When the miner has all the necessary equipment, it needs to be installed somewhere and in this case the need for a frame arises. Anyone can buy a frame for video cards to order or make it themselves. In both cases, even if you choose the most expensive option, the financial costs will be small. But this design will ensure ideal air inflow and outflow to the equipment, which will significantly improve cooling. Often, the assembly of racks for video cards is done based on the equipment, its quantity and features, and therefore beginners are increasingly trying to assemble a frame for a mining farm with their own hands.
Farms often consist of 4-8 video cards. This depends on the miner's budget and the ability to connect GPUs to the selected motherboard. This determines the approximate dimensions of the frame. It’s clear that the frame for a mining farm with 6 or 8 video cards will be different. Some users don’t bother too much and just buy a housing for the farm. This is much simpler, but it costs more and the quality of the case is not always adequate. This often leads to burning out GPUs, constant crashes and other technical problems. Therefore, it is better to spend a few hours and assemble a suitable frame yourself.
How to properly assemble a frame for a mining rig?
There is nothing complicated in assembling a frame or housing for mining. All the miner needs for production:
- A sketch or drawing of a frame for a mining farm.
- A necessary tool.
- List of installed equipment and its dimensions.
Based on this, you need to take into account that below will be presented only the approximate dimensions of frames for mining farms or cases designed for installing medium-sized equipment on it.
The assembly process itself is very simple. The frame does not use the rigidity of the triangle, so to assemble individual units it is enough to have glue, and to measure distances - a regular ruler.
The future frame must consist of at least two shelves. The video cards will be located on the top, and the motherboard and power supply will be on the bottom. It is necessary to take into account that, according to safety requirements, the power supply must be grounded, that is, at least stand on a steel sheet or be attached to the frame using special connections, which you can ask in detail from sellers of electrical goods stores.
What digital currencies are worth mining on a home farm?
If you have a more budget mining farm, namely on a GPU, then you shouldn’t even talk about mining Bitcoin, since the complexity of the network is so high that you will only work at a loss. Hence the conclusion - you need to mine altcoins like Ethereum, Monero, etc.
If you want to get the cue ball, then, as they say, there are options:
- You can purchase ASIC devices specifically designed for its extraction, but in this case, be prepared to shell out a tidy sum, and then wait several months for your investment to pay off.
- The second option is mining altcoins on the GPU and instantly converting them into BTC using special services. This method cannot be called very profitable, but your income will be in cue balls.
- And finally, you can do cloud mining. You may not earn very much, but you won’t have to invest a lot of money, your expenses will quickly pay off, and problems with setting up and maintaining the equipment will not affect you at all.
Frame or body?
The answer to this question is obvious: definitely, for high-quality and comfortable mining you need a frame. The fact is that air circulation in the case is very poor, which leads to overheating of video cards, and sometimes to their failure. Motherboards with four or more PCI-Ex16 slots are expensive (from 50,000 rubles and above). You will overpay for components, you will have a lot of hassle, and in the end the video cards will simply break and you will incur considerable losses instead of the expected profit.
The frame, in turn, is an open type structure, where all the components of the truss are in a visible place. The air flow to such a truss is many times better than to the components in the housing, as a result of which greater productivity and service life of the truss are ensured.
Selecting material for assembling the frame
The frame can be assembled from various materials, however, the most technologically advanced are mining trusses made from steel profiles used in the installation of plasterboard and suspended ceilings.
The advantages of this material are:
- Lightweight and relatively durable material.
- The profile does not require treatment with special liquids and does not require painting.
- Ready-made holes for drilling and fastening - you just need to calculate the distance and pitch of the holes.
Also suitable for the manufacture of steel and aluminum blanks, as well as homemade wooden structures. A mining frame made of aluminum or steel is more expensive to manufacture and requires some rather specific tools. In addition, special dielectric spacers are needed for the motherboard. The risers have a rubber sole on the bottom, they can be installed like this, the power supply also does not require additional insulation, but you cannot place the motherboard directly on metal strips.
A wooden frame is easier to manufacture, the material is cheaper, and the only tools you need are a hammer and nails, although it is better to use self-tapping screws. However, it is worth considering that when using a wooden mining frame, the video cards will heat up faster.
Wood blocks are wider and more voluminous, which will make air circulation a little more difficult. Also, wood, given direct contact with heated elements, must be treated with special fire-resistant impregnations or fire-resistant paint, and before that, among other things, also with a special impregnation against rotting. But, if your mining farm is located in a residential well-heated and ventilated room, then it is not necessary to protect it from dampness.
A working GPU rig already dries and heats up the air quite a lot, by the way, this is another reason why it is not advisable to place it directly in the bedroom. Not only are the video cards noisy, but the microclimate will be like in the desert. However, everyone can decide for themselves where to install a mining farm.
Why not buy
Someone may ask: “Why should I know how to assemble a mining rig if I can purchase a ready-made version?” We don’t deny that trading platforms sell customized turnkey solutions that you just need to connect to a power outlet, the Internet, start the system, and earn income, but this is also not as easy as trading. But ready-made rigs are always more expensive, and almost no one will give a guarantee on them. There is a chance that you will end up with bad equipment, poor quality assembly, or even a virus in the system.
