[Project] BalROG

[crazymofo]

I decided to start making my custom cables & start sleeving it but had a few setbacks. First of all I ordered the wrong housing, I need 2 male atx housing but I got female & male lol. Then the 2nd problem was the pins, I bought 18awg cables but the pins are for 16awg meaning their crimping wings are longer thus giving a very bad crimping result. 

 

 

 

On top of that, the crimping tool that I am using is crap. Hard to crimp it properly as the biting is not aligned properly and the pins are not so malleable, thus not following the crimping bite properly.

 

 

This is very bad, although it might work but sleeving will be a big problem then, so cable sleeving will be put on hold till I get all my pins & the crimping tool. Gonna cost me a lot now, I still need to get sp120 fans, fan controller, acrylic panels & now this lol.

 

 

 

My plan was to mount the RX240 radiator on the front of the casing but the mounting holes are not designed for mounting a 240 radiator so I had to drill some extra holes. Not a surprised to me though since I stumble upon someone worklog before regarding this problem and I am aware of it.

 

 

 

 

Best stuff to collect metal shrapnel. Works like a charm 

 

 

And of course a magnet to collect it all at tight spaces...

 

 

Using a dremel to grind down the holes never been easier!

 

 

 

Flushing radiator time!

 

 

Btw just so you know, both radiator are RX series but both are different in terms of the build quality & paint. My RX360 has a bulge to it at the end tank, not so serious but you cant make it stand straight though. On top of that the paint texture is very rough, where as the RX240 has a smoother finish to it & in perfect condition. Bought both radiators new (RX360 from A.P.E.S & RX240 from cyntrix). I am guessing the RX360 are the first batch radiators? Not sure if the bulge will cause any performance impact or not, lets hope everything works out great.

 

 

 

 

Gunk from RX240 with warm water. Then I started flushing with vinegar, lots of dirt came out from RX240 though. I did flush the RX360 with warm water few weeks before but didn't do it with vinegar, so I did it today together with RX240.

 

 

 

Effect from flushing with vinegar.

 

 

 

Installed the pump top...pretty simple.

 

 

 

Another problem is the pump thread are so close to each other that prevents me from adding a compression fittings directly to it as the cap for other port it blocking. No idea why the hell bitspower design like this, will need to get extra rotary & male to male adapters now...

 

 

Installed all the fittings already 

 

 

Gentle typhoon is mounted temporary till I get my hands on corsair sp120.

 

 

 

As you can see, the casing dosen't seems to be long enough. It reaches till the radiator water tank so I have no choice but to leave this.

 

 

I cut a thin piece of wood with my dremel just to test it and the dremel sucks lol. Can't seem to cut things properly and the cutting disk exploded infront me and hit my hand. China stuff, so I am not surprised. Not sure if I can use it for cutting acrylic or not but for grinding & sanding stuff is ok though. Part of the wood got chipped off from the dremel flying disk. I will try to get some proper cutting disk...

 

 

Reason for a wood is to keep the surface solid as I want to keep my pump at the casing floor. I might replace it with acrylic once I get some panels.

 

 

And more problems, the top radiator cannot be secured to the fans with the provided screws. They are too short as the switch 810 has a curve to the holes. Solution to this is to grind it to smoother and reduce the space but I decided to get custom length screws instead, since I will be using gasket on top of that and this will not work with the given 3cm screws.

 

 

Leak testing, in my rig. Yes I am confident with my setup so I went straight installing it in the rig. No leaks so far, will be adjusting the tubing to the pump once I get my rotary and extenders. Of course now the tubing looks ugly at the bottom because I dont want to cut too short yet. Will re-route the tubing at the bottom part once I get GPU WB & 90 degrees rotary...

 

[crazymofo]

Playing around with leds & acrylic panels. Still can't recreate a proper luminous panel. Will get few types of sandpaper & play around with it again to get an even light distribution on it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[crazymofo]

Been busy with stuff, sorry didnt have much progress with the build....

 

Tested the acrylic panel this time with 5mm sanded + super bright led strip, still getting uneven brightness...

