A customized clear acrylic case with a frosty outlook and ‘cool lighting effects’. This case mod is the end result of what started as a vague idea that it might be interesting to run coolant through the side of the case.

A friend at work donated an old Plexiglas custom case he had from several years ago. This became the starting point for the modifications. One can tell this was different from most of the current clear plastic cases on the market now; for one thing, the entire front bay assembly has to be removed to install drives. Only part of the side panel opens, and this swings on clear plastic hinges. There were no slot covers on the rear, so I made some clear covers that attach to a couple of brushed aluminum slot covers. While the I/O port cover might fit in the rear opening, it would not snap in, and even if it did, it left too much of a gap to attach cables, so was left open. One construction challange I had to deal with was that the case had numerous 90 mm fan openings in the front, side, top and rear of the case.

Layers of 1/4” plastic sheet were cut to the various shapes and built up in layers glued with ‘general-purpose plastic glue’ from the plumbing section of Lowes. This gives a slightly milky appearance and may have tiny air bubbles unless you use spring clamps to compress them or force them out between the layers. For most of the work, I would cut out the rough shape using a band saw. To shape the icicles along the bottom edges and cut openings in the center of the shapes, I used a Dremel tool with a high-speed rotary cutter bit. By building up several layers of 1/4” acrylic sheet and carving the edges with irregular scallops and gullies, I can create an icy-looking surface that will catch and diffuse the lights in the case. Feet were created with four layers of 1/4” plastic, which was then carved to create an appearance of many thiner layers. Once these were glued to the bottom of the case, holes were drilled from the inside and wide-angle blue LEDs held in the holes
with a blob of hot glue.

Illumination of the waterfall and coolant hoses comes from two 15” ultraviolet tubes attached behind the front of the case, and a third 12” tube at the rear. To create a rippling water appearance, I carved grooves into the top of a disk of 1/4” plastic then heat-polished the surface. Light from blue and cyan LEDs mounted under the disk is distorted as the disk rotates on a tiny gear motor. Sifting through my cyan LEDs, I found three that had a distinctive green tint which I mounted behind the Power Switch on the front.

System Board: ECS 570 SLIT-A
CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo 6300
RAM: 1 GB Patriot 3200
Video: EVGA nVidia 8500 GT 256MB
HDD: Samsung 250GB SATA
Optical: Samsung DVD-RW (painted metallic-flake silver)
Card Reader: USB (painted metallic-flake silver)
Hard Drive Cooler: Thermaltake (brushed aluminum)
CPU cooler: Danger Den
Speakers: Computer Expressions Penguin Speakers (modified)
Radiator: Swiftech Blue
Cooling Pump: Danger Den DDPDDC
Waterfall Pump: unknown (salvage)
Fans: Silverstone white 12cm
Case: Unknown make (salvage)

Detailed engraving with mixed styles