A different kind of project.

[Fire$torm]

The thought of having a computer sitting in a non-regular room on concrete has been bothering me since I caught this max credit bug. So when the chance came to use some Lowes plastic money, well.......

I used PVC piping for several reasons. First it is super easy to cut using a ratcheted hand cutter. Two, it cannot rust like every steel storage unit I've ever seen. 3rd, if it gets wet, say from minor flooding, it will NOT conduct electricity.

It took me longer to come up with a proper design then it did to build the thing. That's because the one thing that took a bit to figure out was the amount of tubing the different connectors used up when inserting piping. Turns out all the connectors eat up the same amount. So then it was just a matter of calculating the lengths for the straight sections.

BTW: Although it doesn't look it, this project used up 48+ FEET of 1" PVC pipe. The piping comes in 10 ft lengths and when I was cutting off pieces for the various sections I just winged it when trying to minimize waste. I was lucky in that at the end of 4 of 5 10' pipes I had less then 2" of waste each. Make a bad cut (didn't follow the rule: measure twice, cut once) and ended up with 10 inches wasted. Still not bad as I've only done PVC plumbing work once before in my life....

So here are the pics.




Note: One minor goof happened when attaching the section. The unit is a "closed system" when finished, The problem with closed mechanical systems is that air does not compress well. This did not occur to me until afterwards so looking at the front view, top left, you will notice that section angles to the left slightly. If only I had I drilled a 1/4" hole somewhere......

[DrPop]

F$, that looks really cool! Awesome idea, I like the vertical stacking. When my income doubles and I can afford the electric on another rig , I would seriously think about doing something like this.

[Mike029]

That is awesome... Very cool way to hold the boxes. Can't wait to see the next few builds go up the same way.

[John P. Myers]

I like it Much better than wooden shelving too that would restrict airflow from the sides. Very nice

[saiz]

It seems to be a nice idea. I'm curious about if PVC pipe can do something to cut down noise caused by resonance.

[Fire$torm]

It seems to be a nice idea. I'm curious about if PVC pipe can do something to cut down noise caused by resonance.

Compared to metal shelving? YES! Also it is possible to fill the PVC unit with some kind of material like say sand or expanding foam spray sealant to improve sound dampening. Although sand would add considerable weight and the spray sealant would require adding it as the unit is being assembled which would increase build time. Also you would have to let the spray cure for a day or so before closing up the unit or risk the shelving blowing apart from the trapped gas buildup......

[Slicker]

I use an old metal server rack that had the (older?) Sun (round hole) railes on it. It has metal corner brackets to support 3 plywood wood shelves to eliminate the electrical conductivity issue and 1/4" closed foam padding (think wetsuit material) under each computer to dampen vibrations and absorb noise. It holds 2 PCs per shelf for a total of 6 computers. There is also a 10" 110v fan mounted on the top of the rack. I removed a drop ceiling panel so it blows the hot air into the space between the drop ceiling and 1st floor subfloor which wams the hardwood floor in the kitchen which is quite nice in winter. In summer, I just remove the drop ceiling panel next to it so that the air can be excape back into the basement. They guy who gave me the rack included a door with a lexan window for the front, so that also cuts down on the noise. The rack sits on 1/4" plywood strips so it is off the floor to protect it from rusting should the basement ever leak and to separate it from the tile floor and eliminate any condensation rust marks from the rack's feet.