flooding

[i_like_penguins]

has anyone ever toyed with the idea of submerging a computer in a liquid to cool it? I am begining to. Before I cause to much damage to my computer, does any one have any sugestions? Or better yet, does anyone have any experience that they are willing to share?

[UnseenMenace]

I believe that it is possible to submerge the mobo and other hardware in oil which is used to dislipate heat, however it is not somthing I know to much about or wish to as I change components frequently as any techinque such as submerging components would make this a more difficault task.

[nihili]

Don't some of the Crays use this sort of liquid cooling?

nihili

(Whatever you do, don't use mercury. LOLOLOL)

[joshiieeii]

Go here (http://www.octools.com/redirindex.html?main=http://www.octools.com/articles/submersion/submersion.html) To check out what these guys at OCTools did, it is a very good documentation of a submersion cooling rig. These guys used some expensive inert liquid, I have heard of a guy that used Vegatable oil :eek: , it didn't work out well.:p

*edit* BTW I wouldn't reccommend it unless you have lots of money and are extremely bored :rolleyes: , I think it is more trouble than it is worth.

[Crazy Jayhawk]

Originally posted by joshiieeii
I wouldn't reccommend it unless you have lots of money and are extremely bored :rolleyes: , I think it is more trouble than it is worth. I tend to agree. You can get the same level of cooling from a good air or water rig without the risk of utterly destroying your computer.

[i_like_penguins]

I live in the chippewa valley, home of cray. I know several people who worked at cray. The liquid that they used is called FC-77 and is made by 3M. The liquid is about twice as dense as water, so it is a very good cooler. It is also non-conductive and non-corrosive, two important things when flooding. You can find specs for it at 3M. I do not have the links. Back in the day when Cray was kicking, FC-77 ran about $1000 a gallon. Price puts this out of the question.

I toyed with the idea of oil. The main problem with oil is that it gets thicker as it gets colder. Pumping becomes a problem. If you did not want your entire computer at -20, than oil is a possability. It is not any fun, but it is a possability. I thought about gassoline, but that would make my computer into a TWA-800 type accident wating to happen.

Several other liquids have entered into my mind. One would be to empty several dozen cans of electronic parts cleaner and use that stuff. I have used it on runnig electronics, so it will not short the mobo. It does evaporate VERY rapidly, so if you spring a leak, you will never see it. Fluid loss from evaporation during upgrading also becomes an issue.

Perhaps one of the best ideas I have come up with is 91% isopropal alcohol. It is cheep, has a low freezing point, clean, and does not thicken as it gets coolder. I do not know if it conducts. I am going to find that out soon.

[KaKa]

so you're saying i can use that special non-corrosive alcohol that people use to clean VCR heads and stuff instead of water?? and it would cool better?? How about using Vodka? (all of the above in a Water Cooler)

[joshiieeii]

Originally posted by KaKa
so you're saying i can use that special non-corrosive alcohol that people use to clean VCR heads and stuff instead of water?? and it would cool better?? How about using Vodka? (all of the above in a Water Cooler)

Come on ppl, THINK!!! if you use vodka in a submersion cooling rig. Ummm... can we say moltof.... I would not use any kind of alcohol in a submersion rig, its just too volitile, one spark :mad: BOOM!!

[KaKa]

hohohoho it think like that too but i know a lot of people who use vodka...

[joshiieeii]

Originally posted by KaKa
hohohoho it think like that too but i know a lot of people who use vodka...

I have heard of ppl using vodka an other liquids for a regular water cooling system, but I thought we were talking about a complete submersion rig?? Is it viable to use such mixtures??

[cowanrg]

2 words: mineral oil

mineral oil is also known as baby oil.

it had a very high specific heat index (the amount of heat taken to raise its temp 1 degree). and, its non-conductive, AND, non corrosive. (well, anything will corrode anything given right amount of time).

it is possible though, i saw pics awhile back of a guy that had his submerged. its good and all, but quite frankly, its wasteful. does your sound card really need cooling? do your USB ports need cooling? keyboard and mouse ports? no... but you are cooling them. the only real thing that needs cooling is ram, northbridge, cpu, and HD's (which i wouldnt submerge anyway...)

it would be really rad to try i think, because mineral oil is CHEAP, and if you have a fishtank laying around, you just pump it to circulate (it cools off easily if you have a large enough tank.)

oh, currently, some of the crays that are being built TODAY use pretty standard water cooling methods. the older ones did use submersion though.

hope that helps!

