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Silen Flux

72K views 445 replies 86 participants last post by  TrumpyAl 
#1 ·


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Hello everybody and thanks for checking out my very first project log!

Despite having been described as looking like the 70's idea of today's pc, I just couldn't help falling in love with the NZXT's Phantom the moment I saw it, err, two years ago. Call me a slow lover but I finally went and bought the case the start of this month. That also marked the end of look but don't touch policy
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The ever evolving plans and renders scribbled unintelligibly on random bits of paper, the colour scheme of the planned eye candy will be white, white and more white, laced with black, red and chrome. I'm also planning on reproducing some of the Phantom's edgy designs on the cover plates in order to make the build more interesting and keep it from turning into a miniature hospital operating theatre (though I do find myself somehow strangely fascinated by the Umbrella corp-like you're-all-going-to-die-down-here laboratory freakiness...)

The Intro updated & expanded

There have been some questions so I figured that there should be some answers.

The name Flux got chosen for two reasons; firstly because my plans kept changing no matter how many times I tried to set them in stone, and secondly because I wanted to create a case that was a keeper in the world of nearly yearly changing hardware. I did tell you drooled after the Phantom for two years before actually buying it, right?
Well, mobos and colour schemes come and go - what many modded cases don't do, is change (easily) with the hardware. I therefore wanted Flux to be something that you could to toss in a new mobo, change the sleeving a bit and flush the loop with a different coolant - and be as fresh as ever. Or should I say, that's what I want Flux to be. For now I think I'll just worry about the journey there.

So what will happen then?

The plan is to produce cover plates for the psu, radiator and the motherboard tray, but with a twist: Behind the white cover plates I'm planning on crafting separate acrylic, led lighted "light stripes" that will echo the Phantom and the motherboard's design. Furthermore the light stripes will not be limited to white but will have a selection of colours to choose from, adding to the case's versatility of theming. All three (psu/rad/mobo) plates will have independently controllable lights, so that should one wish, one stripe could be set red, another white and the third missing entirely. The idea behind this is the ever playful "now-you-see-it-now-you-don't".

In the mean while ambient lighting will be provided by two white led lit fans. Assuming I find ones that fit. (Finding a pair should be interesting in a world of non-standard 200mm fan designs)

The radiator will be mounted on the front using a specifically crafted mounting plate. I'm still working on dealing with the warm exhaust air dumping issues that this + the cover plate will be resulting in.

Tubing? Mandatory, they say, unless using mineral oil. We'll be using acrylic routed sneakily through the lighting stripes on the cover plates.

The cables will also get played with but I'm not only meaning sleeving them silly colours now. I actually want to do something a little different with their routing. The anal army two rowed 24 / 8 / 3+4 are nice but... boring. The lighting stripes will feature heavily here as well.

Externally only little will change: The power indicator and fan control leds will be changed, most likely to white (or possibly red). Also the mesh covered areas, mainly the top and bottom front will see some black added to the case structure to stop the now white parts from glowing like beacons through the mesh. I'm also thinking about adding some semi-hidden surprises to these areas but we'll keep the details a secret for now.
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The side panels will see some tidying up but that's all.

So nothing more megalomaniac than that. The hardware will be what I have running now, while the tools will be limited to my hands, the old trusty dremel, an ancient power drill, some files and an iron saw that's probably twice my age.
Ok, the sandpaper can come too.

Hardware

Motherboard: ASUS Maximus V Gene
CPU: Intel 2500K
GPU: 2 x EVGA GTX 760
RAM: Corsair XMS3 4x4GB DDR3 1600MHz

Cooling

CPU: EK-Supremacy - Nickel
GPU: EK-FC670 GTX - Nickel
Pump: Swiftech MCP35X
Radiator: Alphacool NexXxoS XT45 Full Copper 360
Reservoir: Alphacool HF 38 Cape Cyclone 150 v.2

Updates Index

You no pay, you no live here. OUT!!!
Plans & Shapes
Candy cane spaghetti
Guess what?
A mixed bag
An accidental teaser
The sata cables are out for blood!
Lovers, we have light
It makes you speak German!
Me gusta soñar, me gustas tú
Post #66
Staples, yo
Janus smiles upon us
Jailbreaking the rad
Jimm's sugary goodness
You're all going to die down here
EK, you sexy thing!
Open. Close.
Plumbing yoga
Mario ate my brain
Not very French balconies
Seriously...
And there goes the lid, the boilerplates, everything
Bridge to perfection
Dreamy creamy
Getting loopy
Time flies when you're having fun. Or not.
But can it print pancakes?

As a fledgling modder still finding my way around the tools and materials, any and all comments, questions and thoughts are warmly welcomed. Hope you'll enjoy the ride!
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8
#2 ·
As I'm going to be using a single 360 rad instead of two 240s, the first thing I had to do was to modify the case into accepting one. Most people seem to have opted for the top fan slots placement but I didn't like the way this compromised the radiator's fan setup and affected the aesthetics so I decided to go for an alternative solution by opening up the space originally occupied by the HDD slots and 5.25" drive bays and making a support plate for the radiator.

