Log IKEA Eket 35³

[kippenvel]

Hi all! Long time reader, first time poster. This Christmas break I'm planning on building my first custom pc. I have built a custom desk using IKEA Eket cabinets and 4cm solid birch worktop. Until now my old pc case has been living on the floor underneath the desk. I'm going to build a custom case to fit within a single 35x35x35 Eket cabinet, right next to my working area.

Here is my current setup:

The plan [15-12-2024]​

I'm planning on keeping my current hardware, with a full custom water cooling loop. I will adapt the loop to fit in the new case. The main issue was fitting my EVGA 2080 Ti Hydro Copper GPU. With a length of 290mm it will just fit inside the Eket, with a inside measurement of only 316mm. I still need to leave room for the displayport connectors of course, but I found some nice low profile 90 degree adapters. In my current loop the GPU is facing downwards, making it impossible to admire the looks. For this new case I wanted a vertical GPU. I currently have only a single 280mm radiator, witch is barely enough for my Ryzen 5950X coupled with the 2080 Ti. So preferably I wanted to add another radiator, just to be save. I already have acquired an ITX motherboard and SFX PSU, so that will save some space.

I planned out an insert for the Eket cabinet that can be laser cut from MDF. And I will order a custom glass panel for the front. I'm an architect by trade, so I'm most comfortable 3D modelling with Autodesk Revit. The most horrible part of the process thus far was looking up all the dimensions for the pc components from their specifications. Every dimension is relative to another dimensions, resulting in very complicated drawings to finally get the parts correctly modelled. I got through it and ended up with a cool 3 chamber concept. A front chamber facing forwards, housing all visible components. Two chambers at the back of the case, one for the PSU and all cable management, another for two sandwiched intake radiators. I wanted to use my existing 280mm radiator, but could only fit a second 240mm radiator next to the ITX motherboard.

Here is the 3D drawing of the case:

Thanks for reading my post. If you have any questions or maybe good suggestions, I'm looking forward to hear from you. I'm currently building the pc in 3D using Blender, to check if all planned components will fit. I will try to make some nice renderings when I'm done.

 

[kippenvel]

I have finished modelling all components and the water-cooling loop. I already had a detailed model of the EVGA 2080 Ti made in Blender a couple years back. Just for fun to practice my modelling and material knowledge. I could find most other components online and downloaded most fittings from Alphacools website. This is how I hope the end result will look like:

And here's an animation showing more of the layout and water cooling loop:



One of the main components is the Phanteks D140 Distro Block. When browsing for possible distro blocks online it immediately caught my attention. It had the perfect height and a cut-out that will leave just enough space for the length of my GPU. I've already bought it without overthinking it too much. Luckily it all fit together very well. I won't be using the advised connection layout with a parallel GPU and CPU loop, but I'm hoping it will work just fine.