Julie's Pants

[AlienALX]

Right, have decided to come out of my 3.5 year retirement and do something rad. Firstly let's cover the name. For the past year and a half I have been playing PUBG with my friends 5 nights a week. We're not very good (getting old,see) and our eyes are not what they used to be (much less our reactions) but we still have tons of fun. The lead character in PUBG is called Julie. And, bots usually wear Julie's Pants.

 

 

However, as you know sometimes when things cross the Atlantic they do so with much hilarity. My friend's wife is called Julie, and in the U.K pants are like, pants. Underwear, panties. So, every time my pal kills a bot he puts on "Julie's Pants" and declares "Hey I am wearing Julie's Pants !" and we all laugh. It's even more funny because Julie (his Julie) deffo wears the pants.

 

So, this will be loosely themed on PUBG.

 

 

I wasn't going to start another thread, but this is going to be a pretty involved and heavy mod/build. So the last thread was becoming pretty untidy, given it had already covered two rigs.

 

Hardware. I will be using my existing parts.

 

Ryzen 3600

Gigabyte Aorus B450i ITX

Corsair Dominator Platinum Capellix

A few SSDs

Gigabyte 2080Ti Aorus Xtreme

EVGA Supernova 650

Antec Striker case.

 

That's the meat and potatoes. I am also going to fully water cool it. I have these parts/fans/fittings already.

 

 

I also have this.

 

 

Which is for TR4. However, I am in the process of modifying it to fit AM4.

 

 

That was just a rough mark up to make sure there was enough meat for the new holes and the spacing for AM4 would work.

 

I ordered 8 Touchaqua stop plugs the other day.

 

 

Which are now here.

 

Parts ordered.

 

 

 

 

I already have the flow meter.

 

 

And the hose.

 

 

I have also ordered the following.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have also ordered this. This was from when Ryzen released and EK made a conversion kit for existing WBs. It was £1.50 on clearance, and I literally want it to make 100% sure my holes are perfectly placed. IE - it's a sacrificial template.

 

 

I have also purchased the paint materials I will need for this build.

 

 

 

[AlienALX]

The Sunday Funday Conundrum.

 

These are the bolts that come with EK's pump cooler.

 

 

I'm not a huge fan of how they work. Past the threads in the bottom there are allen holes. You do the bolts up into the cooler and top, which pulls it together to seal. Unfortunately due to the design these allen holes are very shallow, meaning they round when you fit it. Once you are done that you screw rubber dampeners into the threads, then M4 bolts into those through your mounting plate.

 

Unfortunately after just three years the rubber was rotten, and was turning everything it touched black. Even more unfortunate because they rounded when going in I was unable to remove them without using a larger allen. Which stripped the threads, and the rubber parts got stuck.

 

So they all had to come out with pliers. You can see it here.

 

 

So those were done. Had a dig around in the bolt box and found some pretty long M4 bolts, which thankfully were a thread match. So it went -

Bolt through pump mount. Metal washer, plastic spacer, metal washer, pump, pump top.

 

[AlienALX]

Finally. Delayed twice, but finally arrived. That said, I paid 0 import duty, so am absolutely stoked.

 

 

I also got freebies ! firstly a lovely message and three face masks.

 

 

A really sexy case badge, and I know exactly where this is going.

 

 

Because I scraped the Antec A logo from the glass the other day. That was scary let me tell you. Then I got this.

 

 

I'm not sure what is is yet lol. It's some sort of fan. Maybe for your fets? IDK.

 

 

And the main event.

 

 

 

Which didn't disappoint. It's friggin huge and weighs a ton lol.

 

 

I called Ma. Apparently there were two packages delivered this morning. Hoping that is the res and rad cover.

[AlienALX]

Right, been doing a lot of thinking. When I looked at the sheer amount of wiring this will require, because I remember it only too well from the Alienware, I really wanted to remove the drives completely. However, this came with issues. The B450i ITX board I have only has one NVME slot. I could have spent loads of money on a 2-3TB NVME SSD, but the thought of eggs and baskets (especially after the loss of the Firecuda recently) made me think twice.

 

I knew this decision would cost me. And it has. However, I bought the board from the same company who I got the Razer monitor from recently for £110 under RRP.

 

 

This wasn't the cheapest solution. However, I then bought two NVME for about the disparity, which is the best solution.

 

 

I didn't want the fastest, or the best, just storage. That means I can use a 1tb SSD in the case I bought to recover the files from the dead Firecuda, which should be more than enough.

Plus I can then eliminate two SATA power cable runs from the PSU and the three SATA DATA cables I was going to have to use also. And I get a better board etc.

