Artificer & Neophyte

[ADAM LCS TT]

[Tom Freeman]

Hi everyone, excited to announce we're competing in 2024 Thermaltake CaseMOD Academy as team Artificer & Neophyte.

My name's Tom, a software engineer from Birmingham with a long history of building PCs and having competed in Thermaltake's modding competitions before and my apprentice is James who's never built a PC, but is a dab-hand with an airbrush and an avid fan of all things Warhammer!

First off, let's go through the list of parts:

CPU: Intel 14700k
RAM: Thermaltake 2x16GB Toughram XG RGB D5
MB: ASUS ROG Strix Z-790F Gaming WiFi II
GPU: Zotac RTX 4070
SSD: Samsung 2TB 990 Pro
PSU: Thermaltake 1200W Toughpower GF A3
Water cooling: Thermaltake Pacific Tough C360 DDC Hard Tube Liquid Cooling Kit

We will also be doing a reveal of Jay's choice of Thermaltake case, so stay tuned for that.

Additionally we have some vouchers to spend at Praetex Design, so will fire up a copy of Fusion and get some designs made up from Jay's sketches.

Thank you so much to all our sponsors, Thermaltake, Intel, Asus, NVidia, Zotac, Samsung and Scan Computers.

Looking forward to sharing our updates as the build progresses and Jay has some great ideas of what he wants to incorporate into it.

Best of luck to all the other teams as well!

Tom & Jay

[Jfez]

Hello everyone, I’m Jay the apprentice (or Neophyte) of Artificer and Neophyte and with Tom’s able guidance and assistance I shall be designing and building our custom gaming rig.

Firstly I’d just like to thank all the sponsors, Thermaltake, Intel, Asus, NVidia, Zotac, Samsung and Scan Computers.

As Tom mentioned in the previous post I’m a big fan of all forms of gaming and have a particular passion for Warhammer. I've played/collected both Warhammer 40,000 and Warhammer Fantasy/Age of Sigmar for almost 20 years. With the upcoming release of Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 and my passion for Warhammer I thought it would be apt to theme the build around the aesthetic of the Imperium of man and Space Marines.

Below is a somewhat brief overview of my research and idea’s so far.

The first decision was pretty easy, which Space Marine chapter would represent my PC? The Ultramarines are the poster boys of the Space Marines. Adorning the Space Marine codex cover and starring in Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2.  So it was an easy choice to go with the boys in blue. 

 

Space Marines also have very distinct heraldry and markings. Firstly the standard across all chapters the imperial eagle, Aquila, hazard striping, skulls (so many skulls) and purity seals but also the more distinct markings of the Ultramarines. The chapter badge and various tactical markings. I think these could be used to great visual effect on the case of the PC.  The XIII legion of Ultramarines being a particular favourite of mine.

 

 

Space Marine vehicles particularly caught my attention when thinking of my build.  Space Marine vehicles are boxy, heavily armoured, impractical and I love them. Rivets, armour panels, vents, viewing ports and cables. All of these feel like great ideas that can be incorporated into my design.

 

I hope the above gives you a brief insight into my plans for this custom build, Hopefully I can do my vision justice and I’m sure with Tom’s help we can create something impressive.

Thanks for reading.

Jay.

They shall be my finest warriors, these men who give of themselves to me. Like clay I shall mould them, and in the furnace of war forge them. They will be of iron will and steely muscle. In great armour shall I clad them and with the mightiest guns will they be armed. They will be untouched by plague or disease, no sickness will blight them. They will have tactics, strategies and machines so that no foe can best them in battle. They are my bulwark against the Terror. They are the Defenders of Humanity. They are my Space Marines and they shall know no fear.
~The Emperor of Mankind, on the Creation of the Space Marines
 

[ADAM LCS TT]

Love the updated content guys, this build should be sweeeeet 

[Tom Freeman]

This week we shared the roadmap for our build for the 2024 Thermaltake CaseMOD Academy.

 

Steps 1-4 will give us our basic build, with Step One - Case Mod well underway, with Jay disassembling the case and preparing the surface ready to paint with various grades of sandpaper.

 

Once that's completed we can wait for a decent day (not too humid) to start painting it, have a bunch of different paints to experiment with and see what works out with a matte clearcoat over the top and check durability, alongside some of the RC paint I've used before.

 

Steps 5-8 will be stretch goals if Jay feels confident progressing and has time to complete them. More information will be shared on later steps if and when we reach them.

Thanks again to the sponsors Thermaltake UK Thermaltake Technology Inc Intel ASUS ZOTAC NVIDIA GeForce United Kingdom Samsung and Scan Computers UK

[Jfez]

Hi everyone. 

Jay here with a weekend update from things from my end. This week me and Tom got together and Tom oversaw and advised me on our test build. Tom will do a post updating you with this as he took all the pictures of my work.

Firstly here is a link to our instagram account.

You’ll find more frequent sneak peeks of the project on the above.