[Crash893]

couldnt you put the cpu in a ziplock bag like thing and vacume seal it then suburidge it in what ever you want?

[KaKa]

"In a water cooler" not submerging it... no one would try to submerge it in alcohol or anything flameble.

submersing your computer inst a good idea...

using a water cooler with some specia liquid is better

[eobard]

Originally posted by i_like_penguins
I thought about gassoline, but that would make my computer into a TWA-800 type accident wating to happen.


Is gasoline actually electricly non-conductive?? Not that I'm gonna try it either way I'm just curious.

I remember an informercial for some kind of motor oil that starred Dennis Weaver. The comercial started with Dennis showing off a concentrated form of the "special ingredient" in the oil. He showed it off by showing a working television set submerged in it. It was clear like water, the tv shell was removed and you could see all of the various components within the liquid while the tv displayed, whatever was on the screen. Maybe if you found out what that was you could use that stuff for the coolant. Probably costs a lot though.

[i_like_penguins]

You cannot use alcohol as a coolent. I checked last night and it conducts electricity. After consulting with a chemistry text book I found out why. Alcohol conducts because there is water in it. Pure water does not conduct electricity. The reason is that when something is disolved in water, and an elecrical current is passed through the water, the stuff that is disolved in the water ionizes and conducts the electricity. This means that Vodka is also out. If you could distile the water out of the alcohol, than it might work. While you were at it you could make 200 proof Vodka. fun.

I am fairly shure that gasoline does not conduct electricity because it is a petrolium product. Gasoline is realy just super thin oil when you think about it. Oil is used in capacitors, so it cannot conduct.

Mineral oil might be the way to go. I will have to try it soon on a crappy computer that I have. Still flamable though.

The ziplock bag idea would be hard to do. Geting it water-tight would be tough.

The advantages of flooding are that things like RAM and other things on the mobo are cooled. If the liquid that you are flooding with is cooled, than yor whole compter is cooled. If you are running very cold, than condensation and frost is not a problem because everything is submerged in a non-watery fluid.

[Wa11y]

I wanna submerge the entire thing. I've heard dielectric transformer oil could work, but I don't know where to get that or how much. I really wanna do this thing for real!

As for running through a water cooling rig, run some denatured alcohol.

[cowanrg]

Originally posted by i_like_penguins
You cannot use alcohol as a coolent. I checked last night and it conducts electricity. After consulting with a chemistry text book I found out why. Alcohol conducts because there is water in it. Pure water does not conduct electricity. The reason is that when something is disolved in water, and an elecrical current is passed through the water, the stuff that is disolved in the water ionizes and conducts the electricity. This means that Vodka is also out. If you could distile the water out of the alcohol, than it might work. While you were at it you could make 200 proof Vodka. fun.

I am fairly shure that gasoline does not conduct electricity because it is a petrolium product. Gasoline is realy just super thin oil when you think about it. Oil is used in capacitors, so it cannot conduct.

Mineral oil might be the way to go. I will have to try it soon on a crappy computer that I have. Still flamable though.

The advantages of flooding are that things like RAM and other things on the mobo are cooled. If the liquid that you are flooding with is cooled, than yor whole compter is cooled. If you are running very cold, than condensation and frost is not a problem because everything is submerged in a non-watery fluid.

you are correct, mostly :-)

alcohol is a BAD idea, no matter how you slice it. it really doesnt have that great of a specific heat, and its highly volatile (meaning it evaporates quickly). when a substance is volatile, this means it evaporates, thus giving off FUMES. the fumes are the things that explode/ignite...

now, this is where i disagree... mineral oil isnt flammable. it MIGHT be, but i dont think its enough. plus, if it were flammable, it would only be in gas form. and, since a spark would not occur OUTSIDE of your tank, no problem there. a spark inside the tank (ie, on the motherboard), could not ignite anything because it needs air to comubst anyway.

fire = ignitor (spark) + fuel (mineral oil, alcohol) + environment(the air we breath contiains much oxygen, allowing the fire to "breathe" as well)

without all 3 components, you cannot have fire. (this is why people use nitrous oxide (no2) in their cars. it is injected into cylinders, and basically creates a better environment for the air fuel mixutre to combust. this creates faster combustions, and more efficient combustions.

but anyway, if you seal your tank (relatively, not air tight...), you should be fine, unless someone HOLDS a match there for a few minutes, then you might even just get a puff of fire. even then, it will only ignite the surface of your tank, and wouldnt even damage the guts, because the liquid itself isnt flammable.

phew! anyone correct me if im wrong please. all this knowledge is from my engineering experience, and dating 2 chemical engineers.

