Project:Blue/Chrome

[RM5D]

The case for my PC is a black and silver tower. The basic theme is black,silver and blue with "an industrial look" - lots of chrome fan grills,dome nuts ect.

Here is a list of what I plan to do.(This might change as things progress.)


1)Mount a window in the side panel and mount a 120mm blue led fan in the centre of the window. A 30cm Blue CCFL is mounted on the side of the window.

2)Mount a hdd cooler to my main SATA drive and paint it blue.

3)Use a hdd cooler, paint and modify it to be a Gpu cooler.

4)Make and mount piece of blue perspex in place of the two open 5.25" drive plates.On this plate will be mounted 3 x 40 mm fans painted blue with chrome fan grills.There will alo be 6 x dpdt toggle switches which will constitute my fan control unit. Six dual colour led's will be used to indicate 7v or 12v on the selected fan.

5)A bay converter will be mounted in the drive bay behind the fans to cool and house hdd 2.

6)Another piece of perspex will be mounted in place of the two stiffy drive plates.This will hold 2x40 mm fans to cool my 3rd hdd.

7)Design and make a PCB for my Fan Control setup.

8)Design and make a PCB for my Power Bus.

9)Add 80mm blue led fans to the front and rear panels in a push pull setup.

10)Make blue and chrome case thumb screws from motorcar aluminum valve caps.(color to be decided)

11)Upgrade my power supply from 350w to 550 w and swop the stock fan for a 120mm blue led fan.

12)Cut a hole in the top of my case and mount a 120mm blue led fan and chrome grill under the handle.(This will be only be done after monitering temps. after everything else is done and extra cooling is needed.

13)My optical drives activity led's will be swopped for blue one's and blue led's will be mounted inside the drives to be seen when drive draw opens.

14)Swop the green and red led's in k/board and mouse for blue one's.

to be continued

Here is my case before any mods.It is an Esquire EPC-8103.

This is my case straight out of the box - no mods.
Case 1

Case 2

Case 3


Part 1

Here the aim was to add a clear plexi window into the side panel,and the mount a 120mm blue led fan in the centre of the window.The window is mounted using 6mm screws and chrome dome nuts,rubber u-channel is used to edge the cutout.

Knowing pitfalls of working with plexi I bought 2 pieces of plexi.TRUE to form when drilling the last 6.5mm hole a piece brock out - so back to square one.The second window whent much better ..... until....while mounting it to the side panel it got caught on the thread of one of the screws and as I tightened the nut the plexi cracked ,not my day.

I finished mounting it and the 30CM CCFL onthe side,it will have to be redone when I get more plexi.
PART 1 1

PART1 2


PART 2

A fairly easy one this.I painted the cooler frame blue cut off the 4 pin molex thru connector and extended the wires.I added a 2 pin connector to plug into the fan controller.

PART 2 1


PART 2 2


PART 2 3


PART 3

Almost a repeat of PART 2 except the cooler frame is mounted on a PCI plate.

[RM5D]

PART 3 1

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PART 3 2


PART 3 3


PART 3 4

[RM5D]

PART 4,5,6 and 7

Everything in these sections are linked so I dealt with them as one.

To start a painted the bay converter blue and mounted the HDD.

PART 1



PART 2



Designing a Pcb for my Fan Controller is next.I draw the circuit diagram and do the pcb layout on Eagle Cad.I use the program's Cam output to plot the pcb image straight onto the copper-clad board.This is done on my X-Y plotter using a modified pen with waterproof permanent ink.The pcb is then etched using ferric chloride in a bubble etch tank.

PART 3



PART 4



PART 5

For the fan controller I used 6 x DPDT - Centre off
6 x bi-colour led's(red/green)
12 x 1k 0.25w 5% resistor's
24 x zero ohm resistors(links)
6 x 2 pin male connectors
1 x 3 pin male connector

I bring +12v,+5v and ground onto the board and switch 0v,7v and 12v to the fans.



PART 6



PART 7



PART 8



PART 9

Time to paint the 40mm fans and modify the wiring.



PART 10



PART 11



PART 12



PART 13

The plexi panel's masked marked and ready for drilling.



PART 14



PART 15

Everthing ready to be fixed to the back of the case front panel.Metal stand-off's were epoxied to the case to a mounting with bracketd and screws.



PART 16

Off - 0v no light



PART 17
On - 7v green led's



PART 18

On - 12v red led's

[ben333]

Looks pretty cool, nice job on the controller I deleted your accidental repost as you asked also. Welcome to Pro/Forums!

[RM5D]

Thanks and Thanks.

[RM5D]

PART 8

The "Power Bus" pcb was designed and made the same way as the Fan Controller.On this pcb it can be seen how skew some of the holes are.Drilling I'm afraid is the weak piont of this process,it is done with a drill prees and a normal hss 0.8mm drill bit.With the pads being so small lining them up is a nightmare and with the fibreglass that blunts a new bit within a couple of holes things are not that easy.

PART 1



The aim of this board was to eliminate excess wiring and adaptors and to have all connections in a central area.After deciding to make the fan control I sudenly didn't so so many things to connect.Presently only my CCFL,REAR 80 mm fan and the fan control get power from this board.

PART 2

This pcb provides for the following:Male and female 4 pin molex's.(+12v,0v,+5v)
2 different styles of 2 pin connectors(=12V,+5V)
3 pin connectors(+12V,0V)
3 pin connectors(+12v,0v,+5v)
Led indiction of the presence of +12v and +5v.



I had to make pcb mount molex's from standard one's.Combining the molex pin with a "vero board pin"
worked for me.

PART 3



I did not populate the board completely because I did not need all the connectors.

PART 4



PART 5



PART 9

Very basic mount and rewire 2 fans.

PART 1



PART 2



PART 3



PART 4



PART 5

At a later stage I might cut out the centre piece to increase flow and reduce noise.On that subject after running all these fans the 40mm one's are the noiseist.At first a bit of a suprise but after abit of thought it made sense.The smaller the fan the faster it turns = more noise and vice versa.



PART 10

Here is was to make my own case thumb screws using motor car valve caps. The caps are anodized ally. Ther are blue round,blue square,red round and chrome square.Icouldnt decide on the colour and shape so i made them all.They are simply made by epoxing the correct screw into the cap.

PART 1



PART 2



PART 3