 

 

Went back to the drawing board & made changes, manage to mount the led at the side & cover with wire tape. I am not sure how long these china leds are going to last before failing plus its covered directly to the acrylic with no gap & wire tape so the heat is going to be trapped. Lets just hope it does not get too hot & burn the leds otherwise I need to rethink how to do it...

 

 

Luminous panel in action, replaced the led strip with a dimmer one. Looks much better now but still uneven brightness. Its not very noticeable in real life though. I think laser engraved acrylic will give a better result. Will try making one with laser engraved instead of sanded...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lego for adults...

 

[crazymofo]

Doing some tests to find the prefect fans for my needs. This is the ambient sound noise at night...

 

 

Gentle typhoon at full speed:

 

 

 

 Ambient sound noise during corsair sp120 tests (done in the daytime): 

 

 

 

SP120 Quiet Edition at full speed (12v): 

 

 

 

SP120 Quiet Edition (7v - using the included adapter): 

 

 

 

SP120 High Performance at full speed (12v): 

 

 

SP120 High Performance (7v - using the included adapter): 

 

 

All this tests are not accurate & do not serve as a guide or comparison on which fans are noisy/silent. Its purely for my own usage, to finding the fans that will suit me well. I decided to use the corsair SP120 quiet edition in my build since I am going with a push + pull setup. Gentle typhoon is a good fan no doubt but its not pleasant to my eyes 

 

Oh and I also got my top panel replacement from nzxt already 

 

[crazymofo]

Tiny update:

Before you guys say anything, I would like to remind you that I already mention before I start this worklog that this will be a very slow build which explains why there isnt much yet. So I just finished installing the gaskets in my rig, I am the very paranoid type of person when it comes to sound. I am planning to go for the ultra silent rig yet performs well in cooling which explains why I keep changing fans from SGT to SP120 high performance to quiet editions and its pretty obvious why I am installing gaskets all over the places haha. Anywhere there is fans contacts, there will be gasket! Also my supplier only had the 360mm size so I had to cut it to fit at the front radiator.

 

 

 

 

Flowsensor is here! I had to make a special order for this since cant get it locally! 

 

 

And some 'rare' fitting sizes & g1/4 rotary's since local retailer only carry 1 size 

 

 

Best part of unpacking is to find suprised goodies! Its not that it very expensive or what but its just the surprise that you get free stuff makes the whole experience happier. The packaging is superb too, wrapped in bitspower own bubble wrap! 

 

[crazymofo]

I know its been sometime since the last update & I apologize for that. Was busy so had to put the work log on hold. Don't worry though, I am free now for a month or so. You will be seeing more updates now. I just finished installing the gpu waterblock, ek bridge & the backplate (I forgot to take picture of the final product). Anyways I plan to start making fill ports tomorrow on the luminous panel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Almost forgotten to remove the original asus washer haha, luckily I realized it otherwise it might not have good contacts with the waterblock  

[crazymofo]

As promised, more updates today  Had to draw circles for making hole to fit the fill port.

 

 

 

 

It worked out great, perfectly aligned but I have a new problem.

 

 

 

So my main objective was to get the pump directly under the reservoir but its super tight. As you can see there is no gap at all between the pump top & the luminous panel.

 

 

Another problem was the pump inlet fitting & the fillport is not aligned. The pump is a little too thick so it offsets outwards a little bit. And also the 45deg rotary isnt straight. I can solve it by rising the pump higher but I dont have space though to rise the pump so had to use 20mm extender at the radiator 

 

 

 

 

As for the pump offset problem, I had to use a dremel to grind the pump cover or whatever you call that round circle thing that secures the pump top & the pump. Basically I trim the gripping material a little bit so that the pump can enter inwards a little more. Sorry for not taking a lot of pictures, when it comes to modding, taking pictures is my less priority since I spend too much time doing the actual work 

 

 

Made the 2nd fillport yay! My initial plan was to put this flowsensor at the reservoir inlet at the top & use extenders from the fillport to the bottom of the gpu inlet. So that I can run a straight tubing from the bottom to the gpu inlet. This will give the straight tubing that we usually see in acrylic tubing builds but then I thought why not replace the extenders with my flowsensor? Plus it will be easier to see on the luminous panel instead of the top & also save me from using extenders therefore less cost! That long extenders is just for aligning, will replace that with compression fitting & tubing.

