The Reactor (TM) Water-Cooler

Im building a large centralized water-cooler and I could REALLY use some input on it. Because of all the pics I cant post the design in its entirety here but you can find it and all the pics .here.
This is my first WC project and im going kind of overkill. Let me know what everyone things.

Looks impressive.
Are you going to build it all by yourself?

Now to the finer points:
0.118" thickness of the acrylic circles seems to be too thin IMHO.
It will be very hard to drill, thread and support barbs without cracking the plastic.
Also would be interesting to know what kind of spliters you're planning to using.

A few questions and observations:

Why do you think you need antifreeze? You aren't chilling your water.

I would use larger tubing for most of your system. With that much flow restriction... especially with 3 rads in series, you'll need to maximize flow wherever you can.

$110 in pump budget could get you a better brand than Danner. You could get an equally powerful Iwaki off Ebay for that much. The mag-18 is not rated for pressure applications. You would likely do better with a 400GPH Iwaki.

Looking for a bit of style I found Braided Stainless Water Flex - 1/2"od x 1/2"od x 36" tube for the outlets $18+shipping

Click to expand...

You realize that 1/2" OD is different than 1/2" ID, yes?

Your fans are a good brand, but I am wondering why you will run them at 24v. Is it for silence? It strikes me as somewhat odd to design a system with so much 'power' and also worry about noise.

Fan filters... You'll *really* need to make sure your case is as airtight as possible if you intend to filter the incoming air at a spot that is offset from your fans. That's a pretty hard thing to do, especially with wood.

All in all... a very ambitious project. I'd love to see this complete, it should look quite 'cool'. Best of luck to you.

Well I was running anti to keep corrosion to a minimum, those fans push nearly 300 CFM, Im running them at 24v because 150 CFM is more than adequate. They are for aestetics to a degree and they are cheap.

How would you reccomend increasing the pipes? I mean, most watercooling stuff is 1/2" OD. I already ordered 20 Feet of that Reinforced Tygon.

As for the filters I will rubber-seal the wood if possible. Or at least find some way of sealing it.

Did a search on eBay, no Iwaki pumps that will work. Know any good places to get them?

WMD-30RLT Iwaki Pump from http://www.marineandreef.com/shoppro/CA_Iwaki_Pump.html look good?

If you need a Mag 1800 I have one. Raised my temps about 6C over a Mag 7 if I remember correctly.

VAdept said:

Well I was running anti to keep corrosion to a minimum, those fans push nearly 300 CFM, Im running them at 24v because 150 CFM is more than adequate. They are for aestetics to a degree and they are cheap.

How would you reccomend increasing the pipes? I mean, most watercooling stuff is 1/2" OD. I already ordered 20 Feet of that Reinforced Tygon.

As for the filters I will rubber-seal the wood if possible. Or at least find some way of sealing it.

Did a search on eBay, no Iwaki pumps that will work. Know any good places to get them?

Click to expand...

Antifreeze is a good anti-corrosive agent... I think I misunderstood and read that you were using antifreeze due to a future plan to incorporate TECs.

Rubber seals will definitely help... you would definitely need a nice seal to keep the airflow coming in THROUGH the filters instead of the seams.

Most watercooling stuff is 1/2" ID. 1/2" OD is probably 3/8" ID. That was standard stuff 3 years ago. Most waterblocks nowadays use 1/2" ID barbs. 1/2" OD tubing will be a large restriction on your flow. Three rads in series will be a large restriction on your flow... If I were doing multiple rads in series, I'd put as large tubing as the radiator's outlet came stock. If it was 5/8" ID, use 5/8" ID tubing. Those things are going to kill your flow.

The 30RLT is a good pump. If you can find a 30RZT, it would be much better, although it's often rare. Ebay's selection of Iwaki pumps is usually MUCH better than it currently is. I've seen 50 and 70s quite often. The 30 will dump a lot less heat into the water, however.

Is noise a concern at all? The same link that you provided for those 48v has 24v fans that would be louder, but move more air. Also... half the voltage doesn't always equate to half the CFM. It's usually worse than half... plus... the pressure is seriously decreased. If you aren't concerned about noisy fans, I'd go with a straight 24v psu to 24v fan. Running the patriot at 24v *will* make for a nice and quiet setup, however.

Also.. thanks for the link. I forgot about BG-Micro... many many moons ago =/. As it turns out, they are located about 1,000 yards away from the place I'm typing this message out =p.

Oops that was a typo, I meant 1/2" ID.

Well it seems with all the concern im going to have to get the Iwaki for peace of mind. You don't spend $400 on a system just to have serious problems getting it to work efficently.