And here it is; the gorgeous Phantom pulled apart and everything refusing to pay rent tossed out.



Time for some quick 3D renders good old 60's style!



The third fan exists but it wasn't needed for the measurements exercise and hence got left in the box.



The truth is that I can't use 3D rendering programs to save my life.
...also the cardboard models are turning out perfect for weeding out initial design bads.



Time to cross the point of no return.



Front fan brackets gone.



Filing time. None of that will actually show from underneath the radiator support plate but that's no excuse for shoddy work.



Rad support plate first cuts.



Not for eating.



Far from laser cut go(o)dness but the plate won't be visible once the build is complete.



The filing queue grows.



53cm is a long way for a small dremel disk to go. Didn't even notice how small the poor thing had shrunk until taking it off (and breaking it)
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Note for the pending filing queue: Must invest in a larger file!



While waiting for the new files to arrive, I decided to have a go at sleeving as it seemed like an easy enough thing to try. Armed with Kamaster and Vestito's guides and the Sunbeam pin removal tools, success seemed inevitable. Except that the pins would not come off. They just would not, no matter what I did. The quick 15 minutes I thought I'd spend with the pins and sleeve had turned into three hours and all I had to show were deep cuts on both my thumb and index finger as even the eight pin connector seemed to have turned on me. It was only when I was just about ready to scream like a girl and give up that one of the pins popped out!
I've never felt that victorious.

Victory!



I think next it's time to start getting friendly with the hopefully less aggressive white acrylic waiting in the corner.

Thanks for watching! Any comments, questions and thoughts are warmly welcomed!
 
#4 ·
subbed for sure! great start!
 
#8 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Konkistadori View Post

Why not atleast 60mm rad?
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Subb3d
At least!?
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The 45 scares me as is! Nah, I'm waiting for them to do the same to rads that they've done to phones, lappies, screens etc; make them thin 'n' sweet.
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Thanks for tagging along!
Quote:
Originally Posted by kgtuning View Post

subbed for sure! great start!
Thanks kgtuning! Noticed you got some cookie builds yourself - hope I won't leave you wanting.
Quote:
Originally Posted by xD3aDPooLx View Post

Great Start so far. I really want to see where this goes.
Cheers xD3aDPooLx. You have a pm.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chomuco View Post

god!!
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new..
That's some nice looking stuff you're strutting there. Don't worry though; the plan is to make this one a little different.






Quote:
Originally Posted by KillThePancake View Post

Looks promising, I'll bite
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But I think you forgot a T in your title
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What can I say - it's a budget build
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Update time!

The acrylic turned out much more placid than the sharp, pointy sleeving business and as the weekend passed I got to run some initial drilling and painting experiments.

Cable management plans taking shape. Don't mind the four wobbly holes; that's just a spare piece to test things on.



Paint testing. First layer's looking promising.



The second however... Not.
The worst thing is that I have no idea what or why it happened. Any thoughts or suggestions you have would be mighty appreciated.



While the paint dried the rad plate got its share of new, larger file powered love.



After filing it was time to jut down some helpful lines (which soon turned into a serious information overdose).



Thankfully there's always the dremel to cut out the unnecessary information!
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Looking neat.



Or what do you think?



Thanks for watching! If you have any thoughts or question, just shoot - any and all input is mighty welcome!
 
#10 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by xD3aDPooLx View Post

Thats some killer drawing concepts man. I love the rad mount, you made. I need a few of those, LOL.
The plan is to take the MurderMod luminous panel concept and seriously revamp it. If everything goes according to the completely megalomaniac plans we're going to have the sketched lines glowing through the white panel - and not only in white but any colour we want, making the build a lot more versatile versus hardware changes. To further add to the plan madness I'm going to try making the psu/mobo/side panel lines individually lightable so that the lighting options will vary from non-lit panels to any combination of white / random coloured lumilines in the now-you-see-it-now-you-don't style.
If everything even half goes according to the plan.

The rad mount took nearly eight hours to make and even then I doubt it'll be any good for rads other than the Alphacool XT45. If I get my workspace sorted and that cnc machine built next summer, can't see why not
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#13 ·
Starting the project just before having to disappear to the country for three weeks probably wasn't one my brightest brain childs but at least there's been plenty of time to test and experiment.

Good news is that the striped lumipanel works in reality rather than just on the paper. Well, sort of: The actual light panel works like a dream, but the thing I was totally not counting on was the top white acrylic bouncing the light inside itself creating a halo. Thankfully it looks like the halo can be dealt with by reducing the opaque acrylic's thickness. 2mm sheet has already been inquired after and with little luck should be available next week.
Oh, and the lumistripe lights the case up like a Christmas tree. Great when viewed in full daylight as you get good clear, colour intense stripe but holy mother of a cow once the world goes dark. And there's supposed to be three of them. An elegant solution is under intestimigation.