[Crash893]

and dating 2 chemical engineers.

you lucky lucky man

i dont think that it would be that much a problem unless you smoke or something

i dont know what sort of computers you guys work on but i dont have huge sparks flyign out of mine.

if nothing else just keep a lid or something handy to smother it if by remote chance it did bust into flames

does any one know if salt water is better at conducting heat than regular water? ( and before you post no im not saying put your motherboard in saltwater)

i just had an idea for water cooling thats all

[Random Nonsense]

a quick point, de-ionised water is good, but over time metal from the contacts etc on the mobo will dissolve slightly, the water will start to conduct.... bye bye PC.......... one way i heard of submerghing a PC safely is to coat everything in silicon sealent thinned down so it paints on, and all sockets filled with dieletric grease.

[CrystalMethod]

Completely unrelated, but...
this is why people use nitrous oxide (no2) in their cars. it is injected into cylinders, and basically creates a better environment for the air fuel mixutre to combust. this creates faster combustions, and more efficient combustions.

Nitrous oxide is a 1 to 1 mix of nitrogen and oxygen. Teh only reason the Nitrogen is there is to make it "stable" when used in race applications.

[r0ckstarbob]

Originally posted by cowanrg
2 words: mineral oil

mineral oil is also known as baby oil.

it had a very high specific heat index (the amount of heat taken to raise its temp 1 degree). and, its non-conductive, AND, non corrosive. (well, anything will corrode anything given right amount of time).

it is possible though, i saw pics awhile back of a guy that had his submerged. its good and all, but quite frankly, its wasteful. does your sound card really need cooling? do your USB ports need cooling? keyboard and mouse ports? no... but you are cooling them. the only real thing that needs cooling is ram, northbridge, cpu, and HD's (which i wouldnt submerge anyway...)

it would be really rad to try i think, because mineral oil is CHEAP, and if you have a fishtank laying around, you just pump it to circulate (it cools off easily if you have a large enough tank.)

oh, currently, some of the crays that are being built TODAY use pretty standard water cooling methods. the older ones did use submersion though.

hope that helps!

cowangr - you said it exactly. baby oil/mineral oil is definately the ticket... unless you've got some bucks to blow in which case you can blow your wad on some fluroinert and liquid nitrogen (N2). baby oil is completely dielectic, non corrosive, relatively non-flamable (requries 144C to ignite it so just don't throw a match in it and you'll be fine) and just good stuff to use if you're considering submersion.

Mineral Oil MSDS Form (http://www.jtbaker.com/msds/m7700.htm)

the only real problem with it is that if you use too much of it, you have to start taking into consideration cooling the oil instead of cooling the mobo otherwise there is the distant fear of it actually insulating the mobo and making it warmer. i don't know the specific heat capacity or the thermal conductivity of it, but that would certainly play a factor in it. i've got a link somewhere of someone doing just this same thing and his final problem was getting a pump strong enough to circulate the oil sufficiently to keep everything cool. said in the beginning everything worked fine until the temperature started getting real cold, the oil started to thicken up and the pumps ceased to work any more. it just couldn't push the oil around anymore. if you didn't want to submerge your board, you could just douse it with a squirt bottle or something like that if you were determined to use some sort of liquid though.

baby oil is the stuff to use though if you're considering going the submersion route. was considering it initially when designing THIS (no it's not done, on month 4 of the design now and cutting final diagram/plans next week) (http://216.254.0.2/~language/interface/computer.html) in order to beat the condensation issue but found another answer that was less messy and less maintenance.

alcohol straight against the board is going to be a BAD idea any way you cut it. so will electrical cleaner. and so will anything used as a fuel - including butane. i'm pretty sure it says right on the bottle that before using electrical cleaner that you're suppose to unplug what ever it is you're cleaning and ensure that there is no electicity going to it if possible and to let it dry before using it again. i don't know if this is electrical cleaner "law" and applicable to all of them, but would assume so.

