• Welcome to Overclockers Forums! Join us to reply in threads, receive reduced ads, and to customize your site experience!

Hose size and head pressure.

Overclockers is supported by our readers. When you click a link to make a purchase, we may earn a commission. Learn More.

Kenski

Registered
Joined
Jul 30, 2002
Location
Brisbane Australia
Have the Innovatek set 5 W/c setup, seems ok but as an inveterate tweaker/fiddler what impact could I expect from changing from:
Stock kit in full tower case with rad mounted in upper rear of case (innovaradi or some such name) which fits well, with a switched 120cfm 120mm Sunon fan and ehiem 1048 pump in the bottom of the case, from pump to top rad outlet is nearly 800mm,
To:
Pump and rad the same but have enough room in the case to mount the pump behind the Psu so that waterblock pump and rad would all be at the same height, (within 100mm anyway) wiyh the waterblock being the lowest, then plumb pump to rad, rad to block, block to res/pump, since this would need pulling apart the system an upgrade to 3/8 (10mm) hose as well.

Reading a few posts here about flow speed and turbulence also, has there been any experiments done with differing hose sizes in and out of block/rad to create more speed or turbulence in the water, like a venturi effect or is there not enough flow to notice a difference ?
I know I could buy a better rad/block/pump etc but the fitted kit looks really neat and professional (suprised me too) and performs well enough just like to get the most out of it.
 
Many of your questions have long been debated and no answers (or proof :)) that satisfy anyone have been found or posted that I know of.

But- there are a few things that are usually agreed on by all parties ;)

Elevation changes between components that are in a closed loop (no bong or fishtank cooling!) AND inside a case will have very little impact on performance: once the loop is flowing it is pretty much a non-issue. Even externally mounted closed systems don't seem to be impacted much.

Shorter tubing lengths help as long as you do not add restriction in shortening the runs of tube.

Here is where some debate starts cropping up ;)
(Many European water coolers use small 10mm tube and 90s out the yin-yang for the look they want, and maintain that higher flow rates and stronger pumps don't help.)

Every fitting in the system will add some more restriction- 90s are worse than 45s which aren't as bad as a straight through coupling, etc.
A tighter bend radius restricts flow more.
Bigger tube flows better.
A water block will perform better with a higher flow rate: a very restrictive system may show little improvement however....the entire system has to be well matched to achieve the best results.

As far as experimentation is concerned, many have done it and not all agree ;)

Personally, I have tried a Koolance CPU200g block with the normal 10mm OD tube, 3/8" ID tube and 1/2" ID tube.
Performance was MUCH better with the 1/2" tubing. In fact, it really wasn't bad.

I have run a Swiftech 462 block for a couple of years I think, and I did try a few mods on it- one was to change barbs.
I used 1/2", 3/8" and 1/4" OD for both inlet and outlet:
My best results are with the 1/4" inlet and 1/2" outlet. Results are only slightly better than the stock block, but it is there.

Anything you do to decrease restriction will help: larger tube, bigger barbs, shorter tube lengths. Another thing that could help is another fan on your radiator: push/pull will improve the heat transfer there.

Just how much these things will help your system, I do NOT really know: from my experience I would guesstimate that at LEAST 2c and maybe as much as 8c.
Some folks that I have ....had discussions with in the past would say that it won't make it any better at all.
 
Thanks for all the great info, looks like an increase in hose size and the shorter routing from a top mounted pump may be the way to go, have a reasonable amount of room in the top of the case so I should be able to run the hoses with gentle bends and no elbows or other fittings apart from where they hook up to components.
As I havn't always done before I'll take some serious note of temps and post the results when I'm done, had fans and temp sensors everywhere on my air cooled setup, now have remote sensors for:
air temp case intake,
air temp rad out,
under block cpu,
water block out,
rad out,
rad in,
reservoir.
So if any improvement are to be had I should be able to tell where the extra flow has done the most good.
Thanks again.:)
 
May as well record temps here so 1. everyone can have a look and 2. I have a record of them that won't get binned when wife cleans up :D
A7v8x bios 1012, Xp2600 @ 2362 1.8v vcore with active mosfet cooling.

Air sensors:
Front case intake = 23.5c
Radiator fan intake = 26.8c
Radiator exhaust = 29.2c

Water sensors:
Radiator in = 29.2c
Radiator out = 28.3c
Water Block out = 29.5c

Hardware sensors:
Cpu temp = 39.4c
Socket temp = 36.1c
Water sensors strapped to hoses and insulated with cork/rubber tape (AC insulation tape)
Cpu probe is under the water block bent so that it touches where the copper core meets the cpu core.
Socket temp is on the back of the mobo in the centre of the socket.
Not 100% accurate, but pretty close,
Compared to the board hardware readings of:
System 21c
socket 49c
diode 30c
with Mbm 5.3.3.0 ( it can only read what the sensors give)

Still believe Hardware monitoring chip/ bios readings ?
Some are good, some are waaay out.:eek:
 
rogerdugans, i've got a koolance CPU200g also,... how the hell do you run 1/2 tubes with that thing?


cause under load i get like 60 celcius in my current setup.... it really ****es me off....


but i'm pretty content already with the oc i'm getting outta it,... so....

at 2.2v vcore, i get 2.5ghz....
 
:)
When I ran the CPU200g with 1/2" tubing, all I did for my temporary test was use tubing of increasing size slipped over each other and clamped with steel hose clamps for safety.
The tubes out of the block were about 3" long, 2" piece of 3/8" ID tube over that and then the 1/2" ID tubing.
The 1/2" tubing should go on far enough to cover at least 1" of the smallest tube and be clamped there- NOT extremely tight as that will restrict the ID even more! Just snug enough that the clamp will not move around should be good.
With a smaller pump (IE Eheim 1048 or similar) clamps may not be needed but......

That is currently the way I am adapting my FCT block to 3/8 tube as well.

Once I have a few bucks to spare I will be coming up with a better solution- I believe that copper tube fittings (solder connections) are available to change sizes to what I/we need; they would get the hose clamped on just like a barb, except one side is 1/4" the other is 1/2". Worst case: they don't have a fitting that does that big a jump and two adapters need to be soldered together. :)
 
Finished the hose upgrade from 8mm id to 10mm id with thicker walls, no elbows or other fittings just gentle bends, flow increase was noticable when bleeding, the air bubbles travelling along the hoses much much faster.
Temps dropped by 3c at the Cpu probe (or 3c less "delta" Cpu - ambient) while the block to water temp remained around 10c, I measured .3c drop there, the biggest difference was at the radiator, air in to air out difference jumped a full 2c so that was the component that benefited most from the extra flow.
Also the previous readings were taken with the radiator fan at low speed (around 60cfm) which I ran all the time as there was only .5c benefit by running it at 120cfm, which I thought a little low given it's a 38mm thick unit with twice the static pressure of a 25mm one, with the increased flow however low/ high fan speed difference has jumped another 2.2c giving me a total drop of 3.7c,
now I have the best of both worlds, 37c Cpu @23c room and quiet, and as the room temps increase in the summer months the Digitaldoc5 switches the fan to high when the Cpu temp rises above 40c, with a little more noise but not the objectionable whine of a High speed air Hsf.
Now have great cooling and low noise:D :D

Ps: "die temp" is 26c or 3c above ambient Wow! my watercooling is really good......and I believe in Santa............and there are elves at the bottom of the garden.............:p
 
Last edited:
Back