Dimensions and drawing of a frame for a truss of 6 cards
In order to make a mining frame for 6-7 video cards, you will need
- 7 meters of aluminum corner 15x15 mm, thickness 1.2 mm.
- Electric drill, M4 metal drill and hand saw.
- Bolts and nuts 24 pieces
Cut 5 pieces of 70 cm, 6 of 35 cm and 4 of 30 cm. Assemble them according to the sketch. First we assemble the bottom. We take 3 planks: 70 cm, 35 cm and 30 cm, fasten them at an angle. To ensure that the corners do not move apart when drilling, and the holes completely coincide, use a piece of wooden board as a stop. Place any dielectric on the bottom and place the motherboard and blocks on it.
Lastly, we install the bar for the raisers; we attach it at a distance of 12 cm from the top of the frame. Fans are installed at the back for blowing (120mm or 140mm, or you can blow with a floor-mounted household fan).
When making a frame from other materials, the dimensions will be the same. The advantages of aluminum corner over other materials for making frames are obvious:
- Aluminum does not corrode, as a result of which it retains its appearance for a long time.
- Cooling of video cards in such an aluminum frame is much better than in a wooden one.
- Aluminum is easier to process than steel or other similar material, however, it has all the advantages of the latter.
The process of manufacturing the frame itself is quite simple and consists of assembling it from an aluminum corner with fasteners using special rivets and bolted connections.
Additionally, to complete the manufacture of the farm, you must purchase:
- Corners for fans.
- Self-tapping screws.
- Spacer rings.
- Power button.
The cost of assembling the frame, taking into account the purchase of all additional consumables, will be about 2,000 rubles.
There is a second option for manufacturing a frame with the following dimensions:
- Width 30 cm.
- Length 60 cm.
- Height 30 cm.
The manufacturing process of such a frame is no different from the previous one. The dimensions of the frame differ only due to the location of the components of the farm: motherboard, video cards, power supply unit(s), hard drive and RAM.
Comparison of video cards
You can start earning cryptocurrency using simple video cards or using special devices. Comparative characteristics and average cost are given in the table:
| No. | Video card, marking, type of RAM | Price, rub | hash/s |
| 1 | 11Gb GIGABYTE GV-N108TAORUS X-11GD | 60259 | 652.957 |
| 2 | 8Gb GIGABYTE GV-N1080D5X-8GD-B | 42041 | 415.141 |
| 3 | 6Gb Palit GTX1060 Super JetStream | 22656 | 269.138 |
| 4 | 6Gb ASUS EX-GTX1060-O6G | 27561 | 269.138 |
| 5 | 4Gb GIGABYTE GV-N105TD5-4GD | 10861 | 147.753 |
| 6 | 4Gb Sapphire 11256-21 RADEON RX 470 | 21138 | 263.277 |
| 7 | 3Gb Palit GTX1060 Dual GeForce GTX1060 | 15766 | 257.030 |
| 8 | 3Gb ASUS DUAL-GTX1060-O3G GeForce GTX1060 | 19503 | 257.030 |
| 9 | 2Gb ASUS RX560-O2G RADEON RX 560 | 8350 | 115.394 |
| 10 | 2Gb ASUS RX550-2G RADEON RX 550 | 6832 | 70.055 |
As can be seen from the table, the performance of video cards depends mainly on the RAM and model. Lightweight devices lag significantly behind their full-weight counterparts in performance.
Dimensions and drawing of a frame for a truss of 8 cards
The mining frame of 8 video cards has the following dimensions:
- 80 cm long.
- 40 cm wide.
- 33cm high truss
The manufacturing process is similar to assembling a frame for 6 video cards. The tool is similar, as will be described below. Again, the frame may have slightly different dimensions depending on the placement of the truss components on the frame.
Before manufacturing, the miner needs to make a sketch on paper and decide on the placement of the power supply, motherboard and video cards on the structure itself. With the proper approach to this process, you can save on material by reducing the size of the structure. But it's better not to do this. The cost of the frame is negligible in relation to the cost of computing equipment, and if you have found the money for 6 or even 8 video cards and other components, then spend a little more and assemble a large frame, it is best that there is room for one or two more graphics cards adapter in case you want to increase the power of your rig. The main thing is that there is somewhere to put it in the room.
Assembly tools
It is clear that to manufacture either a frame or a body, you will need a tool. If the choice fell on a structure made of aluminum or steel, you will need the following tool:
- Bulgarian.
- Drill.
- Screwdriver or riveter.
- A needle file or a file.
Without this tool, high-quality assembly of a frame or frame for a truss is impossible. If you can’t buy a tool, you can find it from your roommate or a friend. If you are assembling a metal frame, then use rivets or bolts with nuts to connect the planks.
A self-tapping design will be less durable. In addition, when installing or removing components, you may be injured by sharp edges. But for assembling a wooden frame, self-tapping screws are ideal.
Short iron corners will help make the structure as reliable as possible, but you can use glue and nails. The main thing is that the frame is stable and you do not experience any inconvenience when servicing the rig.
Don’t forget that the components need to be regularly blown out and, if necessary, additionally cleaned of accumulated dust. The main thing is that the equipment is well ventilated and does not short out . Happy mining!
