Project Missed Apex

[chaozbandit]

Long story short, I'm putting a bunch of my old hardware together for a second, on-the-go gaming pc. Since I had ambitions to mod the case since I got it but was always short on time, I decided to finish the project off now with the help of some 3D printing.

 

Backstory: This was my first ever self-built PC, and shortly after my first ever physical modding project. Purchased in 2012, it housed my early AM3+ build - a Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition and a reference HD6950. Over time few things were changed, mostly aesthetic (lighting, fans) before completely moving to a new platform (FX8350 and a R9 290 DCU II) and the Fractal Design Define R5. I'm mainly a simracer and with Windows Mixed Reality headsets going on sale so often now, I decided it's time to get a second rig going for when I want to break out the G27 instead of setting it up at the main rig. 

 

 

In this spoiler are what the case would have looked like new, and it's Update 0 mods (anything done before starting this build). The list is as follows:

• Swapped out the standard Cooler Master top panel for the USB-3 variant
• Cut out the side panel for a custom full-size acrylic panel
• Spray painted the outer chrome trim, interior hard drive caddies, and drive bay locks gloss red
• Removed some interior mesh and cut out the rear fan grill for improved airflow
• Installed NZXT sleeved LEDs before swapping it out for a custom SuperBright LED strip

 

Spoiler

 

Current Plans

Although I have some spare cases I could harvest metal from, I'm too lazy to work with sheets so I decided to go for acrylic instead. Initial plans were to cut out the roof of the case so I could fit a triple rad but plans fell through due to the chassis rigidity and lack of space. So far the hard drive bays and drive cages have been de-riveted and the bottom fan mount cut out for a new false floor. I suppose the Define S2 is what I'm trying to work towards, but I'm happy as long as the end result is a clean interior.

 

The final colour scheme isn't final yet, but I'm over the whole RoG palette of black, red, and white. Being a racing rig I figure black and gold is the perfect combo, especially after seeing the Apex Nurburg ring taxis. There's also a gold colour filament I can use for my 3d printed parts, which will hopefully make the mounts and brackets I need pop against the black wrinkle finish on painted acrylic.

 

 

With my recent upgrade to Ryzen, I now have a mostly complete second set of hardware to throw at this. The specs are subject to change but I'm not too fussed about the performance of this rig.

 

• AMD FX-8350, NZXT Havik 140 + Swiftech Helix 140mm
• Asus Crosshair V Formula-Z
• G.Skill Ripjaws X 16GB 1666
• Asus R9 290 DCU II
• OCZ ModXStream 600W
• Samsung 840 Evo 120gb, Seagate Barracuda 1TB
• Some spare Swiftech Helix 120mm and Scythe Ultra Kaze 3000rpm fans wherever they fit

 

Update 1 Progress

Acrylic purchased but I forgot where I put the guide on my table saw so I cut everything freehand. Not a huge issue but now I need to do a lot more trimming where some cuts went askew. The material is 4.5mm thick and pretty easy to cut; first piece is the vertical blanking plate beside the motherboard tray, which will need an additional 4mm spacer to fit securely. Since the only thing I'll be mounting in the front is a fan controller (Lamptron FC5-V2), I could blank out the face of the chassis and prepare it for sound deadening (either QuietPC or Silverstone supplied). The lower intake needs to be beveled to fit in the lower intake flush, and from there I can drill holes for final fit. Additionally the triple drive bay blank was cut wider so it can be riveted, although pilot holes need to be sunk first since my rivets are only 3mm deep. 

 

 

Since I'm not about bending the acrylic, it will have to be cut into two pieces. The top half is prepped but I need to take a vertical measurement for the lower half so it can clear both the PSU and the planned luminence panel, for which I will be soldering brand new white LED strips from a local supplier. The local hardware store didn't have any rubber u-channel so I settled for self-adhesive V weather stripping to cover the bottom cutout and a new false floor cut. None of the metal cutting in this chassis is pretty but you can't expect much from a basic Dremel and some metal cutting discs.

