Log Sub 6L, sandwich style, full hardline custom loop, 8600G & 4070 Super build

[CTFGaming]

Good day, I am new here so please let me know if I have done anything incorrectly.

I recently built an ITX build in a fractal torrent nano and it has given me the urge to design and build a sff fully water-cooled pc to go even smaller.

So I set myself the following challenges when starting the design:
1. Must be less than 6L - was originally 5L but after increasing the rad size I quickly realized that was going to be impossible.
2. Must contain all the components - no power bricks or external rads.
3. Use as many off the shelf products as possible to make the project repeatable.

The parts I have put together so far for the build:
1. Aorus B650I Motherboard
2. Ryzen 5 7600x
3. 32gb of DDR5 G skill ram
4. 970 pro 1TB NVME
5. MSI 4070super Ventus 2x
6. Alphacool Eisblock Aurora RTX 4070TI Ventus with Backplate (on Order)
6. Alphacool NexXxoS ST25 Full Copper 92mm Dual Radiator (on Order)
7. Alphacool NexXxoS XP³ Light - Black V.2 CPU block (on Order)
8. Alphacool DC-LT 2 - 2600rpm Ceramic Pump (on Order)
9. EKWB HTC 12 Fittings (on Order)
10. Custom designed 180mm (Dual 92mm) Distro plate for pump above.
11. Custom lazer cut case.
12. ID Cooling - 9215 ARGB fans x 2 (on Order)
13. Enhance 7660B 600W flex ATX PSU (on Order)

So the plan is to build a sandwich style layout case based heavily off the Velka 3 but extending the height up to accommodate the radiator and fans and extending the front out a little to accommodate the custom distro plate. My current dimensions are 260 (h) x 230 (l) x 100mm (w) = 5.98L.

I live in South Africa and some of the items I have ordered from Alphacool have around 9week lead time so this may be a slow thread I do apologize. So far I have all the components 3D modeled to ensure they all fit and will focus on the distro design and case design once I have confirmed everything. Where am I so far:

Hope you all enjoy and let me know if you have any advice, I am a bit worried about the cooling capabilities but I am planning to undervolt and tried my best to choose components that are efficient ass possible +- 300w TDP max. Will update regularly as parts come in and as I make progress on the design but I really feel the finished product is not going to disappoint.

 

[HWI]

Nothing wrong with doing something just for the fun of it and this looks like an interesting project, just curious why did you choose these components when you can air cool them in a case smaller than 5.9L?

 

[milesvw]

Nothing wrong with doing something just for the fun of it and this looks like an interesting project, just curious why did you choose these components when you can air cool them in a case smaller than 5.9L?

He is right. Not trying to dissuade you by any means. But a riser to put the video card where your PSU is and a Jiusharks JF13K CPU cooler would probably work fine (it can definitely cool a 7600x at 163w, it did my 12600k at 183w).

 

[CTFGaming]

You 100% correct I could have gone smaller with air cooling and with probably better thermals but always wanted to try my hand at liquid cooling. This is purely just to see if it would work kinda project. I have also been watching a lot of Optimum on youtube and his Form T1 watercooled builds with 4090's got me inspired. Wanted to see if I could go for a more mid tier gaming PC in a smaller form factor with similar results.

 

[CTFGaming]

Also the vision I have for this is going to look sick, watch this space I have always liked the look of led lit water blocks and distroplates and I feel when people use them in SFF PC's they do not get shown off enough as most cases are closed off boxes. Hence a lot of water-cooled sff builds just use soft tubing as nobody ever sees it anyway. This is not going to be ground breaking in terms of thermal performance or size but it will look like a piece of art when done that I can assure you.

 

[hrh_ginsterbusch]

Also the vision I have for this is going to look sick, watch this space I have always liked the look of led lit water blocks and distroplates and I feel when people use them in SFF PC's they do not get shown off enough as most cases are closed off boxes. Hence a lot of water-cooled sff builds just use soft tubing as nobody ever sees it anyway. This is not going to be ground breaking in terms of thermal performance or size but it will look like a piece of art when done that I can assure you.

Totally understand it, the S300 liquid cooling mod I just mostly finished is like: Oh, air cooling would be fine. BUT: I like it this way, and yes, a bit of ARGB fun is nice once in a while

cu, w0lf.

 

[morj]

@CTFGaming you can go to about 5.5L with a thicker radiator using this layout: https://smallformfactor.net/forum/t...ckless-5-0-5-5l-fully-watercooled-case.14328/

If I were to build in this case today, I would have used a CPU pump combo block and 8mm OD pneumatic tubes to save some more space.

