Neo's watercooled Lian-Li V300 *56k :(*

This is my first picture thread and I have alot of pics to follow, sorry 56kers.

I had originally wanted to post a worklog, which this will be of sorts. I ended up working on this think none stop everyday after my classes were over though and never did that. I will attempt to leave comments of what I was thinking at the time and why I chose to do things that I did. If you have any questions about what I did or about your own mod on a V300 that you want to ask feal free, and I will do my best to give you a quick answer.


I was originally tired of my gigantic Gigabyte 3D Aurora and wanted to downsize my pc because I like to have it on my desk. I was browsing around the forums when I saw a postthat said LianLi had was coming out with a new matx case. I had never owned a Lian-Li but new of their incredible quality. I was originally going to buy the Silverstone SG01, but once I was the V300 I knew what I had to get. I love the anodized black finish it has, and the perforated front with silver accents just looks amazing.

I watercool all my pcs (my new project is somewhat of an exception, that will be a future thread), and the V300 was not going to be an exception. I set out to find a radiator that would fit. I stumbled upon a new series that Black Ice had put out; the gt series. They are very thin and have flat end tanks. I found a diagram of the dimensions of the gt240 model and decided that it would fit (barely as I would soon realize). I searched out all my other parts for the build and went ahead and placed my orders.

Don't confuse the timeline of my purchases as hasty. I drew numerous drafts of what would go where and how to fit this or that. Somethings that I did happened on the spur of the moment, but the parts I chose were entirely intentional.

My parts list:
V300 case
slimline dvd-rw (slot loading)
slim ide converter pcb
4 fan controller
2 x 120mm vantec ball bearing fans
1 x 80mm vantec ball bearing fan
1 x silverstone radial fan
Radgrillz Brick 2 x 120mm
1 sheet of AC Ryan modders mesh
1 Blank black Lian Li V2000 side panel
4ft 7/16" tygon tubing
hose clamps
DD GPU block
Alphacool DDC Ultra pump
Swiftech Storm CPU block
...the rest are normal pc components (cpu, mobo, etc...)

where are the pics!!!!! i love my case and might do the same to it. Pics!!! lol

Once everything arrived I began to chart out what I wanted to do. I found out that the radiator I had chosen was perfect for the job. It fit with little more than a mm on each side.







I had decided that the top inside the drive bays wsa the best place. If I were to mount on the front fan bracket then motherboard clearance issues would come up, and I would have a harder job placing my pump.

I went ahead and used the rad grill template and marked out where to cut.




I ended up having to cut off all parts on the case that would be used to mount the fans (according to the template). This is because I needed the fans to be able to clear the hole so I could drop in the fan/rad/grill assembly.

The top hole cut and rad grill fitted



There was a slightly major problem with the design. (Oxymoron?) When fans are mounted to a radiator the endtank that has the inlet and outlet is offset from the middle of where the 2 fans mount together. This offset creates a problem because the radgrill does not account for it in its design. To fix this I decided that instead of hardmounting the radiator to the fans with screws, I would fabricate a cage to hold it. I opted to use AC Ryan modders mesh because it is made of stainless steel. (not only is it strong, It makes wicked sparks when dremeling it!)







All the little notches you see are there to make it easier to get a screwdriver in to turn the fanscrews.

Next up I went away from the radiator to go ahead and mount the rear radial fan.





I have since removed the mesh you see in those pics. It was too resrictive and caused alot of noise.

Kid8 said:

where are the pics!!!!! i love my case and might do the same to it. Pics!!! lol

Click to expand...

HAHA, hold you horses man. I'm literally typing this up right now! I have probably close to 30 pics so its gonna take alot of writing.

Next I dropped in the radiator unit for a test fit.




Worked like a charm! The only great improvement I could add to it is to buy some weather stripping from lowes and put the around the top side of the rad to make a seal between the fans and the rad itself. There is space there currently as you can see, but it doesnt bother me and my temps are fine with o/c'd opteron and x1900xt.

The next step was to decide where to put the fan controller. Since I would be removing the drivebay almost completely it was out of the question. I decided that since the sunbeam fan controller I ahd bought had threaded shafts under the buttons to hold it onto the plate it comes on I could use that to mount it to the front of my case. I decided to mount it to the far left side of the case, vertically. It is also a perfect fit in this case. The rear of the pcb is about 2mm away from the motherboard tray. This I did not know of ahead of time, but if it had been a problem I would have figured out a solution.








The next issue, which I ended up having to sleep on, was the front power/reset button. I had long passed the point of no return on using the front fan bracket that it is attached to. I needed to come up with a different mounting method. I ended up bending the metal surrounding it outward and using 2 sprung screws with nice terminating nuts that I had leftover from an old swiftech gpu block. I had to use a drill to widen the holes on the front, but it worked perfectly. It took a lot of tweaking to get it just right. To much to either side and the button would bind to the openning when pressed.




The front was almost comlete. Now I had to figure out where to put the dvd-rw and how ot orient it. I knew I wanted to do it on the front; it was really the only space available with tubing in place.I decided to mount it vertically just to the right of the middle silver strip. In order to do this I needed to fabricate yet another cage/bracket. I still had plenty of modders mesh left over and decided that would be the best thing to use. Again because of its strength and stiffness. I took a sheet of paper and made a template of the drive by rotating it over the paper in three steps, tracing its outline each time, and never picking it up off the paper. I made little tabs on the back section that would fold over the back, tuck under the ide converter, and screws would go through them. That held everthing in place well. I originally had a front flap on all 4 sidesand then removed one to put it where it currently resides.





