My first WC build - Black TJ07

Just started on a recent project. I got tired of seeing all these awesome water cooled rigs so I decided to build my own.

Started off with a new PSU and a some custom sleeving from Nils at MDPC-X. I ordered it around the 4th of July so he threw in some extras





Heres some of the finished sleeving:



I know some of the heat shrink doesnt quite line up but for what I wanted I think it will get the job done and it was my first time.

Got a hell of a deal on ebay and couldnt resist buying a TJ07



And of course the first thing I decided to do was tear it completely apart and sleeve the ugly blue front panel cables.





Then that leads up to today. Powder Coating. Filled in all of the screw holes with some spare screws and just dropped off at the powder coating place. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be to find a powder coating place but I found one thats going to give me a pretty good deal. Im a little worried about the motherboard tray. It seems to be metal with some sort of coating. So we'll see how it does when they bake it.



Should be getting the goods back later this week. Also just placed my water cooling orders today as well. I'll list all of the hardware once I get it in. I wont be cooling the graphics card just yet because there arent any full cover 680 Lighting waterblocks yet.

Ill post again once I get more stuff in. I'm very open to any comments or build ideas. Thanks!

So lots of recent developments today!

Just got the parts back from powder coating. I must say powder coating is the only way to go. Just makes everything look so professional and seems to be pretty durable.



Ended up costing $60 for everything to be coated. My advice for people shopping around to get something powder coated is to find a smaller shop that will run your parts with one of the larger paying customers. Also the more generic color the cheaper. The place I had these done was doing a batch of parts the exact same color so that will probably be the best route.

As far as the motherboard tray it turned out pretty well considering the shinny coating on it to begin with. They didnt even have to remove it or anything however YMMV.

I had filled all of the screw holes and that made placing everything together much easier. I was worried about clearances of all the pieces because I was unsure about how thick the powder coating would be but I was able to fit everything right back into place.



Once I got everything I need to check the clearance of the top 240mm rad. I dont have any before pictures but I was able to remove the top mesh that held the two stock 120mm fans. I had to trim the mesh to be even with the main aluminum panel. Once I did that I tried fitting the rad in the top. I found what I thought was a decent spot and marked the holes to drill. Drilling mesh is not very easy and pretty hard to get very precise with it. So you can probably tell I buggered up the holes a little bit but thats nothing a washer or two cant help I also had to widen them out a little bit for better alignment.



Once all that was accomplished I tried fitting the rad with two 120mm fans. Turns out the motherboard tray gets in the way so time for more cutting.



So thats it for modding as of now. I'm sure something else will come up later. Ive got the most of the WC cooling parts here now and will probably begin installation of those next week after I take my two finals for school. Summer class blows... The joys of engineering I suppose.

As a note. The PrimoChill tubing SMELLS so damn bad. Seriously it burned my nose it smelt so bad ha. Not sure if its because of the heat right now but holy crap its awful ha. Hopefully theres nothing wrong with it. Was nice to see it was made in the USA though.

Also wanted to give Gary at Sidewinder Computers a shout out for the excellent customer service and awesome prices. Thanks for all the help! Give these guys a look next time your looking for water cooling stuff, they are really good.

Hardware List:

XSPC RX480
XSPC 120mm Universal Radstand
Black Ice GT Stealth 240
Swiftech MCP655 - w/ Speed Controller
Swiftech Apogee HD
EK-VGA Supreme HF (Till Lightning FC Blocks come out)
Swiftech MCRES Micro Revision 2
PrimoChill PrimoFlex PRO LRT Tubing 1/2" ID 3/4"OD - Black
EK EKoolant Premium Liquid Cooling Premix Coolant - Clear
Bitspower Matt Black Compression Fittings
Akasa 5.25" Bay to 2.5" / 3.5"
Corsair SP120 - 4 Quiet for the RX480 and 2 Performance for the Black Ice rad
Phobya Y-Adapter 4Pin Molex to 4x 3Pin (Bottom rad fans)

Once again any comments or suggestions are more then welcome. Thanks for looking

I had some sata heat shrink but I was worried about the fitting of the connectors into the motherboard headers because the TJ07 has one USB port per motherboard header. So for me to place them into my mobo two cables have to go side by side unfortunately I didnt want to have clearance issues. But once I start plugging everything up I'll see what I can do because that way certainly looks better!

I think I'm going to give the stainless a look a try for a while till I get all of the components in and see how everything looks as a whole. Would look real boss with stainless compression fittings ha. Thanks for the suggestions!!

Ha YES! I know I messed up by not doing that. The only modding I thought I would had to do was drilling holes for the radiator in the mesh but I should of known better.

I honestly wasnt even going to water cool if for awhile but once I decided to get it painted I couldnt resist ha.

Anyone have any problems with this primoflex tubing? I read on here about plasticizing or something. Im just using EK's clear coolant.

Just got done with my finals so time to start really getting after it. Got quite a bit done today. Once again I am very sorry for the crappy pics. This build deserves much better.







As you can tell the top rad was more than a close fit. I started getting a little nervous there for awhile but I got lucky and it slid right it. Im a little worried about how much noise the fans will make sucking air through the top mesh since its pretty restrictive. We shall see! The two top fans will end up being on a fan controller just havent found an option I like just yet.

As you can tell there is no gpu. It should be here tomorrow hopefully. I finally got fed up with the waiting for lightning voltage adjustment and sent it back to Newegg. Say what you will but they said voltage was coming but it never did so they can have their card back Not worth the $100 premium right now. As far as its replacement it will be a ref gtx 680 with a full cover koolance waterblock.

I know that white cd drive is awful and hopefully I can find a replacement soon or none at all. Ill probably sleeve the sata cables too at some point. The sabertooth puke green is awful as well. Went with the blue rings on the corsair fans because blue leds might make be getting added soon.

As always please leave any comments or suggestions. Thanks for looking!

Heres some teaser temps:

Try this:



Should of used OCN in the first place.

Btw does 68C seem high under load in prime95 for my CPU?

2600K @ 4.8 and 1.42v ambient 22-23C
Edited by hammerforged - 7/20/12 at 12:58pm