 

 

I tell you, this is probably the hardest part in my build so far! First I need to attach the pump to the fillport at such a tight space, then from the fillport I need to connect to the reservoir at such a tight space to work with. Once everything is set, I had to connect this small piece of tubing to the radiator & oh boy...it was so hard! Because I cant move the pump or have enough space to work with. Took me more than 1 hour to get the lower portion done. I had to remove to rivets at the back of the casing to fit this luminous panel properly below the pci bracket & I also drilled 2 big holes at the bottom acrylic panel to route the pump wire from below the casing & also allow me to adjust the pump speed. Not convenient to adjust the speed from under the casing but at least I have the option if needed. I plan to connect this pump on a lamptron cw611 though so it will allow me to adjust the speed through the fan controller instead.

 

 

 

This is what you get when you dont have motherboard. Had to hang the gpu with strings to get the accurate measurement for the fillport locations.

 

 

So far everything is looking good, will work on the psu side cover & at the front. Took me more than half a day to get the lower portion routing done. It looks simple but I did a lot of small modding here & there to get it in such a tight space.

 

 

The luminous panel is just a prototype though, but I dont plan to change it since is amount of work I need to remove the fittings & put it back is such a pain. If the led 1 day failed then only I will decide to create a new luminous panel with laser engraved instead of hand sanded for better light distribution. I also have an idea to make a aluminum bracket to fit the led inside whenever it fails, this will make the whole replacing led process easier. Basically what I mean is instead of using black tape to hold the led strip to the side of the acrylic, I will create a thin spacing with aluminum instead. 

 

Not sure if you understand what I am trying to say but for now I think I will just use the current luminous panel.

[crazymofo]

The side cover is a little high so I will need to trim it a little bit. 

 

 

 

My design is to put another acrylic at this angle to help the airflow from the radiator. 

 

 

Due to short acrylic panel, I had to glue another acrylic to it  I am going to cover it with matte black sticker so the colour dosen't matter. Most importantly is to make good use of the resources you have! Don't waste it 

 

 

Done with the whole cover but I had to make a hole & attach a screw to keep the acrylic panel touching the luminous panel otherwise there will be a gap 

 

 

Easy to remove too, so cable management from the psu shouldn't be a problem. Just pop it out & plug in hehehe

 

 

I know the side panel is not straight but this is probably the best I can do with a dremel. Once I put the sticker I think it wont be noticeable.

 

 

Now I need your suggestion, should I cover this part like below? Full cover or partial?

 

 

If I cover it fully then the 5.25" drive bay part also I will need to cover...

 

 

Or should I just cover the top part, meaning the radiator & sp120 fans will be visible. I plan to make an ROG logo ...still thinking which to go for since full acrylic cover is very common & everyone done that already. I am thinking of doing something different.

 

[crazymofo]

Got my vinyl from [@kray_keigo] today. Serious good high quality stuff :thumbs:  

 

 

As you can see from the picture, my previous cut with the dremel wasn't that perfect. Shaky hands  so a quick fix with eproxy & you won't even notice it hehehe

 

 

My touch & go card definitely helped me in applying the sticker without bubbles 

 

 

 

I am quite satisfied with the psu cover considering this was my first attempt, not so satisfied with the luminous panel yet as you all know but since this isn't a sponsored build or what sort, just my personal rig so who gives a fark  I can perfect the luminous panel but that would mean me taking apart the panel, unscrewing lots of fittings here & there that took me quite some time to get it in place with such a low clearance plus I might need to spend probably another RM50-100 to get the material, laser cutting etc so I think i'll pass.

 

In case if there is a leak during the leak test somewhere under the psu cover & I couldn't fix it without taking apart then I might consider getting the luminous panel perfected. Lets just hope no leaks ya 

 

 

 

 

Still deciding to go cover this 5.25" bay with acrylic + matte black sticker or acrylic + ROG logo. Once the side panel there won't be any difference but so still thinking...

