"Build "Sabertooth Z77 vs a lump of wood

[steamboatbob]

this is a full case scratch build i have been doing for a few months which is building a case out of wood,

just a note i am not using any Vinyl stickers for this the whole build is done with real timber and paperbacked timber veneers, all from a local source. The timber selections i have are Jarrah "Dark Red" and Sheoak "Orange-Light Red" the veneer is mainly paperback Tasmainian Oak and i have 2 small offcuts of vrey thin timber burls which im saving for later to highlight something.

this is what i started with a 3000mm*90*90 sheoak log and a 1500*600*60mm Slab of Jarrah Burl



this is an idea of where im at right now
this is the front panel of the pc, motherboard tray and Mobo heat shield


this photo shows heat shield and cutouts progressed a little bit more but also showing XSPC raystorm cpu cooler with wooden look



and a few little photos to tease you with

case at the moment made from sheoak and jarrah



front of case showing the custom made resivoirs made from swiftech micro res cut in half


Custom made resivoirs


case internals




Reason why this takes so long to do is that every piece of veneer that i apply to the mobo heat shield takes around 24 hours to set under clamps and cutting out marking and making it right before it goes on is loads of fun


timber veneers i have to do the mobo heat shield and cooling blocks with


and as a side note i am taking time to do this one right, as money is a little tight and so is my spare time.

Cheers

BoB

[Zygomorphic]

Wonderful work! That is a really neat idea of using real wood for this case, I'm looking forward to seeing it completed! Take your time and do it right! 🙂

[Chino]

Loving the workmanship so far. 🙂

[kkn]

looking lovley.

[WeRNothiNg]

Dude that is going to be awesome.

[Lystfiskern]

Very nice - will be a nice build to follow. Excellent craftmanship Sir!

[steamboatbob]

thanks for the reply guys.

I must say though that i find it really wierd that not many people use the Sabertooth Z77 as a case mod board as it is so flexible a platform to change it asthetically. and to do so easily it was all of 8 screws on the back of the mobo that took to get it off.

[steamboatbob]

ok a bit of an update here

and the motherboard used in these pics is fried and is only used for measurements

[JonTEM]

Wow! And I thought that I was the only nut that was interested in building a case out of wood. I'm presently working on a new build using Texas Cedar, and just happened to come across your thread. I've worked wood before and I must say that doing what you are doing is not only hard; but, a great deal of work.

People who have never done anything like this really have little idea what's involved. To say that I am impressed is putting it mildly. Cudos dude!

On your reservoirs, are you going with a florescent color? Using water or a specialized type of coolant? That was a beautiful plank of wood showing the natural grain. Lovely! Also! Are you making a special handle for carrying? What do you estimate the finished weight will be?

[steamboatbob]

Thanks jontem

i definately agree about the workload, its an absolutely massive task doing this, but i really enjoy my workwork so im taking my time and making things right, and trust me i have heaps of offcuts of timber and veneer and bits that are just slightly the wrong size 🙂

with the reservoirs i am going down with no fluro colours on this build the internal lighting will be white and im thinking about some mayhems metalic white coolant to run this beastie

i will not be making a carrying handle as it weighs way too much at the moment and at a guess when everything is all installed it will weigh a heck of a lot aroiund the 20 kg mark the case itself right now with nothing installed is close to 7 kgs and there is heaps more work to be done like the top, doors ,PSU cover, drive cage etc and then all the watercooling bits and pieces as well. I dont believe that this case will be going anywhare except to the top of my desk unless some major corporation wants me to show off some hardware in it but i think i'm dreaming with that one 🙂


i will be using XSPC waterblocks as i can mod them to my liking with a bit of veneer and only the cpu and the GFX cards will be cooled

currently this is the system that will be going into the case it all resides in an antec 600 case which does the job for now the 2 GFX cards are sapphire 7970 oc 3gb ddr5 series 1 which has the black AMD pcb cpu is a I5 3570K and it all sits on a sabertooth Z77 Mobo with 16 gb of ram

the only real difference is that it will be watercooled and the H80 will dissapear and i will be getting some different harddrives and some real cable management will happen as well not the just shove it all in and hope it stays method like i have right now