[AlienALX]

 

 

 

OCD ALARM ! OCD ALARM !

 

[AlienALX]

OK. So the res and pump did not fit in the side I was hoping they would go in. Seems it's quite a bit smaller, ho hum. It literally fits in one position on the other side. This could change with the different board in there, IDK. Not off to the best of starts then. I did test mount it last night and decided to test out some of the RGB too.

 

 

So it's some progress I guess. The SSDs arrived today. Board hopefully tomorrow and then I can finally mod that block plate because it could again be board specific. So I don't want to make it fit this one, then come to find it doesn't fit the new board.

[AlienALX]

Ah, the fun (pain) of custom builds. So I decided to pretty much connect up the whole hive of bees. The flow meter is the odd one out (12v 4 pin) and I am not paying £30 for a DRGB one. Thankfully the new board has both DRGB and 12v 4 pin, so I don't have to wire up another whole controller just to get it to lamp.

 

 

Oh it's so much fun /sarcasm.

 

 

Sadly all was not well. Still camera shots make it appear fine.

 

 

But.....

 

 

[AlienALX]

But then......

 

 

[AlienALX]

OK so I did some digging. Couldn't find a ring to match in size, but did find a smaller one. More than enough for the flow meter tbh.

 

 

 

Just did some minor modding to the flow meter. Well, I didn't touch it, I just made a hex adapter plate so the new ring will fit. Will get pics tomorrow.

[AlienALX]

Right I decided to finish it up. First I cut out a traced back plate from the flow meter itself.

 

 

Now the circle is far from perfect. I don't have a hole saw so I just used a carbide bit and carved it by eye, then went onto a sanding barrel. It doesn't need to be perfectly round, as you can't see it. It just needs to create a channel so the new RGB ring can fit in there.

 

 

And the relief channel for the wires.

 

 

Which now creates a 3mm deep recess in which I can use any number of RGB rings, not the one specifically that the back plate was machined to fit.

 

 

 

Oddly I've had that acrylic for about three years. I don't even remember what I bought it for now. It will be very similar to the paint, though. And I like the way it looks.

Oh yeah. It doesn't seal up on the back. The back is solid, and you can only get it through the front, so it won't cause leaks etc etc.

[AlienALX]

Board came. Job one, drill the plate. Then see if it will fit.

 

 

It will. Clearance the bolt heads.

 

 

Don't worry, that's the LED channel not the water way.

 

 

 

 

[AlienALX]

Right, today's work is finished. I wasn't happy with the plate holes. I said I was going to fill and paint them, but couldn't be assed. So I cut them off.

 

 

Instead of the flat nuts I used some stand offs. Even with them the block can go down to the socket, without a CPU in there. Note the board has changed as I am using the Strix now (well, testing it mainly, it was used).

 

 

These mods have given it a much cleaner look.

 

 

And freed up the flat M3 nuts to be used at the back. I need to cut down the bolts BTW.

 

 

As for the Strix?

 

 

So that Bitspower fan did come in handy because it kept whining about there being no CPU fan. 

The paint arrived today. Like the main paint.

[AlienALX]

Bodywork begins tomorrow.

 

[XGoodGuyFitz]

This looks like it will turn out to be something incredible. 

[AlienALX]

Hope so !

 

It's chucking rain today. I can still get it prepped though. Will have to paint around the weather, but then I've been doing that all year haha.

[AlienALX]

OK so it is prep time. No need to go into crazy detail. I use 320 alu oxide (because it holds onto the paper well and doesn't turn into slurry) and I sand wet. Always. Few reasons. I use a cleaning liquid. This makes it smell nice, has detergent which lubricates it, and keeps the mess down. Problem with dry sanding is you need to wet it at some point any way to see how it is. And to clean it down.

 

Panels were removed.

 

 

And then sanded well. The original finish was like a satin, but had a texture. I wanted that gone. Just remember, you don't need to go ham here. You are just wasting your time. Get it smooth, get it keyed. You don't need to sand down to metal unless you have damage or rust, and in this case there are none of either.

 

 

The evidence is on the board. You can see what I am using there. It's skin friendly, so the nice part is you can not only wipe the panels down with it to transport them, but you can also use it to clean the slurry from your hands. You are aiming for a nice flat finish.

 

 

 

Parts are still wet. I just know it's right, as I do it by touch.

 

Just remember, sometimes logos are quite deep. Like, almost etched. You want to keep going until you can't see any of it any more. Not paint, anodising and so on. If you leave it? you will see it through every layer of paint you put down. Thankfully this seemed to be a thin screen printing of paint, so came off very quickly without me having to keep going down.