 

 

It's either bending the metal or cutting it off with a dremel. Went with the lazy method lol otherwise the acrylic panel wont be able to sit nicely over here.

 

[crazymofo]

Hero & haswell is here, yeah I went for hero finally. Dont intend to wait for formula any longer plus I got hero from a friend at an attractive price 

 

 

So I did the usual process, install cpu, mobo standoff etc..before putting on the waterblock with thermal paste I decided to open it to take a look inside & what a horror!!! Oxidation so badly, this is basically my fault though. I run the loop for 2days & drained it for some changes but didnt let the components to dry properly & just left it there to dry itself haha. Also if you notice the o-ring somehow left those black marks on the copper & it was hard to remove it even with vinegar. Not exactly sure what is going on but I hope it dosen't leak. o-ring condition is still good though...

 

 

The usual vinegar + warm water + lime solution

 

 

So since I am doing push + pull config, available space is quite tight considering I am using RX radiators. To make sure I have sufficient spacing, I made myself 120mm fan body to estimate the distance when installing my loop. This is because I dont have any 120mm fans spare & the sp120 fans I ordered will arrive in 3weeks time 

 

 

Started with cable sleeving, just the internal I/O cables only though, psu cables haven't yet and oh boy it was time consuming alright. Took me more than 2hours to get it done. Hard since I had to sleeving while standing & the cables are quite thick & of different sizes.

 

 

Current loop, short, simple & clean 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I sleeved using MDPC sleeving & I find it way better than colortrail sleeving in quality wise. Colortrail is quite good too & most importantly cheap but MDPC is much easier to sleeve but too expensive lol. I almost used up all my sata sleevings already for the internal I/O cables such as usb cables, etc. Need to get more for the sata cables. I am a little OCD on stuff like these, I know you dont really need to sleeve it but thats just how I roll. Maybe I am a perfectionist?

 

 

ModMyToys pcb installed! 

 

 

[crazymofo]

So yesterday I was sleeving the switch 810 front I/O cables & I used up most of the sata sleeving which was meant only for the sata cable. Sadly its enough to sleeve 1 sata cable only so now I got to order more. 

 

 

 

I am using MDPC sleeving btw and the quality is top notch. Applied a little super glue to the sleeving & cable so that it will not come out no matter how hard I pull it. I had bad experience with previous sleeving I did on 24pin cables so this time I will be adding super glue to give that stronger hold.

 

 

 

Time to start filling up the loop.

 

 

 

 

I plan to go for blood red colour to match the ROG theme. 

 

 

Just experimenting with how much dye I need. 

 

 

 

 

 

I only added 1 drop red & 1 drop blue but the liquid turned straight away to dark purple. This means the red ratio must be more than blue.

 

 

Sadly I was too confident & added lots of red & 1-3 drops of blue straight away into the loop. It straight away turned to purple. Now I got to drain the whole liquid & flush it with distilled water & get the ratio right. Learned my lesson lol, then I mixed the dye in a seprate 1.5 bottle first & started filling the loop from the bottle. 

 

 

 

I got the colour that I need, the ratio I used was around 20drops of red & half a drop of blue. I drop the blue into a small glass of distilled water & slowly fill the water into the 20drops of red water. Used around half a glass so approximately only half a drop of blue is required.

 

 

Upper part red looks fantastic but the luminous panel kinda make the red looks yellow/orange at the bottom part.

 

 

Ignore the cable mess, I am playing around with leds. Apperantly the 3mm & 5mm leds I bought was wrong, they are not giving constant light. The led is have the "pulse effect" blinks & dims, blinks & dims etc. This may be nice for some people but I dont really like it so I got to find the correct ones now haha.

 

 

 

 

So do you like my reservoir? I hope the tiny bubble stays hahaha it gives a really nice effect to it, but unfortunately there are few scratches on the res. Oh well, people are not going to stare at it too long anyways right? 

 

 

 

 

 

[crazymofo]

I did some red touch up today, just to highlight more red colour in my build since its pretty dark atm. Sanding the pci bracket is a pain in the ass I tell you, wished I had some paint stripper lol. 

