How to fit more drives in my Fractal Design Define R5

[berberries]

There are currently a total of 10 HDDs in my unRAID NAS. I have a few spare drives (new from RMA) that I've wanted to install but haven't been able to come up with any ideas for a long time. There are 8 HDDs installed in the HDD bays and i used 2x 5.25" to 3.5" adapters to install 2 more drives in the 5.25" Bays. Is there any way you guys can think of to install more drives in the case? I was thinking of finding something that could mount to the top fan mounts which i currently do not use for fans. Would greatly appreciate if someone could link a product which that would work with or any 3D printable adapters that might work. I would greatly appreciate any advice you guys could provide, thanks in advance! Below is a photo of my NAS.

 

[johnno23]

placing drives in the top where fans would normally be placed I dont think is a good idea? you restrict any airflow...heat rises so you would just be letting your drives run in a low temp oven is my take on that scenario.

[berberries]

2 minutes ago, johnno23 said:

placing drives in the top where fans would normally be placed I dont think is a good idea? you restrict any airflow...heat rises so you would just be letting your drives run in a low temp oven is my take on that scenario.

my NAS is used lying on its side, with window facing up as it is placed on top of an Ikea LACK coffee table underneath my table. the only airflow in that area is the rear fan pulling air out of the case, but i don't think that fan is doing much work anyways with the 2 fans on my DRP4 blowing air right into it.

[johnno23]

OK...no issue of rising heat to impact the drives. 

you could do a little DIY with some ABS for example. cut to fit the area and drill the holes to mount the ABS to the fan mount and drill some holes to mount the ABS as a backplate to the drives. I would use 5mm ABS for example as the holes could then be recessed so that the dirve is flush 

If concerned about heat the cetnral part of the ABS could be cut away so essentialy you just make a frame large enough to fit he 140mm fan spacing. 120mm fan spacing might also work but off the top of my head I dont know the size of the hard drive and if the frme would be too thin or not. 

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

Seeing those empty PCI slots, I got random idea and figured surely not... but yes, they exist. PCI 3.5" drive brackets. I'm a tad sketched out as it doesn't even use the actual PCIe/PCI slot for support like a GPU would. It's possible, but can't say I would recommend it. 

 

https://www.microconnectors.com/rear-panel-dual-2-5-single-3-5-metal-hdd-ssd-mounting-bracket-kit/

[LIGISTX]

30 minutes ago, berberries said:

my NAS is used lying on its side, with window facing up as it is placed on top of an Ikea LACK coffee table underneath my table. the only airflow in that area is the rear fan pulling air out of the case, but i don't think that fan is doing much work anyways with the 2 fans on my DRP4 blowing air right into it.

You do have front fans blowing air across the drives tho… right?

 

Id personally try and 3d print something to hold more drives between the drive cage and PSU, but may not be much room to really do that. You may just need a larger case, or a full on 24 bay server chassis. 

[Needfuldoer]

Have you seen this? There's room for another drive cage behind the power supply.

 

https://imgur.com/3wWXjDN

[DoctorNick]

You can get hot swap or hard drive mounts for 5.25" bay to 3.5" drives. Edit: Nevermind the bay,s, they are already stuffed I see. You might be able to mount HDDs on the cable side of the case, behind the motherboard tray. 

And as mentioned by @Needfuldoeryou can stuff another bay in the case, if you can find one. 

Source, manual: https://www.fractal-design.com/app/uploads/2019/07/Define-R5-manual.pdf

[m9x3mos]

7 hours ago, DoctorNick said:

You can get hot swap or hard drive mounts for 5.25" bay to 3.5" drives. Edit: Nevermind the bay,s, they are already stuffed I see. You might be able to mount HDDs on the cable side of the case, behind the motherboard tray. 

And as mentioned by @Needfuldoeryou can stuff another bay in the case, if you can find one. 

Source, manual: https://www.fractal-design.com/app/uploads/2019/07/Define-R5-manual.pdf

This is exactly what I was going to suggest. 

If there is enough disc's in that area, you can add another cage there. 

You can usually find them in ebay. Sometimes on Amazon at a higher price though.