So once the test build was completed and out the way, I stripped down the case and started on the hard work of preparation for painting. I spent a nice afternoon while the kids played in the paddling pool keying the surface of the Thermaltake CTE E600 MX. This is a fairly straightforward process but quite daunting since it's such a nice case and I’d rather not ruin it. 😄

 

I will give the case another final pass with a finer grain of sandpaper but there are other things that must be done first to the case which I will keep quiet about for now.

The other part of this week alongside my research into materials and planning was spending my evenings learning CAD on Fusion 360.  

I have experience using software packages mainly the Adobe suite, using Premiere and Photoshop but have never tried my hand at Fusion 360.  Tom pointed me in the direction of an excellent series of tutorial videos on Youtube and I have been working my way through them. 

I really enjoy using the software as daunting as it looks at first, it is very intuitive and I’m really enjoying the process. This process should enable me to design some of the key aspects of my case design. Below are a handful of the things I’ve created while following the tutorials so far.

Hopefully the weather stays strong and I can get outside to continue with the work to provide another update next week.

Thanks always for taking the time to read this. 

Jay
 

 

[ADAM LCS TT]

Fantastic and detailed build logs guys. its great to follow along 

[Jfez]

Hello again.

This week's update features a fair bit more preparatory work on the Thermaltake CTE E600 MX.

One of the modifications to the case I wanted to make involved doing a bit of cutting. Luckily Tom owns a Dremel and was willing to trust me to use it. 

     

 

This was my first time using a Dremel or cutting metal so it was quite daunting at first but following Tom's advice (keep the speed slow, take your time and wear the safety gear!) I managed to get the vents cut out fairly easily.. 

This was a big but necessary step towards the next part of the project. I sanded down the newly cut edges and gave the case another run over with a finer grade of sandpaper ready for the next steps.

The cutting out of some of the vents gave me left over parts for another job. 

Using my cut out spare parts I did a test spray of some of the paints we are going to use on the project. Just to make sure the paint looks as I expect and also that there are no issues with the paint when I start spraying the actual case.

Luckily everything went to plan so I can look forward to the next steps. Getting the case prepped is key for me in these early weeks as British Summer is coming to an end soon and the daylight hours will be shorter and the weather less predictable (Is British weather ever predictable?)

 

I’ve also been carrying on with the fusion 360 tutorials in my spare time and started creating the case in fusion ready for some preparatory steps for future parts.

Thanks as always for taking the time to read this and I will see you next week for another update.

Jay

[Jfez]

This week saw small but important progress.

First the spraying of the base colour on the outer case. For this, Tom and I got together one day and took the case out into the garden to do some touch ups on the metallic paints from last week and laid down the blue on the outer case. This came out really nicely and sets us up for future painting.
 

    

Another job this week was a small but time consuming job. The Zotac Geforce RTX 4070 has lovely logos on the fans but the colours didn’t match the aesthetic I was thinking. Thus began the process of masking up the GPU, spraying and painting to get the look we wanted to achieve. I think this came out quite nicely as well. Although I’m still getting used to the idea of painting working components.  😄

  2    

Finally another job that seemed simple was drilling some holes in the back of the case for a secret project… let's call them speed holes for now. 

Being a bit of a noob to not only modding computers but just drilling metal in general this took a surprising amount of time to do. Luckily I had been provided with the right guidance on drill bits from Tom to help me along in this job. 

 

 

 

The rest of the week was spent doing more practice in Fusion 360 and drilling, sanding and applying screws on a part of the build which we think is particularly cool but we plan on keeping secret for a while longer.

With a list of jobs to do next week and a trip to the hardware store for supplies required we'll keep working towards our final vision.

Thanks as always for taking time to read.

 

Jay

[ADAM LCS TT]

Love this.... this a great build log update

[Jfez]

Hi there,

Another week flies by. Trying to keep doing bits here and there in between work and family life. This update is going to cover a few jobs I completed this week.

First job was to attach a mount onto the back of the case. The mount needed to be sanded and hit with a blast of etching primer before being primed to match the case.  This will be part of a side project we are currently working on behind the scenes, I expect we’ll have an update in the next week or two.
 

     

I also took advantage of working in a school with a full DT suite to use the band saw and cut my mesh to size.  Using the band saw was another new tool that I’ve never used before this project but it was quite straightforward and I had a DT teacher on hand to supervise me.
 

     

Luckily my measurements were all correct and as you can see below, the new vents seem to fit nicely.

    

The back vent required a bit more work that I’m more experienced in. So it was time to crack out my trusty airbrush and compressor to do some painting work.

   

Peeling off that masking was so satisfying. I’m really pleased with how it looks.

   

Finally while I had the airbrush out I applied some test gradients to the previous test vents I cut out. This will be the paint recipe I will use to try and create a nice gradient on the flat panels and provide some visual interest.
 

Next week will involve me ordering some more bits and bobs for the project and getting my paint on.  Airbrushing some gradients and adding the weathering and detailing to the case paint job. 

Thanks as always for reading.

Jay