 

 

In the coming days I'll be working on 3D printing some parts and getting some pilot holes sunk for rivets. The front panel has to be done first, since that's where the mounts for both the false wall and basement will be hung. Will probably get the floor mounted at the least and a new bottom intake and shroud printed for the Ultra Kaze. The "chimney vent" will have to go through the basement cover, but trimming for that won't happen until further down the line. I believe there's enough space to re-use the Cooler Master drive caddies so I'll need to print new cages to mount on the acrylic. A switch panel will have to be printed where the old hot swap bay used to be, and the associated plastic cut out from the top panel.

[MEC-777]

Sub'd!

[chaozbandit]

Update #2

 

The last piece of acrylic has been cut! And turns out having a table guide helps a lot!!

 

 

Turns out the top piece of the basement cover is just thick enough at 4.5mm that it sits perfectly between the top of the PSU and the lowest PCIe bracket, which means there is no room for a sunk luminence panel. I'll be falling back to the second option which is a above-panel light bar similar to rally lights but two strips deep and diffused. Hopefully this throws enough light to get over the top of the GPU, as well as lighting up the cooler.

 

 

Here you can see my old acrylic window. I have a brand new side panel I've kept in storage in case I ever want to re-do it, but that doesn't look like I'll need it. The basement pretty much goes from the motherboard tray right to the window so I can get away with minimal mounting hardware as I don't expect it to move very much. If anything, the cutout for the chimney will be enough to keep it in place.

 

 

Most of todays work was spent massaging the pieces to fit properly. The floor was trimmed and drilled to slot in neatly over the cutout, and the lower front panel (now mounted, yay!) was beveled and drilled. Unsure how exactly I want to place the acoustic foam; whether it'll be one piece top to bottom or just the footprint of each cover. Also pictured is planned placement for the Ultra Kaze, which leaves just enough room for the drive cage although the sata data and power will be tight. Turns out the acrylic is way too thick to rivet properly so I've resorted to using the millions of fan screws I have laying around.

 

 

There's a lot of space up top that I'm not sure what to really do with. This is how I've usually run the exhaust in this case except for that time I had a radiator up there. This time around I'll be using the massive Havik; the poor AM3+ mount can't quite handle the weight alone, especially now that the tray is weakened, so I'll have to figure out a way to rig up some fishing line.

 

At the moment I've already started modelling some pieces: the aforementioned mounting brackets and some blanking plates for switches and lighting. Some more massaging of the acrylic is some needed before they can be wrapped and final fit. Just need to drill a few more holes in the chassis before I can give it it's last blowout and wipe down.

[chaozbandit]

Update #3

 

Outer panels are in! Still not final as they are yet to be wrapped, but all the holes are drilled and edges deburred. Have to say even though the cuts arent arrow straight and corners not perfect 90s, the overall fit is pretty good.

 

 

This thicc acrylic should be sufficient to take out any slack in the chassis resultant from removing the drive cage but we shall see. They sit pretty flush to the inner faces of the chassis which is why there are a few cutouts here and there.

 

 

Still working on modelling some parts, first up is the bracketry for the fan controller hence the cutout for a single bay up top. Planning to do a lot of cable clips as well for cable management down the road.

 

But also look what finally arrived! Thankfully unaffected by the Canada Post strike but the same cant be said for the other parts I ordered.

 

 

8.3/10 unboxing experience.

[Arika]

no idea if you could get something like this to work. but what you if you printed some plastic rims (flat of course) and stick them to the fans so they look like spinning wheels?

[chaozbandit]

25 minutes ago, Arika S said:

no idea if you could get something like this to work. but what you if you printed some plastic rims (flat of course) and stick them to the fans so they look like spinning wheels?

 

Neat idea! Could do it on the hub itself but it would look weird on top of the blades. Time to print out some TE37s.

 

 

[chaozbandit]

Update #4

 

First prints! It's only been a few months since I last used Blender for another project and I've already forgotten a few of the basics. Embarrassing. 

