Custom PC - UK (2021-09)

MODDING / READERS’ DRIVES

reservoir and the pump, as I wanted
to control the vibration and for that
area to also act as the bottom mount
for the reservoir. Most of this work
was done slowly, cutting pieces of
copper pipe and then experimenting
to get the right angles before joining
them together.

What coolant do you use?
Aaron: I originally used some green
coolant, which was a nightmare.
It looked great in the pictures, but
clogged up all of the waterblocks
with pearls after a bit. It was a
Mayhems coolant called Aurora – I’m
not sure Mayhems even makes it any
more. Nowadays, I just use distilled
water with a couple of stabilisers and
maybe a little bit of green dye.

The copper heatsink fin stacks
down the sides look great.
Aaron: They’re a stock feature to the
case, and one that I knew would look
great with a reservoir recessed into
the fins. They’re all made of plastic
with some convincing paint applied
to them.

Is that a wood-effect
expansion card?
Aaron: I originally had an EVGA
GeForce GTX 980 Ti hybrid card
that came water-cooled from the
factory. I used the same vinyl overlay
method on it that I used to create the
wood effect on the front of the case.

It also had a ‘vertical mount’, simply

as a product of the micro-ATX board

laying flat in the case, but it does do a

good job of showing off the card.

I’ve since gifted that card to my

brother, and put some copper piping

in a prominent place behind the

window, along with the waterblock

that’s now on my Radeon RX 5700

XT graphics card. The interior

modifications don’t go much past

that area, since so little of it is visible

behind the wide panel. The card

you can see is an Elgato HD60 Pro

capture card, which has had a little

paint job because it’s fairly visible

behind the window now.

Was all the work done

by hand, or did you use any

CNC machinery?

Aaron: All the work was done with

basic hobby-grade tools, apart from

a few of the cuts made to the steel

panels – I used an air-powered cut

off-tool to make that work a little

easier. Most of the mods on this case

are bits that I fitted very precisely

with quite a lot of Dremel work.

The Nixie clock on the top required

a few components to be cut to make

clearance, and another panel built

behind it to close off the back. The

reservoir on the side is one I chose

after I measured the available space

and figured out what diameter of

reservoir I could fit in that space.

There are no solid mounts on the

The grille that’s there now is actually the

base of the Revenant statue that came

with the collector’s edition of Doom 2016

reservoir – it’s held in place by the

lower hose, as I mentioned before,

along with the copper return and fill

lines located at the top and side, plus

a few strategic zip ties.

Did you come across

any difficulties?

Aaron: A big concern of mine was

the plasma disk and having that

current flowing freely right by

critical electrical components. A lot