P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Want to show off that smoking system or your latest creation?
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by Bio-Hazard »

Depends on if they use thermal tape (nice thin stuff) or those nasty thermal pads (nasty thick stuff) that they use to even out uneven surfaces on some components. High quality thermal tape works great if you use it for what it was designed for (ram sinks and the like)............ :mrgreen:
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by DMB2000uk »

Well it was thick brown stuff, so I'm guessing it was the latter.

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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by Bio-Hazard »

Ya, that thick stuff really sucks, it does work a little, but not all that well, you just have to be careful with thermal paste and double check that all the IC's are making full contact with the sink as a lot of them aren't soldered to the board completely flat and level.
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by DMB2000uk »

Ok, so today marks the day this case really belongs in the modding forum :P

I had the time to mod my case properly to sort out cable management once and for all :partyman:

For this task I decided I needed a Dremel... So went out and bought one...

Image

Always wear your safety goggles kids! They will save your peepers!


So, the plan of attack for this mod is to make the cables as discreet as possible as they can be in an original P180. I'd have loved to have all of the pre-cut holes and room for cables to be hidden behind the mobo and case door (ala updated P180/P182), but my P180 doesn't have any of that. :(
There is barely any room to fit a cable behind the tray and door, so the number and thickness of the cables I can hide behind it are limited even with modding the case.

But undeterred I thought long and hard about how to hide my cables. And I decided that I could route most of them round the back of the bottom chamber and up where the floppy drive bay thing finishes, then they could be cleanly routed up the side of the motherboard.

Here are all the cuts that I planed to make:

Image Image Image Image Image

While I was at it, I decided to cut off the front 'mesh' to reduce the restrictions on the fans at the front of the case that little bit (it all adds up :P)

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And many hours, broken/worn down Dremel wheels later:

Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image

The picture of the random hole is to route my 8pin EPS connector up the back of the tray, so it can be hidden from view entirely, even just this one cable is really too thick for the gap there, but it squishes in (even if the case door bends slightly) so I did it anyway.

I have decided that cutting smooth corners with a Dremel is harder than I anticipated, and was probably the reason why I abused and got through wheels so quick.

Anyways, I did all of those cuts yesterday, and filed the edges all nice and smooth and had a test of fitting components in, and found that the holes weren't big enough, and that I'd forgotten to cut a bit between the top and bottom 'chamber' to let the 8pin EPS through. #-o

Oh well, I've got plenty of time off work with the long bank holiday weekend to fix it, so I wasn't too annoyed. Better too little off, than too much. So I marked bigger holes on all of the cuts and tried again today. While I was at it, I decided that I would go crazy and add a hole in the back of the motherboard tray which would allow me access to the CPU socket mouting holes, handy for adding and removing the watercooling bracket/cpu backplates without having to take off the whole mobo (Thanks Bio for subconsciously planting that idea in my head!).

Sorry I don't have any pics of what I did today, we had snow showers this afternoon, so I wanted to get it all done as quick as possible before they hit. Besides, they'd more or less just be repeats of all the pics of yesterday, and you can see the final work at the end of this post.


Before you take a look at the finished pics, have a gander at the rig before all the modding took place:

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Finished Pics(!):

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I don't know whether I said before now, but I swapped all of my Antec fans for Noctua NF-P12's. Besides full speed, I can set two options: more air at the same noise level; or the same air while running quieter. Good compromise I think.

And as to the reason that my watercooling hasn't been put back in yet, is I'm waiting on a contact to get me a couple of sunbeam SLF-12-B LED 120mm fans for my radiator (he knows someone in the company) as I can't find them for sale anywhere, and their rated specs are the best I've seen for quiet LED fans (they look suitable for use on a radiator to boot). So the downtime gives me chance to clean it out and make sure it's all running as it should be when it goes back in.

For the mean time, I have the Noctua NH-U12 on, and that is keeping the CPU pretty cool while being reasonably quiet to boot (with the fans on full speed).

So if my P180 was sexy before, It's drop dead gorgeous now ^_^

Comment away plz!

Dan
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by Alathald »

Damn fine looking case you have there!

Can't wait to see it at it's full glory when you put the watercooling system back in. :supz:
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by stopthekilling77 »

we discussed the bracket hole earlier. gotta love that P-180 doncha?
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by stev »

That's some really nice cutting for the MOBO tray. :) Access is everything when the components are all working without a complete tear-down.

Nice progress! :supz:
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by DMB2000uk »

Thanks guys!

Yeah, It'll be awesome when I get my watercooling back up and running ^_^

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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by martini161 »

oh, i was gonna ask what happened to your lcs. why did you take it out in the first place? and your lucky your case doesnt have a window so you can put those hidious yet awesome fans in. and what kind of dremel is that? one of the fixed speed ones or one of the variables? also what kind of bit did you use? and i see you arent hesitating to use your mod powers are you? :axe: oh well that was a stupid comment any way :P
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by stopthekilling77 »

Dan: The Modding Mod.

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Cyberpower generic case
B450M PRO-VDH MAX
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by DMB2000uk »

I see what you did there :axe:

It's a variable speed 300 series. I just used the cutting wheels that came with the box, and kind of wore down/snapped all 5 of them in this two day sesh (wouldn't have if I'd of cut everything right first time!) I then used the bits that looked capable of sanding to smooth down bits, and then a file when they didn't seem to work properly any more. Like I said, I abused the Dremel, but it was worth getting it for how awkward some of the cuts would have been with any other powertool (They were awkward enough with the Dremel!).

And this is why I had decided to take out my LCS :ANAL:

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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by martini161 »

yeah its been awhile since i read this thread. should check it more often. its weird how both our rigs threads have the same number of pages yet yours has so many more pageviews :shock: maybe i can right a script and have my file server check it 100 times every 5 mins 8)
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by DMB2000uk »

You can't forget that this thread has been round a year and two months more than yours has.

And people obviously find watercooling a P180 very interesting, as only about half of those page views can be me (lol, just kidding).

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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by Bio-Hazard »

Yah, there does seem to be a bit of a following on the P180 series chassis, I even had my rig in a Swiftech water cooled version for a little while, but it was just to cramped for my liking and not enough to mount all the radiators internal that I wanted, so it was back to the good ole UFO.
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by martini161 »

wow i can see why they reviesed the p180 bio that wire management is just plain yucky :rolleyes:
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by Bio-Hazard »

Yeppers, not really a lot about the case I really like, but everyone has their likes and dislikes I guess................. :shock:

It was just a review sample from a while back and I didn't mess with it all that long main reason I did the review is because it came with the water cooling components and that's what I'm using now to cool just my video card................ :mrgreen:
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by DMB2000uk »

She is back under water ^_^

Got fed up of waiting for the sunbeamtech LED fans, and had enough Noctua's (took me a while to realise that) so decided to throw them on the rad instead of the NH-U12P heatsink.

It's good to be back!

It's late now and i'm too tired to take pics, so you will have to wait a week for them as i'm super busy till then :axe:

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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by DMB2000uk »

Watercooled pics!

Image Image Image Image

Alathald, you can't b*tch about my ide cable any more as check out how much I was able to ninja stealth the it (second pic) ^_^

I just got a Canon D40, so if the pics are off in some way its because I had it on manual and still don't quite know my way round a SLR yet :P

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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by Alathald »

Now THAT is sexy...too bad nobody can see it with the side on... :axe:
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Re: P180 Watercooled Project Log (56k Beware!)

Post by martini161 »

please tell me that isnt packaging tape holding the ide cable to the bottom of the 5.25 drive bays
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