The openning I cut on the front is exactly 2 holes wide. Which is ~3cds wide. A couple of people have said that I should put some sort of strip around the cut to make it look cleaner. I total agree but because the drive/cage are so flush with the front it is relatively impossible for me to do. I tried to sand it to as much of a line as I could but was limited becasue the holes are overlapping.
I used motherboard standoffs and screws to hold the drive in place. You may not that I am only using 2 flaps to hold it in place with only 3 screws. Trust me when I say it is not moving AT ALL. The modders mesh is very rigid and it will not budge.

The hardest parts were now done. The majority of the cutting and maming was complete. Next I had to roughly plan out my loop. I dropped in the pump for a quick fit.





I skipped some steps picturewise after this. But it was really your normal tube routing at this point. Well, not quite normal, but the rest of the pics should be able to show well enough what the flowpath is.

Pics of the videocard side of things. The tubes are routed behind the hdd rack and psu. There is normally a piece of metal there from the hdd rack connecting to the drive cage. I cut this connecting piece off.




Custom voltage regulator heatsink view


Pump resting on a Tempurpedic bed free sample. This is the absolute best thing I have found yet to put a pump on. (NOTE: That kink is the tube to the fillport, it does not impead flow!)


This is the money shot everyone will be wanting to see


I had to put a 60mm fan over the NB heatsink. I have it cranked up to max voltage for overclocking the opteron, and the absense of a cpu HSF leaves it with little airflow.


As you will see in these final pics I made new side panels for the case. The original case has cutouts on both side for the drives. I no longer have a drivebay at all so I made these. A single V2000 side panel is the perfect size to cut out both side panels for the v300. I didnt take any pics of this but it is straight forward. I used the existing v300 sidepanel as a template and traced it onto the masked v2000 panel. I also used it to make marks for the screw holes. I do not have the equipment to make the receced (sp?) holes, but I have black lianli thumbscrews coming in for the sides. Please note that the screw pattern for the sides is the same for both sides. If making your own side panels you can use just one side as a template for both, just be sure to match the grain of the brushing.

How much did all that cost! Im so jealous and what mobo is in it. Did you have to cut anything to fit the 7900?

Nice job a for recessing (or countersinking) if you use a larger drill bit and go down slightly (make it the size of the screw head) as in a tiny amount and test you will be able to countersink enough to get the screws flush

@hupo- Yes, You have to cut of part of the floppy drive bay to fit ANY card over 8". Also the Card in there is a X1900XT, not a 7900. You will need to cut for basically any mid to high end card out these days. Also even if it is a shorter card, if it has a pcie power connecter then you will also probably need to cut it. I have a DFI RS482 Infinity board in it.

@firelord- Thanks for the idea to countersink. I already have ordered a bunch of black lian li thumbscrews though and will be using those. They wont be flush but will make access to the inside much easier.

neogenesis2004 said:

@hupo- Yes, You have to cut of part of the floppy drive bay to fit ANY card over 8". Also the Card in there is a X1900XT, not a 7900. You will need to cut for basically any mid to high end card out these days. Also even if it is a shorter card, if it has a pcie power connecter then you will also probably need to cut it. I have a DFI RS482 Infinity board in it.

@firelord- Thanks for the idea to countersink. I already have ordered a bunch of black lian li thumbscrews though and will be using those. They wont be flush but will make access to the inside much easier.

Click to expand...

(and can you give me a pricelist. Since im in love)

excellent work neo, very nice

Excellent! The finished mod looks very clean

Just curious, how are the noise levels? I have been comtemplating mesh in my next mod but I would assume it would let mroe noise "escape."

Well, there is still air in the line sadly, Because of where I placed the t line the bubble get sucked right past it. I think I might place it at the entrance to the rad instead of the exit. The suction from the ddc is just so high where it is right now. I also have raptors in raid 0 so they create quite a whine. But if I were to not have those then I wouldn't say it was silent but it has a constant sort of woosh sound. Nothing high pitch fanwise.

Very nice, how loud is the system?

P.S.

Your sig is wwaaaay too long. 10 lines is the max.

Its not that noisy in most aspects. The loudest fans are the ones on the rad, but thats to be expected because the rad in itself is a barrier to the air. It makes a quiet whooshing sound, almost like a ocean wave. Right now the loudest things are the raid 0 raptors in it. The seeking doesnt bother me at all, but I have a very fine ear and the high pitch whine really stands out to me. I bought some of that sound deadening stuff for cases, Im gonna see if that can maybe cut down on some of the whine. Overall I'm very pleased with it all. I'm going to be disassembling it to install a Thermalright HR-05 on the nb so that I can take that little fan on the stock nb hsf out of the case and cool it passively while overclocked. That will also cut down on noise quite a bit.

looks good.

.

wow, I hvent posted here in a long time. I forgot about this thread. I ended up selling everything off to pay for tuition for a semester. I still have the case with the rad, radgrill, and dvd-rw in it that I tried to sell way back that I'm gonna put back up for sale in the FS forum.