 

 

 

 

Here is the optical bay cover. Its a temporary cover I think. I haven't decide yet should I make a big ass ROG logo at here or just mount ssd over here. Oh & yeah, I painted some screws hehe, looks nice isn't it...

 

 

Initially I was thinking to make a luminous panel to display the ROG logo in white + red like how kier did with his build, but then I am thinking if I were to get SSD then where should I mount it. You know you gotta "show off" if you are using SSD right. So I am still deciding. Sorry for this blurry picture, lazy to adjust the camera ISO haha

 

 

Also kustom pcs is out of lamptron CW611. Noooooo!! Gotta wait for them to restock  D:<

[crazymofo]

Just an update in this forum:

 

This build actually been going on for months. I have worklogs in forum.lowyat.net, OCN & themodzoo. I decided to create a worklog over here because I am a subscriber to linus & saw his live stream talking about JakeGFK build & I do follow his build in lowyat.net so I figured might as well create a worklog over here

 

Also by creating a new thread & posting all my past updates from another forum, I found out there were few things that I said I will do e.g sharing my sleeving technique etc but didn't had the time to do. I am sorry and also there were a lot of changes going on with this build, e.g changing SGT fans to SP120, selling off the nzxt hue & a lot of things. As time goes things changes so yeah...

[TicTac]

Nice man love the detail you have put in the build log so far keep it up

[Damikiller37]

Looks like you have spent a good amount of time planning it all out and it's done quite professionally. I can't wait to see it done. Awesome job so far!

[Chatzev]

This looks amazing! Can't wait to see the final product!

[Nicktrance]

This looks really good, can't wait to see more!

[o0odellero0o]

Are you assembling a computer or operating ?
How much it cost in RM ?

[crazymofo]

Are you assembling a computer or operating ?

How much it cost in RM ?

What do you mean? I am assembling it but based on design that I like thus modding comes on place. Its a hobby & I would like to have a unique rig than others

 

Total cost probably more than RM7K & will continue to rise till I am done.

[TheDigitalRealm]

What do you mean? I am assembling it but based on design that I like thus modding comes on place. Its a hobby & I would like to have a unique rig than others

 

Total cost probably more than RM7K & will continue to rise till I am done.

 

I totally understand. When I get the balls to water cool I want mine to look unique as well. I have a switch 810 and might put some LED strips under the metal mesh strips on the bottom.

[crazymofo]

Didnt had any progress last week because my father accident 2weeks ago so I was staying up night in the hospital. Another bad news is that the rig is partially done, so I been playing games on it. Finished far cry 3 on it but today when I was listening songs the display suddently just went off. Now there isnt any display from the graphic card. I think my graphic card died so will need to test it & most likely send to RMA. This is farked up :lol: 

 

I am almost done with it, just left to install the remaining fans & make custom cables but shit happens. I was hoping to finish this build by end of this month but...

 

Anyways thanks to [@HoNeYdEwBoY] for the rams  :wub: I didnt know the ram led has a pulse effect. I thought it was just a normal constant led (didnt read reviews :lol: ). Remember previously I had 3mm led for the raystorm & I didnt like the blinking effect, but since the ram has a nice pulse effect to it, I think maybe adding that blinking led to raystorm might match. Will test it & see how it goes

 

 

Sleeving the 3mm leds.

 

So I started adding fans on top & the standard 3cm radiator screws doesnt fit so I had to custom make my own screws that is slightly longer.

 

 

 

Started sleeving the fans too. Yes I am a perfectionist I guess, even fan cables I will sleeve even though its already black. Usually small touches like this can make a difference in a build. 

 

 

Time to make my custom 24pin cables & sleeve it :P

 

 

Its my first time creating custom cables so I had to experiment on which technique works best with which tools. I spent like around 1hour with 25pins for trial & error & finally manage to get the perfect technique that works best for me.

 

 

[crazymofo]

Because of that I would like to create a short tutorial for you guys :lol: I said before I wanted to share my cable sleeving technique but I guess I'll pass that since you guys can watch lutr0 videos. His guide is probably the best out there & when I first started I followed his guide as well.