 

 

Anyways last night I quickly drafted up two brackets for the Lamptron FC5V2. It's not a very heavy unit so it doesn't need very much support but when you box PLA it becomes surprisingly stiff, even with a relatively low infil percentage. As I later confirmed once the print was finished, the bottom portion had roughly the same tensile strength as the acrylic on its own but the top face with no support that the controller actually mounts on was pretty flexible near the tip, at just 1mm less in depth. 

 

The guys I do most of my printing at are pretty chill and the last few times I went they showed off some pretty neat UV and glow in the dark filaments, among others, but what had really caught my eye was this sort of brushed gold / bronze stuff that has a semi-matte finish to it. They had just put in an order for a very glossy gold variant but it would neither arrive in time for the print nor really match the palette I'm going for so I passed.

 

https://filaments.ca/products/easyfil-pla-gold-2-85mm

 

Of the printers I've worked with in the past, the Ultimaker 2+ strikes a decent balance between print speed and quality. Although it's more prone to mechanical woes than some others (RIP our Lulzbot), the slightly thicker diameter filament makes prints significantly stronger than what the Makerbot uses despite taking roughly twice as long to complete a job.

 

 

One of my biggest gripes with the U2+ is that no matter what I do, at least one edge always tends to lift or shift just by way of how the bed adhesion behaves. I've tried with brims and skirts and no matter what it still lifts, both on a coated and uncoated bed, so it's just something you have to learn to compensate for. Nonetheless the majority of my prints come out fine, even when printing without supports for when you have large cutouts for various mounting solutions.

 

 

The brackets came out better than I expected, although you can probably tell there is a slight variation in their designs. The actual Lamptron side of the brackets are identical but the bottom portions were done separately to accommodate for a wiring pass-through on the one.

 

 

Come time to mount up and the measurements were spot on! The acrylic holes that I had to drill to finish the mount... not so much. Unfortunately one side is slightly tilted but not enough to throw the alignment off too much. The plan is to run three fan channels and two temperature sensors as shown in the harness above; I had forgotten the FC5V2 used a molex connection for power and of course I don't have anything in storage that is quite long enough to reach where I need it, so that will have to be sourced at a later time. 

 

 

Mocked up and good enough for now. Still plenty of clearance for the switches I need to put in up top and another bracket to go below for the rear wall. Incidentally I will probably be drafting those very panels tonight, but tomorrow is a short print day so there likely won't be much getting done. The bottom fan intake is coming along nicely and hopefully something will come of it later in the week.

 

The wrapping material and Silverstone sound dampening have also just arrived but I probably wont touch the stuff until these next few parts are printed.

 

Oh, and I'm having a blast with the Explorer. It's right up there with the DK2 I last used before it and is more than adequate for simracing.

 

 

[chaozbandit]

Update #5

 

Smol parts, smol update.

 

 

The rear wall went in without any hiccups as expected. This panel is purely for aesthetics and cable management so it doesn't need much support, though for peace of mind I whipped up a simple L-bracket just in case. Also tried my hand in making some tiny cable clips which will be superglued to the back when the time comes, although these are a bit too short and won't hold more than two usb3.0 cables.

 

 

At the moment not sure how high I want to set the height; it sits right up against where the wiring harness for the Lamptron exits so it will need a notch, but I dont want that much empty space atop or below the panel in case somebody accidentally takes a peek up there. 

 

The absolute flimsiest piece I've ever made - a 1mm thick fan frame to mock up where the cut will be made in the floor. Might as well use it to mock up potential fan grills. The basement sits right up against where it is now so it will probably need a bit more offset.

 

 

Tried my hand at scanning a Tomica premium Nissan Skyline GT-R but as you can see it didn't go so well. The plan was to use it as a decoration for the x-dock cover but looks like I'll need to bust out a 1:18 to scan instead of this 1:62.

 

 

Next up are more brackets for the basement so I can mock up the edge fitment and start filing it down so I don't cut myself everytime I take it out and whatnot. Ran out of time today to print so these will come later in the week.

 

[chaozbandit]

Update #6

 

Mistakes were made, friends.