You may be interested in the case im modding to go with this Its a Cooler Master Centurion 2. Painting the frame, installing window, top fan holes, more fan holes cut, blue LED's, ect. Together they should look pretty badass.

And yes, noise is a concern. I mean, it will be fun sometimes to turn it full blast for some extreme OCing but I don't plan to run it that way a whole lot.

Sounds like a sweet and pretty ambitous project, can't wait to lean more of its progress

I will be sure to keep you updated. I estimate it will take me at leasta month to get everything done.

Ok ive poured over the different pumps and ive come up with the 2 I really like.

Either the WMD30RLXT Fittings: 1" / 1" GPH@4' 960 $130.00

or the WMD40RLXT Fittings: 1" / 1" GPH@4' 1200 $159.00

Would these be able to pump through all the resistance of 30FT of pipe/tube and my 3 rads?

Earlier Flow Concept:

You don't want the RLXT, you want the RZT or RLT. The RZT is the best... it's pressure rated. The RLT is second-best, only get it if your only other option is the RLXT =p.

The tubing looks better... nice and fat. But... seriously, that's a monster of a long flow path. You need to measure the amount of vertical travel your pump will have to provide. The way I'm reading it, you'll either end up with almost 0 flow or your pump will barely handle the circulation. You might want to go with 2 pumps.

Well here is my brakdown of flow:

Flow Breakdown

Pump
1" Outlet to 1" ID tube to 1" to 1" fitting in excahnge box

Exchange box
Seperates to 3x 5/8" to 3/4 with 3/8" ID tube to each radiator with 5/8" ID Barb

Each Radiator
Enters 5/8" OD then Exits 5/8" OD Barb to 5/8" ID tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" barb in exchange box

Exchange box
Seperates to 4x 1/2" OD x 3/4" with 1/2" ID tubing to 1/2" OD Barb Waterblocks

Each Computer
Enters wateblocks at 1/2" OD then exits 1/2" OD barbs to 1/2" ID tube to 1/2" OD x 3/4" barbs on exchange box

Exchange box
Enters 1/2" OD Barbs converges into 1" OD bard then 1" ID Tube to 1" OD x 1" fittings on first pipe ID tube

Pipe 1
Enters 1" OD barbs exits exits pipe 5/8" OD to 3/4" on 5/8" tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" on next tube

Pipe 2
Enters 5/8" OD to 3/4" fittings exits exits pipe 5/8" OD to 3/4" on 5/8" tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" on next tube

Pipe 3
Enters 5/8" OD to 3/4" fittings exits exits pipe 5/8" OD to 3/4" on 5/8" tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" on next tube

Pipe 4
Enters 5/8" OD to 3/4" fittings exits exits pipe 5/8" OD to 3/4" on 5/8" tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" on next tube

Pipe 5
Enters 5/8" OD to 3/4" fittings exits exits pipe 5/8" OD to 3/4" on 5/8" tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" on next tube

Pipe 6
Enters 5/8" OD to 3/4" fittings exits exits pipe 5/8" OD to 3/4" on 5/8" tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" on next tube

Pipe 7
Enters 5/8" OD to 3/4" fittings exits exits pipe 5/8" OD to 3/4" on 5/8" tube to 5/8" OD to 3/4" on next tube

Pipe 8
Enters 5/8" OD to 3/4" fittings exits exits pipe on 1" OD barbs to 1" ID tube to 1" ID to 1" barb on pump

How would I got about that? Hmm.

Its 10FT of Pipe, id assume about 15FT of 1/2" ID for all the computers, then about 3FT of 5/8" ID for the pipes themselves. So all in all about 27 feet, guess I can round that up to 30 to be safe.

I can't find the RZT pumps anywhere

I ended up calling the guys at http://www.pumpcatalog.com/ to see what they had to tell me. Apparently I will have to figure out total length and backpressure accross the radiators. This is becoming rather difficult, ah well didnt expect it to be easy

Do you have the figures already for that or is it going to be number crunching time? If so.. how are you going to do it?

I follow everything but that piping. What is the poitn in having 6 pipes or whatever going from exchange box 3 to the pump inlet?

I have something similar to you. I have multiple computers all in one loop, which requires a large pump and a few big HCs. One thing I'd recommend is to reconsider your series/parallel configuration.

Keep the CPUs in series. Splitting the flow into 4 routes is going to make the water crawl through your waterblocks. I recommend the 3 CPU blocks all in series right after the HC's combine back into one tube. After the 4 CPUs, then I'd start another parallel for the GPU/NB (so one tube from CPUs into two for the other blocks).

Also, I'd put the 8 big glass tubes into parallel as well.

Reason I'd start putting the things into parallel is to save your flow. You could probably get away with a smaller pump if you took some stuff out of series, and I'd think better temps if you put the CPUs in series.