[AlienALX]

The next stage is getting everything clean. Now you can pretty much waste good alcohol here  or paint prep (which is basically acetone) but at this stage we don't know exactly what we are  dealing with.

 

What I mean is if the paint on here is acrylic then if I hit it with acetone thinners it will eat it. Meaning I will have to then chemically strip the whole lot. Powder doesn't like acetone either. Again, it will melt. Basically you need to think of these paints on their chemical makeup. Acrylic paint is literally that. Plastic. Those plastic particles are in a solvent. In this case acetone. So, it doesn't take much to think about it. Add acetone you basically liquidise the acrylic again and it turns to slop.

 

As such at this stage I recommend dish soap and warm water. Give it a good scrubbing with a sponge. Dish soap carries an excellent degreaser, so you will get it nice and clean. Rinse with cold water only. Why? because cold water cannot carry limescale. See? all this BS I have had to figure out over years and years. Now I will wipe it with isoprop before I start painting, but yeah no point wasting loads of that now.

 

Right now I would like to keep the insides of the panels their stock white. Not because I CBA sanding, but because I want them white. As such I have about four hours of masking to do. Just taking a break now.

 

Cleaned panels.

 

 

Got a few different tapes here.

 

 

Most notably that 3M fine line tape. That stuff is about a tenner a roll. I had to use it here as the edges were very fine at points, but you will see me using that much more once the base coat has gone down. Right now I am trying to just cover the white.

 

 

One more to do.

There are some scratches on the white. It's a known problem with the Striker. They pack it incredibly well, but don't tape down the panels so they tend to fall off in the box. This isn't a huge issue, as I have some white and will fade in some touch ups once the base coat is down.

[AlienALX]

Red base coat is down.

 

 

Lots of drips. All of them on the middle one. This doesn't matter, as I will be wet sanding it. I just wanted enough on there. Weather is terrible atm so yeah, I don't want to have to paint it red again.

 

 

Will let that harden by the radiator for 24 hours, then tomorrow I can get to wet sanding.

 

[AlienALX]

Hmm. Well, I have only used this exact paint once before. I usually opt for Kobra. Sadly they did not have the exact shade I wanted so I got Flame again. TBH? the last time I used this it really pissed me off. It was high pressure, and the orange peel was *insane*. This was low pressure, so instead of mad orange peel I got mad dripping.

 

When I looked up the drying times it said "working time one hour". Come again? Mission accepted.

 

Remember the drips?

 

 

Me either. Wet it down to see what your next stage will look like.

 

 

And do the rest.

 

 

And the aftermath.

 

 

BTW for those interested. I am using P1200. This means more work, as you need to do it about three times. However, the chances of "burn through"* are practically 0, so you won't be putting more paint down and then repeating the process.

*is what it sounds like. You sand through the paint and achieve the layer below. This means you need to repaint it and start wet sanding again. Stay away from high spots, curves and edges here. And don't press hard. Just glide the paper around gently and use your fingers to determine when its smooth.

[RollinLower]

incredible paint job, looking forward to the completed system!

[AlienALX]

Oh I am just getting started dude !

 

Next up we start fine masking and putting down flake

[AlienALX]

OK so this is about the time of day I usually get done. Have a shower, rest etc.

 

After giving it a very good clean I removed the masking. There is minimal bleed.

 

 

What I mean by bleed is where the paint bleeds under or into the edge of the masking. I expected this. The reason is I used the lower end cheaper masking tape for this stage.

 

Like, the cream coloured stuff, not the more expensive blue stuff. The reason is that because of that white base coat I can just wet sand any bleed off. Bleed now is not an issue, but if the masking on the effects layer bleeds we will be in trouble, hence why I save the more expensive tapes for the more critical stages.

 

I also need to do some touch ups on the damage on that side too.

 

 

Remember, at this stage it will be very hazy. That's nothing to worry about. That means we have a key for the next stage. I now need to let it cure for 24 hours, before beginning more masking etc.

[AlienALX]

Tonight I did the first fine line layer mask.

 

 

Then masked off the rest of that panel.

 

 

Leaving exposed what will get the 2nd round of paint. Did the same with the other side panel.

 

 

 

Then onto the front piece.

 

 

 

Then mask the backs again.

 

 

 

Tomorrow I will put down the first FX layer.

[AlienALX]

[AlienALX]

Decided to pull a late night. Given that like, 45 seconds are in actual painting and the rest in masking cleaning and prep.

 

 

 

 

That's the first effects layer. The red flake. The bent pieces of the panels will be getting silver flake, which should make it shape shift. Will leave a straight red line between the two.