 

So basically to make custom cables you will need 3 important tools. First is a regular all in 1 tool for wires that you can buy from hardware shops. This is a must have tool, I use this to cut my wires, cut my M4 screws to custom sizes, strip the 18awg cables & even cable crimping. The second tool is used to entertain yourself during this long process :P Its an e-cig. The 3rd tool is obviously crimping ratchet. I am using a decent crimping ratchet which is why additional steps are required to get the perfect crimp. Maybe if you get those expensive ratchet life will be easier, I dont know because no way in hell I am going to spend more than RM100 to get a crimping ratchet, mine cost less than RM50. Btw I am selling the same ratchet (will revise the price later in my thread).

 

 

First step is to strip the insulator.

 

 

 

You will need to estimate yourself, so there will be some trial & error involved.

 

 

Because it can't be too long or if its too short then you wont be able to get a good crimp grip.

 

 

Next is to placed that wire into this pin, but the pin wings are straight & I find it hard to crimp them because they will be shaking & the pin can easily fall off. So what I do is I bend the wings first to a curve shape & then only insert the wire, this will reduce the amount of movement & chances of the pin falling down is reduced.

 

 

Just remember to place it properly in the ratchet or you will destroy your pin.

 

 

 

Do ignore my beautiful fingernails ya :P

 

 

See, now its easier to place the wire into the pin. The way I estimate how much insulator to cut is the amount of copper wire should be sufficient that its able to enter in the "pin square house". Just barely, like a tiny mm only because you dont want too much in there or you will have a hard time connecting the male pins into it later.

 

 

Anyway once you done placing the wire, carefully put the pin & wire into the ratchet & crimp it fully.

 

 

This may look a good crimp to you, but its not. Because if you pull the pin from the wire, with sufficient force the pin will come out. No mater how hard you crimp it with the crimper, the grip is just not too strong.

 

 

This is where the other tool will come in handy. As you can see, the crimping curve is much sharper, so I just need to crimp the pins again to give that "extra grip". You will know how much pressure to apply with trial & error. Too much & your pin will break, too little & the gripping strength wont be strong enough.

 

 

Once that is done, I can pull the wire from the pins as hard as I want & it wont come out. Of course if you pull really hard it will come out though but it should be sufficient la for our usage.

[crazymofo]

I totally understand. When I get the balls to water cool I want mine to look unique as well. I have a switch 810 and might put some LED strips under the metal mesh strips on the bottom.

You can get nzxt hue, its quite good. I installed it previously but sold it off because I went with a cheaper route which is china leds that cost me less than RM20 (USD$7) hehehe...

[crazymofo]

congrats..featured on nzxt fb page summore  :clap:

←

Thanks bro, I have no idea nzxt was following up with my build LOL.

 

 

 

 

Installed the corsair fans. I am thinking of replacing the corsair sticker to something else. Maybe rog logo stickers instead? Hmmm

 

 

I have no issue with the clearance at the ram or cpu heatsink for corsair fans in push pull config but I will be having problems at the 8pin cable for the cpu.

 

 

Not sure how I am going to put the fans over here, maybe I will need to modify the corsair fans, might need to cut the shroud with a dremel I guess.

 

 

Shit ton of connectors for custom cables. 

 

 

 

I went with heatshrinkless style

 

 

My custom cable doesn't work directly from the psu due to different cable layout from the original psu cable layout. So I had to rearrange the cables back to the original layout. I was hoping the 24pin cable didnt need to follow original layout but apparently  not. I think gpu cables & 8pin cables the layout doesn't matter as long as the wire colours are right. Will see how things goes.

 

 

 

Double wire! We meet again...muahahaha

 

 

 

After rearranging the cables to original layout, it works. Readings all seems alright, 24pin custom cable success!

 

 

Time for cable sewing

 

 

This gonna be a long process so bye bye, see you next month :P

 

[TheDigitalRealm]

You can get nzxt hue, its quite good. I installed it previously but sold it off because I went with a cheaper route which is china leds that cost me less than RM20 (USD$7) hehehe...

 

I don't like the hue, doesn't seem as bright as bitfenix lights, according to reviews. Bitfenix strips should be easier to route. I also may have to copy you on painting the mesh red. It looks amazing! D: