the holes in the middle part.

The top face part will be glued down to the middle part later. I need to fix in the wood and carbon permanently first.

I did bring all my soldering tools with me, so there is that.

 

[AlienALX]

OK so the wiring and soldering is done. The white stuff is liquid electrical tape.

I need to find a RGB cable now to connect to it.

 

[AlienALX]

We finish tomorrow.

 

[AlienALX]

OK so as per the purchases thread I decided to upgrade the CPU. This rig has the best GPU I have (wc 6950xt) but the CPU is the worst of all three I have (11700k, the others are 5700x3d and 12700kf).

So I got a 14600k. It was £229 with the Assasin's Creed game coming out in Feb I think (worth £50).

So I needed a board. TBH had it not been for this specific one I wouldn't have done any of this lol.

Will also be the first PC I have on D5. So I needed that too. 32gb Acer Predator.

No bending pls.

And obs the cooling gear needed to add the CPU into the loop.

Then last night I was racking my brains trying to remember what storage I have it in. As this used to be my backup and TV rig (use it on Weds evenings to tap into our LAN night, and have played TLOU 3 times through as well as Dead Island 2 on the TV) it has the least. I just couldn't remember what, though. Then I realised the CPUID link was on a forum I use lmao.

OK that makes sense. A cheapo 512 for Windows and a 2tb. So I grabbed another 1tb PCIE 3. It was £25 less than a PCIE4, and as I won't use it to boot from there was no point. IE, a 512 is useless for anything but Windows now IMO.

I also forgot TP. It is a one shot deal this, so I won't use it until I know the board will boot with 14th in. Thankfully I do have a 12700k I can borrow out of my now TV PC, so I won't be stuck as the board has no Flashback.

Other things. The EPS cables are now all made and the LED things have been fitted. The feature RGB thing is now all done, with the wood and carbon glued in.

So when I get home next week I'ma be awful busy lol.