I would like to point out that the central group consisting of 6 heatpipes doesn’t really pierce the heatsink, but touches it only with its upper part. There are 42 additional short 60mm plates soldered to the bottom of these heatpipes that create an impression of a solid heatsink:

Not only this part of Thermalright AXP-140 cooler is soldered through. Every single contact is soldered, including the contact surface between the base plate and the heatpipes.

Moreover, all parts of the heatsink are nickel-plated:

As I have already mentioned above, the cooler boasts the highest quality of assembly. Unfortunately, we can’t say the same about the base – an Achilles heel of mot Thermalright coolers. The nickel-plated surface of the copper base plate is finished OK:

Its evenness, however, is far from ideal:

As you can see, there is a small bump in the center of the base plate that is also shifted a little to one side. You can see it even better from the thermal compound imprint left by the even CPU heat-spreader when the cooler was installed and fastened with its bundled retention:

Of course, this imprint cannot compare against impeccable imprints left by Scythe or Thermaltake coolers, but it is very decent for a Thermalright cooler, I have to say. That is why we didn’t make any manual improvements of our own this time. I would also like to add that the thinnest part of the copper nickel-plated base plate measures 2.1mm.