All in all there's currently a bit of a work order queue as I'm having to wait for the white fan-to-be-leds to arrive. Before the fans there cannot be mobo panel and before mobo panel there really can't be any of the other panels either.

At least I've managed to cook up some candy cane spaghetti.





8-pin route testing. It's going to be tight up there once the fans are in place.



Thanks for watching!
 
#17 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mosquito Mods View Post

Very nice work on that rad mounting plate. I hope when I get around to my next project, mine turns out as good
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Thanks! Took me eight hours to measure (again and again and again and again, just to check) and cut that one, I was so scared of messing up and having to start again.
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#18 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Egami View Post

Thanks! Took me eight hours to measure (again and again and again and again, just to check) and cut that one, I was so scared of messing up and having to start again.
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lol I'm a hobbyist woodworker, and there's a particular saying that I enjoy and do implement...
"Measure twice, and cut once... then sneak up on it anyway"
biggrin.gif
 
#19 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mosquito Mods View Post

lol I'm a hobbyist woodworker, and there's a particular saying that I enjoy and do implement...
"Measure twice, and cut once... then sneak up on it anyway"
biggrin.gif
Uh oh... Looks like overclock totally failed to notify me of your comment. Oh bugger. Sorry, didn't mean to be rude or anything.
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Usually it's me that gets sneaked upon, and even more often it's something so obvious only a total ****** would have missed it.
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Like today it was the perfect twilight to try and take pics of the lumipanel but guess who realised this only as the last bits of light were fading away...
Hobbyist woodworker sounds like a great thing to be - I wish I had the equipment and facilities to work with wood. It's the only material that you can really *feel* when working. If you have any pics of your works would love a link.
smile.gif


Right. Update in an hour or so.
 
#20 ·
I can't really describe this update as anything other than a mixed bag. A lot of things have come together: The lumipanel works and the 2mm acrylic has adequately addressed the halo issue. This has subsequently brought the panel's total height down to 5mm which is great as it now fits under the mobo no problemo. The Christmas tree lights issue is also getting resolved but I need to pull off some rewiring and socialise a fan controller from a friend before declaring victory.
On the hardware side the cable management plan is starting to take form, as is the plumbing - what if I had to completely rewrite the piping diagram over the weekend. I also found some bits in the case I have no idea what they're for, but I think I should let the pictures do the talking.

While waiting for the thinner acrylic to materialise I decided to spend some time with the freshly cooked candy cane spaghetti and see if I could find an interesting way to arrange the cables.







The experiment may have gotten slightly out of hand as I soon found myself thinking what if I redid the colours a little?



Well, the colours and the routing. I think I need help.



Sunday passed watching Futurama and learning how to bend over some hard tubing.





Monday arrived with the news that the acrylic had arrived. Probably the fastest pickup in the store's history followed. Gimme!
At this point I decided that fans or no top fans, I was going to attack the shiny new 2mm acrylic and make the mobo tray cover into flesh. It'll get cropped down to size once the fans are available. However when taking measurements I discovered some strange bits for which I couldn't identify any use for. So I cut them out.





The weird bits out of the way it was time to show the acrylic the saw.
Did I by the way mention the condition of the "shiny" when I went to pick it up from the local plastics shop?



Yeah... Enough said there was a hefty discount involved.
But the mobo tray cover is alive!!!



...man those half torn acrylic scratch cover plastics sure make for one ugly sight.
By the way, those calling cardboard a cheap and inconvenient design material - I dare you to do this casually with your real mobo!
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Ahem. The rad plate has also received some paint. It's not quite prrfect though (nature attacked mid painting) so I'll be sanding that and doing a fresh coat once I get the chance.



Had to try it on regardless.



Hmm. Now just need to decide which cable arrangement to run with.



There is a picture of the test lit lumipanel but it's all distorted by the scratch cover plastics and held in place by a clamp but, but... do you want to see it regardless?

Thanks for watching - let me know what cabling arrangement / colour setup you think I should go for!
 
#24 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by strych9 View Post

This looks really interesting, and makes me miss my Phantom which I sold off a few days back
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Definitely subbed.
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Oh noes! Hope the Phantom went to a good home? Falling more in love with the case every time I get to work on it - it really has some really handy features despite the paintjob being... a bit odd.
Anyways great to have you join the expedition, hope you'll enjoy the ride!
 
#26 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Squashie View Post

Me like, subbed...
Woop! Thanks for tagging along! Hopefully you'll like even more next week when I get my connection fixed and get to push out an update. Currently suffering from super choppy connection that keep failing on me every three minutes or so, making uploading photos practically impossible.

I did somehow manage to upload this one though. Let's call it a little teaser of things to come
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