 

Long story short I had thought the vandal switch I bought from FrozenCPU many moons ago was 16mm when in fact it was 22mm, which means the cutout I made for it in my switch plate was entirely off. Not wanting to scrap another 5 hour print, I'll be having a go at it later today with a 7/8in spade bit in hopes of making it work.

 

Rather annoyingly two corners of the plate have some fairly disturbing lift but far away from any structural vertices to not be a factor. It's a good thing in hindsight I flipped it and printed the model right side up or else the mounting surface would be horrendously misshapen. While this meant the print itself would take longer because of all the support needed, it was ultimately worth the trouble. 

 

 

 

Those of you who have not printed on a glass bed before may not have realized this but PLA actually finishes in two or sometimes three different finishes at once. The hot side gets a glass smooth gloss finish and you can see the starting strands of filament; the sides and top are sometimes very grainy and sometimes this grain can be found slightly matte if the detail is fine enough.

 

 

As you can see: the big black thing doesn't go in the small hole. Thankfully the single toggle switch was correctly modeled and went in without any snags, so I have that going for me at least. You can probably guess where I'm going with this two switch array - totally redundant and unnecessary, but what else an would I use the space for.

 

 

A rough mockup in the case. The whole moat indentation around the switch plate itself was to get around the steel folds of where the Cooler Master X-Dock used to be, and since I didn't want to cut away even more of the case this was the next best option. Just a few more holes to drill before it can be riveted in but not before the top face gets wrapped to give it a more stealth look.

 

 

Earlier in the week I had printed the L brackets to put the two pieces of the basement together, a rather uneventful endeavour.

 

 

Here's the final mockup for the drafted intake that will sit in the basement. The bottom (filter) and the top (duct) sections are about 5 hour prints each but the center mount for the Ultra Kaze is a staggering 9 hours so it will have to go on the Makerbot. Half of it has been printed thus far.

 

[chaozbandit]

Update #7

 

r/nevertellmetheodds

 

What are the chances that two different prints on two separate printers would fail?

 

This will just be a minor update as the next few pieces are multiple hour long jobs and Im spending the downtime on reddit or modelling the next steps of the project, and refining some measurements.

 

 

At first I would be worried the fan grille wouldnt be strong enough but it really doesnt have to withstand much force once its in there. 2mm of solid PLA is plenty strong at the joints but not in the middle of a free hanging curve. As amazing as the layer height the Ultimaker 2+ can achieve at 0.15mm, it becomes very fragile and easy to fail if the initial layer fails as can be seen in the top right corner. Salvageable if its just one strand but its cutting it close.

 

 

Speaking of fails, did I mention how much I really don't like the makerbot? Whether its a mixture of them taping be bed for whatever reason or the thin PLA that just doesnt hold its shape as it cools, at least half of what I print on the Replicator 2 ends up warping. Great for rapid prototyping but not something you use for items you want to last.

 

 

And by the time I made it back to the other lab my first print ended up jamming. Oh joy! Retracted the filament and snipped the cord to restart the 5 hour job...again.

 

 

Ended up coming out alright all things said. However the middle portion of the duct where the fan will eventually sit needed a pretty drastic rethink.

 

 

Rather than risking another 6 hour job failing I had to split it into three more manageable portions. The mounting plate is thus printed at slightly higher infill, though it doesnt make much difference at 2mm thickness. The remaining shroud is split into two low-infil portions so they can be resized to any other thickness of fan down the road if I need it (the Ultra Kaze is 38mm, so these two are ~21mm each). You may notice that one half has a slightly odd looking cape: this is purely because I had forgotten which side the filter needs to go in and accidentally raised the wall on the open side, so now I have a tongue for additional rigidity. The completely open side of the bottom mount will probably end up just being covered by a loose panel once its done so oh well.

 

The slotted edges on either side are for a mounting plate where a fan screw will go in at the top and bottom, effectively sandwiching all the pieces of the duct to the bottom-most piece, which is itself screwed into the acrylic blanking plate on the floor. The duct as a whole will hopefully come out to a final height of 8.5cm, just shy of the 9cm PSU height.

