Big push the last few days to get it all put together and at least closed up for the first time. Lots of stuff to update on the progress and a lot of pictures that I did not take through the steps, feel free to request a image of anything you are curious about that isn't clear from the images I have posted. So in roughly chronological order, here are the steps I have taken from the last update to now
18x15 Thermaltake exhaust fan was slightly too thick to fit next to the motherboard near the IO so I lined them up and marked it then I filed a little notch on either side of the fan housing to allow the motherboard PCB to snug up to the fan. I also needed to recess the fan screws on the motherboard side, (I did them all) because there was not room for the screws to be proud of the fan housing. Works great and the fan header is right next to the fan.
I am on the fence about sleeving the AC input line and removing the junction from the input... I will likely do it to remove the excess wiring from the case.
I still need to shorten the CPU and PCI-E power cables, I just used what I had on hand and they are both 3-4inches too long, even to allow some play.
The ATX 24pin gave me some trouble as I only have 6mm to work with above the motherboard and below the HDplex PSU. I tried to use a factory 90 degree adapter and solder to it but I burnt one of the pads off so I then desoldered the PCB from the adapter and used the pins to solder directly to the wires at 90 degrees. Most of them worked out well, but I added some liquid electrical tape to the whole soldered area to help reduce movement and to insulate the joints. Still a tight fit but it works fine. I am using 20ga wire for all of the HDplex wiring. All stock HD-plex wires that were modified for length and in other ways.
The HD-Plex unit was also a challenge to get to work,
-The overall length of the unit was about 3mm too long so I needed to remove the end-cap from the unit on the modular side as well as recess the case screw in the area to allow the PSU to be tight to the case corner-stud.
-I finally for the PSU mounted to the front panel. I mounted the PSU to the mounting bracket that comes with it and after positioning and trimming for the case corner stud, I tapped 3mm screw holes into the front panel (2mm deep) using the old tried and true method of triple-notching a screw and cutting your own bottom threads into a 2.5mm pilot hole, works like a charm. I also put some thermal tape between the PSU and the bracket and again between the bracket and the face plate. After shortening some pan-head screws to 2mm, the PSU was properly mounted.
-The AC input lines were also problematic as they exit the PSU from the end and there is not much space on that side. I actually was able to get the wires routed between the GPU 8-pin and the GPU pcb just fine, unfortunately there is great difficulty in assembling the finished product that way so I ended up cutting a notch out of the top of the PSU on that end, trimmed up a rubber grommet and routed the wires directly towards the AC input plug at the back of the case. Made final assembly a breeze.
-The modular side of the PSU went fine with the exception of the PCE-E plug which had to have some of the housing trimmed to allow the PCB of the RAM in slot 2 some breathing room.
Next the power button. The stock power button would not work as the pcb impacted the GPU shroud a lot and without cutting it down a lot, making t a lot weaker, I decided to try and make a switch I had on hand work instead and so far its great. Just needed to shorten the lead wires a lot and open up the front panel hole by 2mm and lower it as much as possible to get the 16mm switch installed clean.
The front USB is another issue as the plugs on both ends are very strained with the HD-plex unit nearly blocking both ends. I picked up a header extension that should allow me to rout below the PSU and hopefully get USB-3.0 active on the front panel
Finally one of the biggest changes I had to make to allow for assembly of the unit was to reverse the screws on the front panel. the screws were just not accessible enough to make it worthwhile to keep the original setup. With the right screwdriver extensions I could have kept the front cover clean with no screws showing, but I like to tinker and didn't want to have to go through that amount of trouble to open up the case in the future. So I drilled 3mm holes in the front cover, countersunk them with a carbide tile drill (exact taper match for bugle-head screws btw) and drilled and tapped the corner studs to accept 3mm screws. The finish is nearly identical to the top and bottom cover which also have exposed screws so it doesn't look out of place
A few other small things, I needed to trim plastic between the wires on my 8pin plugs for the PCI-E wires to allow them to turn sharply, worked great. Had to bend the input wires on the AC line at 90 degrees to avoid the CPU cooler.
