#buildingpc

Okay... Where was I?

Yes, I had all the parts and was ready to go, all I needed was time and motivation.

About a month later (Okay, one part of that is I like to have spare time to do things, The other was recovering from my sight being wonky after finding out I have type 2 Diabetes)... I manged to sit down and start to bend pipe using this heat "gun" to bend the pipe. It not too bad to use (I had raise it up on books to use it, and not mind the hot air being blasted into my chest. The hardest part I found was getting the silicon insert to go into the pipe. After taking some diffent points of advice from youtube (liquid soap, Soapy water, sanding the insert) I managed to get it to work. Now, I will say this, bending hard tube is remarkably easy, getting it to fit, that is the biggest challange.

I free-bend the pipe in the end, I did conceptulize what bends I would need and where using pipe cleaners and drawing out a guide (which I did use on the pipe from the graphics card to the drain and to the pump), but found it quicker to eyeball the bend and plan my bends by putting the pipe in the system and going from there (fun fact: it is easier to insert the silicon insert back into the pipe when you have a bend in it, at least it was for me). The only things I will add on bending pipe:

If muck up the bend, resist the urge to thow it away, sometimes that bend can end up useful elsewhere or can be adjusted with counter-bends.

It is better to overcut than it is to undercut, it helps in the fitting process, believe me.

It is better to under-bend than to over-bend, which makes sense with the next point.

PETG CAN FLEX! That last bend was 1-2 milimeter out? Don't panic! Put some light pressure on the pipe and it will go in (unless you undercut, in that case, start over or see if you can add some slack)

"Long pipe is easier than short pipe" would not make sense right? "All I need is one bend in a short piece of pipe and then I am home free" right? until you realise that the flex in PETG is proportional to the length of the pipe.

Sandpaper is handy to have when using a chamfer tool. it helps remove the chatter and burrs left behind.

Research is important! I don't think I would of got this project of mine done without it, JayzTwoCents has good advice, along with these Videos I found were helpful.

That was it with hard tubing, in the end, it was not that bad of an experience, the only other thing would be to spend the money and get mayhems Blitz to clean out your radiators and the loop. It is worth the trouble, I assure you.

The only problems I had with it was routing all the cables in the tower (I can see the point of using a full tower with water cooling now.), and a faulty power supply, the computer powered up fine, but, whenever I put some load on the graphics card, the computer would turn off. So I bought a new power supply, found out that the new PSU was LONGER, but, it worked fine with the new power supply. So I had to remove the Hard drive cage to fit it in (sigh), problem, one of the screws was under the water pump, so, I had to drain the system, remove some pipe, unscrew the pump to remove the cage to install the power supply (groan). After going though all this annoyance, I decided to replace the flow meter which was working fine when I tested it initally, kept sticking with the coolant, which was odd, but, as I read, it was better to not have it, so, I removed it.

I did also have a red light strip initally, but thought it might be best to shift it over to the right side of the case so I would have light leaking out instead this bright red light. Might of worked. . . if the wires didn't fray and filled the room with the smell of burning plastic.

So, I now have a working computer! Which is a big black and red glowing monstrosity. It was fustrating at the time, but, I must confess it was fun. At the moment, I am fighting the *urge* to shift it into a bigger tower and add another graphics card. probably down the track... Maybe.

I have the complete computer up in PC part Picker if you want to have a look, or come from there (Hi!) to read my rant on tumblr

I'm not a computer expert by any means but for anyone that wants to learn a little bit about building a PC then check out my presentation.