 

 

Now to rack my brain on how to design the duct to go through the top of the basement cover...

[PandaCopyRight]

... im still laughing at the project name ... 

[chaozbandit]

Update #8

 

I made a booboo.

 

 

Remember how I said I would drill out the hole for the vandal switch? Turns out I misread switch diameter as thread size and well... I have to make a new piece now. But its okay because the lifted edges were starting to bother me a bit and I kind of wanted to redo it anyways. Going to adjust the fitment of the switch plate to fit more snug and drop the thickness to save print time. Also if you must know, it was 100% satisfying to peel off the supports on the bottom which came apart like a thin accordion, leaving a micro-toblerone finish.

 

Again no real updates in terms of putting parts together as this week is all printing.

 

Which means now I get to vent on the frustrations of 3d modelling and how you should actually always triple check your work.

 

Since the next piece I wanted to print was the fan mount, I actually needed to ensure a flat surface throughout to ensure a flush fit with the duct and shroud. Threw it together quickly in Blender, no problem.

 

 

Loaded it up into cura, no problem. It's exactly as it should be and so I sent it off to the printer.

 

 

It wasn't until halfway through that I noticed something was wrong. The grooves, where have they gone? Loaded back into cura to look at the print pattern...

 

 

...sure enough the auto generated bed adhesion had filled in the slots to almost their entirety, rendering the piece useless unless I just want a really obscure fan mount. So back to the drawing board I guess but really frustrating as there was no real way to anticipate this kind of behaviour. The other three pieces with this kind of slot for later mounting all rendered properly in cura with and without bed adhesion enabled, so maybe its just an oddity with this specific piece. Frustrating.

 

Took some time to finish re-doing the top duct for the final time. Got it under 9cm in total height and I mist say it doesnt look too bad. For those curious, it's a 120mm to 90mm reduction. I was originally aiming for 105mm but it felt slightly too wide my my liking so I sized down. Why these specific diameters? These are measurements for the Nissan GTR's exhaust diameter of course.

 

 

 

On the bright side, really liking this VR thing.

 

 

[PandaCopyRight]

would like  a 3d printer so i can do similar things ... but its expensive

also ... still laughing at the project name ... 

 

[chaozbandit]

5 hours ago, PandaCopyRight said:

would like  a 3d printer so i can do similar things ... but its expensive

also ... still laughing at the project name ... 

 

If you have time and money anything's possible! 

[PandaCopyRight]

15 hours ago, chaozbandit said:

If you have time and money anything's possible! 

yeah, im at the stage of having neither  

[MEC-777]

1 hour ago, PandaCopyRight said:

yeah, im at the stage of having neither  

Welcome to the club.  

[chaozbandit]

Update #9

 

Sooooo.... they ran out of gold. I may or may not have had a hand to play in this matter.

 

Long story short the core components are mostly done so I can experiment with the remaining pieces, the filler ducting will be made in normal black but since the switch panel is somewhat visible and hidden I figure it would be cool to experiment with glow-in-the-dark filament, a nod to the outlined buttons on racecar steering wheels or emergency marking or whatnot. And yes, it exists.

 

https://filaments.ca/products/easyfil-pla-glow-in-the-dark-green-2-85mm?variant=27841075848

 

Speaking of automotive themed nods, since I dont have any space to design a proper directional duct for the lower intake, I'm now playing around with modelling it after the forward ducts on a Porsche 911 GT3R. The two types used are the traditional shielded look or the fully open rad exhaust. As the top of the cone sits right against the basement acrylic I dont have much headroom to play with so it will come out fairly flat.

 

 

 

Actually really pleased with how the cone came out given how much rough work went into planning it out.

 

 

Slowly getting there. Once the final positions are marked I will be cutting out a hexagonal hole in the bottom for the actual intake, but likely cutting out a regular square for the intake passthrough. Unless any of you lot have an idea on the best practice for cutting out a 90mm hole cleanly...