multiple radiators worth it?

Is it overall worth the noise, effort, restriction, money, and space to put multiple radiators? For example, I am about to have 2 2-342 and I already have a dtek procore as well. How much of a temp difference am I looking at moving from the procore to the 2-342 or some other combination of two or even all three?

What else do you have in your loop?
How many water blocks are you using and who makes them?
What temps are you getting now?

Also, what pump are you using, and how much fannage on each radiator? We going for a silent rig here, or fairly quiet/good performance, etc?

I also have a gpu block (silverprop HL)
cpu block- swiftech 6002-p
criticool waterplant 6 in
pump-mcp600

Only one fan on the procore. Don't think i'll do the whole push/pull.

Don't care too much for sound but I don't want any vantec tornados.

I wouldnt want to dabble in that sort of restriction. You may be looking at 2-4 C temp difference for double the noise. If you went 3 then you definately would need additional pumpage. Also, the space factor of three HC's comes into play even in large full towers. Unless you plan on expanding your pumping and maybe running parallel sections for each block, you wont see adequate performace for the space and noise gains, not to mention the cost incurred on fans.

Generally, people run multiple HC's in parallel, so restriction isn't a problem. Since flow actually goes up this way, and you're cooling more water at the same time, I'd say temps would go down at least a few C's. I wouldn't really see a point in doing multi HC's unless you run a dually or have lots of waterblocks.

If you already have the 2-342's, than money really isn't an issue, is it? So the question is really if the noise, effort, or space is worth it. Noise could be an issue depending on what fans you're using, it's not much effort (putting two T lines while your loop is in parallel is a great way to fill/bleed), and you can figure out if you have space for it.

Bottom line is it will bring your temps closer to ambient. I'd leave out the pro core and stick with the two 342's if you decide to go for it.

Bottom line is it will bring your temps closer to ambient. I'd leave out the pro core and stick with the two 342's if you decide to go for it.

Click to expand...

Agreed. Remember that you can only get so close to ambient, and there's a point where more heatercores aren't going to do anything for you. Unless you're running 5 blocks or a pelt, a pair of 342's is going to be just fine.

As for running them in parallel - it would be kinda tricky to put three cores in parallel, simply because it would take a lot of tubing to set that up inside a case. A seperate radiator box would be a different story. Are these going to be in parallel or series?

actually I only have one 2-342 now.... I will use it later though. I guess I'll just scrap the procore and just go with a single 2-342, wasn't too crazy about the noise/money/etc of doing both.

Another question, the panaflo m1a that I have mounted on my procore right now has a really annoying purr or whatever to it. If I were to replace it with a 80 cfm evercool aluminum fan would it raise my temperatures to a significant extent? There is only a 5 cfm difference but the pressure of the m1a is almost double. Would it really matter in a radiator's case?

CFM doesnt mean nearly as much as pressure. If the fan cant push/pull air through the radiator then it doesnt matter how many cfm its rated at. It will drop significantly depending on restriction through the HC. Its the same as with a water system. Head pressure is far more important then gpm because if the pump cant push the water through the system then its rather pointless to use it as nothing moves.

Get a Sanyo Denki 120mm fan from the classifieds. All I hear when I run them is air moving. Put a Rheo or 7vt mod and its whisper quiet. VERY good fan. And it seems to pull air rather well through the HC. You NEED a shroud. Here is one I use. http://www.svc.com/cw-mini-coolshroud-black.html
2 of them easily fit on the '77 bonniville core.

JT

well I already have a shroud. It is just that the whine that these fans are making is kind of annoying. So I guess it is really bad to go from a 120X38 fan to a 120X25.... I dunno I guess I can go do the 7 volt mod but I don't know if that will get rid of the whine and/or lower the performance more than changing to the 120X25 fan.

edit: just saw the ad for the sanyo denki fans and it looks good. Though, he doens't have any on ebay right now. I guess I can replace the panaflo fans with those and 7 volt mod them. How do I 7 volt mod a fan? I don't need to purchase one of these do I?
http://www.jab-tech.com/customer/product.php?productid=2041&cat=41&page=1

azianese said:

edit: just saw the ad for the sanyo denki fans and it looks good. Though, he doens't have any on ebay right now. I guess I can replace the panaflo fans with those and 7 volt mod them. How do I 7 volt mod a fan? I don't need to purchase one of these do I?
http://www.jab-tech.com/customer/product.php?productid=2041&cat=41&page=1

Click to expand...

If you look closely youll see that its a standard 4-pin to 3-pin adapter except the ground and 5v+ are switched. If you have any of those laying around you could use it. Just remember to switch BOTH sides of the 4 pin or you might have unwanted results plugging it in something else.


If you dont have the tools yet you should get molex pin removers. I feel they are a must if doing anything with wiring. I got 1 of each $10 but purchased it with a sleveing kit so they were a lil cheaper. Could probably get away with a female one as I found out it will also remove male pins [edit] just not as well [/edit].

http://www.jab-tech.com/customer/home.php?cat=146

Also the 3-pin floppy remover is good to have. I showed its use in another post making a custom wire for tornado using an RPM monitoring fan controller.

Im bored at the moment so I took some pics on how to mod it and attached em. Pic one is the 4-pin-> 3-pin converter and the tools. 2 is me taking the pins out one handed. *not easy btw* 3 is after the pins have been switched over.

JT