[Cancelled] The Pride Of Hiigara - Phase 3: Electronics

[hiigaran]

Why would the copper look any uglier than other types of pipes/tubes? Is it the colour, or something else? I'd be spray painting the copper to give it another colour anyway.

Speaking of colours, I should actually decide on colours. I'm still thinking of blue and yellow. The base layer would be white, like the wall it's mounted on, then the design gets a blue, and the LED lights creating the border glow are yellow. The question is, what particular shades of blue and yellow?

[Walfas]

If you're spraypainting it then that's fine, but you still have the joints. Yes, you might get them all perfect and have absolutely no excess solder anywhere, but that's probably an unlikely scenario. I feel like it'd look a little too bulky, what with seven cards to deal with. With clear plastic piping, you can also create the glow effect through all of it with a few LEDs, too.

[hiigaran]

No solder. Joints would be done with a flaring tool. Simple to work with, and long lasting.

I'm still not sure what you mean by it being too bulky though. Whether it's tubing or copper pipes, the diameter will be the same, so the sizes wouldn't change. Unless I'm missing something, it shouldn't be making a difference, right? Wherever possible, the pipes would be bent, rather than being given 90 degree attachments. Since it's all in series, there would be short pipes between cards, and to avoid having pipes crossing over from one piece of the design to another (eg, from one of the wings, to the large circle), it would be bent downwards and go into the design and underneath the base, so all the ugly junctions can be placed there.

I'm actually not sure what I want to do with colouration here. Should I make the pipes (or tubing, if copper is really a bad idea) the same colour as the design, so it blends in, or contrasting at the same colour as the border glow to make them stand out? My concern with the latter is that it might ruin the look of the design. Would it look like I'm throwing too much into it by drawing attention to the pipes?

[Walfas]

I just think being able to form your tubing to whatever you need is easier than being stuck with straight runs. Unless you want that look, it might look more organized/sharp that way, too.

As far as colour, I'd suggest to try and keep it the same colour as the rest of the setup, and then maybe have the border lighting a different colour.

[hiigaran]

Soft copper tubing can be bent very easily with either a bending spring and some leverage against your leg, or with a conduit bender, so they aren't restricted to straight runs and junctions. I can think of a few places I'd want junctions instead of bends, but for the most part, bends would maintain the flow of water better than a sharp turn.

By the rest of the setup, are you referring to the colour of the hardware itself, or the design?

[Walfas]

Hardware itself, so like your pump, the GPUs, motherboard, etc...

Colours are nice, but more than 3 usually ends up being too busy.

[hiigaran]

That would be a concern. I don't really want to go for red designs if at all possible. I don't think many cards are blue when naked though...

[Spazturtle]

Most PCBs are black, CPU and CPU waterblocks are typical Copper, Nickle, or covered up with black plastic. Pumps are allways black.

[hiigaran]

Hmm...so black on blue...I suppose it isn't too bad.

Also, I've found a printing store I can get my design printed from. I still need to get a vector of the design though

[hiigaran]

Few updates:

Started buying some of my tools. Got myself a 550 watt drill, an assortment of drill bits for wood, a hammer, wire cutter/stripper, and a 7.5m measuring tape.

After unpacking the measuring tape, I started measuring the actual room I have to work with. Turns out that my estimate of 4m by 3 was a little too optimistic. While I have the available width, the maximum height is 2.60m. This has also thrown another consideration that slipped my mind, which is that I'm obviously going to have a table for the monitors in front of this thing. If I make this full height, a lot of the design ends up unseen. For this reason, I'm scaling down the entire thing even further, so the dimensions will be 2.60m in width, by 1.94m in height; approximately two thirds of the original dimensions. It's unfortunate that I need to scale it down so much, but unless I want to remove the table completely and build a table and monitors into my bed instead, I don't really have much of an option there. On the bright side, less materials to use...

I also visited the printing store and made a few queries in regards to print sizes and prices. Unfortunately, they don't print in something big enough for one piece, so I need to split my design into three, horizontally (ie, full width, so it's split by height). Got a vector of the design, so I just need to put it on a flash drive and go back. Either I'll get it done tomorrow, or early next month, as I'll be flying without any days off after tomorrow for about 4 or 5 days.

EDIT: Okay, now that I made that random and not-so-serious comment about removing the table and having monitors and peripherals built into the foot of my bed, I've actually started looking into that. This may be a plausible endeavor. I shall do some research on this, but it seems quite possible to build some sort of frame that runs on castor wheels/rails under the bed, along with a vertical sliding mechanism that locks into place when raised, housing the monitors, and a fold-down board for a table with the keyboard/mouse.

Again, I'll have to look into this in a lot more detail, but I'm already liking this idea!

EDIT2:



Went to the print store today. Decided to go for the larger size to span the height of the wall, which brings it to 260cm. Cost 200 AED (55 USD) to print all five sections. To see how it would look in my room, I started sticking the different sections up:




I haven't put up the last two sections, as I need to sleep for a flight, but more photos will follow.

Already loving how this looks, and I almost feel bad that I will be cutting this up to use as the templates for the acrylic that will go in its place.

I've also decided to stick with the theme and name this the Pride of Hiigara.

I'm hoping to get the plywood and acrylic ordered by early next month.

[Kingy]

[Walfas]

Now....don't rip it.

In other news, I didn't know this was a Destiny-themed thing, heh. I've never actually played the game, but I've heard mixed things about it.

[hiigaran]

Nope, not Destiny. Hell, I don't even know what that's about (been out of touch with gaming since leaving Sweden). This is Homeworld. From all the way back in 1999.

Now....don't rip it.

I actually purchased one of those precision knives sets, so that I could make more accurate cuts than I could with scissors. Very cheap, too, so it was a worthwhile investment. Just used the knives in combination with my metal ruler, and I was able to easily trim the borders of each segment. The knives will come in handy once more when I start cutting the black parts out.

Anyway...

All five pieces are now up!



Now comes the fun part! Buying the acrylic, router, chamfer bit, and either a router table, or something I build myself. I'm probably not going to have any further updates until the 6th of October at the earliest though.

[Talifan9]

Wow.

[Ruthalas]

(postinf to subscribe)

This is fantastic! If you need any help, do let us know!

I vote for pipe over tubes, simply for the ability to maintain a given shape.
The angular design would look good too!