 

[CTFGaming]

@CTFGaming you can go to about 5.5L with a thicker radiator using this layout: https://smallformfactor.net/forum/t...ckless-5-0-5-5l-fully-watercooled-case.14328/

If I were to build in this case today, I would have used a CPU pump combo block and 8mm OD pneumatic tubes to save some more space.

Thanks for pointing this build log out to. Really nice build btw. I did originally consider this layout but moved the Rad to the top specifically to make space for the front mounted distro plate/pump unit that I am designing. Looks so nice on the O11 Dynamics so wanted to see if I could incorporate it in a SFF build.

Is it not usually better to go thicker fans thinner rad? From what I have read the gains of the thicker radiators are not proportional to the additional static pressure of thicker fans ie. Thinner Rad, Thicker Fans > Thicker Rad, Thinner Fans. I have never done watercooling so this is a genuine question. This has made me a little worried about the thermal results I am going to get out of my build.

 

[morj]

Thanks for pointing this build log out to. Really nice build btw. I did originally consider this layout but moved the Rad to the top specifically to make space for the front mounted distro plate/pump unit that I am designing. Looks so nice on the O11 Dynamics so wanted to see if I could incorporate it in a SFF build.

Sure, it's a nice feature to have, hope it turns out aesthetically pleasing.

Is it not usually better to go thicker fans thinner rad? From what I have read the gains of the thicker radiators are not proportional to the additional static pressure of thicker fans ie. Thinner Rad, Thicker Fans > Thicker Rad, Thinner Fans. I have never done watercooling so this is a genuine question. This has made me a little worried about the thermal results I am going to get out of my build.

The difference in static pressure is minimal for Noctua: NF-A9X14 HS-PWM has 2,11 mm H₂O while NF-A9 PWM has 2,28 mm H₂O (this is possible due to the fact that the slimmer fan has higher RPM).

Given that the Nemesis M184 GTX is a two-pass radiator, I think the performance gain versus a thin radiator might be quite noticable.

 

[CTFGaming]

So as you can see from my original post this PC has been a long time in the making but finally feeling confident enough to post some in progress photos. It is almost there and would probably be complete but had a fitting break on me in the final assembly so the finish has been pushed back a couple weeks (in South Africa so shipping is slow to get here). Anyway hope you enjoy!

 

[CTFGaming]

So spent my Christmas finally finishing up the assembly of the SFF water-cooled PC and I can finally say she is running on water . This has been almost 2 years in the making and I am absolutely stoked on how it came out. I still have some stuff to finish off like 3D printing the bezels and getting some glass for the side panels but knowing that this actually works after all the time and money that went into this build is an absolute relief to say the least.

My cable management leaves a lot to be desired but after shortening and re-pinning like 50 cables I realized there is just no good way to do the cable management in a build this small. I may 3D print some covers just to hide a bit of the mess.

So after some basic tweaking and testing I am averaging around 40c on the coolant while gaming, this has my CPU around 75c and my GPU never cracks 60c. At idle the the coolant sits at around 35c (this is a delta of around 10c) with CPU at 50c and GPU at 35c (same as coolant). I am running an under-volt and slight overclock on both.

I will be honest it is not the quietest build I have ever done as the fans idle at around 70% and go up to around 90% while gaming but I knew that was going to be the case as this is an incredibly small loop and is pushing the efficiencies to the max.

So in conclusion I am cooling between 250 - 300w using a dual 92mm rad paired with slim fans in what I can only say is 1 of the best looking SFF PC's around (Yes that's my opinion). Anyways hope you all enjoy the pics and hopefully I can get the last of the items I need to finish off the side panels in the new year and call this build complete!!!

 

[CTFGaming]

My 1 image did not seem to post so sorry if it shows up for you but here is a repost.

 

[endosan]

Very impressive! I like the look of the case, no doubt. Out of curiosity, what would you guess it weighs in at?

 

[endosan]

Very impressive! I like the look of the case, no doubt. Out of curiosity, what would you guess it weighs in at?

 

[CTFGaming]

The case weighs just over 2kg. The whole build weighs close to 8kg. It’s definitely not on the light side. I chose to make the case from 2mm think stainless as it’s a good thickness for tapping m3 threads as well as countersinking an m3 screw head. It’s really solid feeling and a very heavy PC

 

[CTFGaming]

Also I will make the case files available soon but just need to do some cleanups before posting