Publish date: 2025-11-05

K3s Cluster Homelab

Overview

This is a project I wanted to work on for some time now. Creating my own Kubernetes cluster, starting with k3s and moving onto kubeadm later! To start with my first node and control plane, I'm using a Macbook Pro Mid-2012 system with Ubuntu 24.04 installed. As of November 1st, 2025, it has 2GB RAM and a 500GB HDD.

The end-goal is to add a few more nodes and use this cluster to learn K8s networking, Persistent Volumes, and Cluster administration. And to also use Pi-Hole ;)

Why k3s? It's not as resource-heavy as other cluster managers. Lightweight enough to run on a Raspberry Pi. But as soon as I upgrade the RAM, I'll probably move to MicroK8s

Nodes

Control Plane: Macbook Pro, Mid-2012
- OS: Ubuntu 24.04
- RAM: 2GB ~Upgraded~> 16GB DDR3
- Storage: 500GB HDD ~Upgraded~> 240GB SSD
- CPU: Some Intel i5 2.5Ghz
GPU Node: Custom-Built PC
- OS: Fedora Workstation 43
- RAM: 32GB
- Storage: 3x 2TB NVMe
- CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7800x3D
- GPU: RTX 4070 Ti Super

Running Deployments

Pi-hole
Nvidia Runtime Class for MLOps workloads, still needs testing
MetalLB: To give LoadBalancer services a Private IP address on my network
Prometheus + Grafana: Metrics and monitoring dashboards for the cluster
Git Runners with Action Runner Controller (ARC): Now I can access private IPs on my network thanks to self-hosting the runners!
Catus Locatus App
ArgoCD
Velero: Cluster backups to AWS S3
ExternalDNS: Manages my AWS Route53 DNS by adding subdomains I specify in my Ingress objects.
Cert-Manager: Manages my SSL certificates for mTLS communication in the cluster

YAML Manifests

Manifests I use can be found in here: https://github.com/aliAljaffer/homelab

Photo updates

UPDATES Mar. 10, 2026

Cert Manager + ExternalDNS in Action

All my ingresses:

Get a Private IP (Thanks to MetalLB)
Are assigned a DNS record on my domain (Thanks to ExternalDNS)
Get SSL certificates and communicate over HTTPS (Thanks to cert-manager)

Accessing my applications becomes easier!

UPDATES Nov. 17, 2025

A new toy in town: ArgoCD

We're up and functional! Really enjoyed getting to know this tool and I can immediately feel the benefits of it.

UPDATES Nov. 8, 2025

Self-hosted GitHub Action Runners!

Ran my first workflow to build and deploy THIS website on a Kubernetes pod! :)

RAM upgrade! 2GB -> 16GB

UPDATES Nov. 6, 2025

New node!

New node specs:
- OS: Fedora Workstation 43
- CPU: AMD 7800x3D
- Memory: 32GB
- GPU: RTX 4070 Ti Super
- Tainted with gpu=nvidia to run exclusively for ML workloads
Prometheus + Grafana Monitoring stack with External IP using MetalLB for Grafana
Pi-hole now runs its service as NodePort

Grafana Control Plane Monitoring

UPDATES Nov. 5, 2025

Pi-Hole

Upgrades

Before SSD upgrade

After: SSD upgraded, thermal paste changed

Cluster is ready! 😊

Text Updates

2026-03-10: (dns) I installed ExternalDNS and Cert Manager - now my apps are managed under my domain with TLS :)

2025-11-08: (ram) Ram arrived, works wonderfully!

2025-11-07: (nodes) Added new Node running Fedora, 32GB RAM, AMD 7800x3D, and RTX 4070 Ti Super for ML workloads (tainted)

2025-11-06: (pihole) Pi-Hole is running and blocking! :)

2025-11-05: (os) Purchased a Kingston 240GB SSD off Amazon, installed Ubuntu 24.04 LTS!

2025-11-01: (ram) Well. One of the RAM sticks is causing the system to crash on boot. Time for new ones. Ordered 2x8GB DDR3 sticks.

2025-11-01: (start) Journey starts! Acquired this old Macbook from my sister. i5 2.5Ghz, 4GB RAM, and a WD Blue 500GB HDD.