if you're looking for fluids to use, the term you want to look for is "100% Dielectic"... does not conduct electricity. there are several out there. you just have to look.

but please, for the love of Job, DON'T use water, deionized, distilled or whatever. if it's not impure when it starts it'll get that way eventually, unless you've got that computer in a cleanroom and plan to change the water out once every three or 4 days just to make sure you don't toast yer machine. BIG headache. it's one of those ideas that look good on paper and has really crappy application value. you will have to LIVE with that computer. the word Maintenance will become your best friend. and worse yet, you'll never ever ever be able to get it lower then 32F, unless you cut it with something dielectic and pray that it doesn't have any impurities in it to corrupt the water. and besides, the distillation of water for consumer uses isn't all that precise - operating on a +/- 10% is all the FDA requires. but it's enough to eat yer box for breakfast.

good luck and let us know what you decide!

[Baboo]

I can't remember where I saw this:

Earlier this year I saw a crazy guys project where he submerged his whole mobo, cards etc into a bath of Mobil1 (well thats what was next to it in the pic). He used peltiers to cool the oil to -16c.

He oc'd his PIII 600@1100. Now that's very reasonable.

[i_like_penguins]

I tried the mineral oil thing. I took an old 486 that i had and put it in a large pan. My plan was to hook it up, power it up, and dump mineral oil on it to see what would happen. I never got to the mineral oil part. As I was about to pour the oil on it Windows 98 gave a B.O.D. I could not get the computer to recover. :mad: DIE WINDOWS DIE:mad:!!! I am downloading a distribution of linux right now. I do not know when I will be able to try again.

[cowanrg]

i dunno how hot 486's get, but i dont think they can just be booted without ANY cooling...

[eobard]

Originally posted by cowanrg
i dunno how hot 486's get, but i dont think they can just be booted without ANY cooling...

If it's up to a 66mhz processor you don't need anything, not even a heat sink. But over that an appropriately sized sink and fan is recommended but I'm not sure if it's required. I've seen pictures of DX4/120's with only a heat sink, no fan.

[r0ckstarbob]

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http://totl.net/Eunuch/Eunuch2.html (http://totl.net/Eunuch/Eunuch2.html)




:D :D :D

[i_like_penguins]

The point of the 486 was to see if the computer would be able to run while submerged in oil, not to test cooling.

[Wa11y]

Originally posted by i_like_penguins
The point of the 486 was to see if the computer would be able to run while submerged in oil, not to test cooling.

EXACTLY! And I wanna know what the best oil for that would be. It seems to be mineral oil. But I'd stay away from baby oil, since it has fragrances, so I don't know if that would effect the dielectric properties of the oil. I'm wondering about the best way to cool it though. I'm thinking a large bore radiator, and some damn good pumps. Anyone offer some suggestions?

[cowanrg]

mineral oil is the key... (kmart and stuff has it CHEAP)

as for pumps, i would just get regular pumps for watercooling, as its fairly similiar in consistency to water (a little thicker), so your pump wont get its max GPH rating.

as for cooling the liquid, i would just use a radiator. the thing about mineral oil, its FAIRLY close to water in its cooling and pumping ability. there shouldnt be many variances. i also saw a guy who just used 1 tank for his mobo, and other BIG tank for the fluid. where the mineral oil was held, it was HUGE, allowing for a large amount of it, AND a large surface area to cool off. with submerging, you dont have to worry about bubbles or air getting into your system as much. so creating bubbles in your reservoir tank would help disperse heat. active cooling MAY not be necessary for a submerged design. (dont quote me on that ;-)

hell, try some stuff out. but mineral oil is quite viscous.

(viscousity: a fluid's ability to flow through a medium.)
syrup has low viscousity, oil has a lot.

[Crash893]

i saw this thing in popular science i cant find a link right now bull i try later

anyway

it was a box about the size of two shoeboxes

they had water to about half way up and two shafts with about 200 plastic disks on each shaft constanly rotating in to the water and then back up.

then there was a fan on the top of the box that blew in air

they said it had a surface area of like 2 football feilds.

you could use this set up in a resivore set up sort of thing anybody get what im talking about what do you think.

[r0ckstarbob]

Originally posted by cowanrg
mineral oil is the key... (kmart and stuff has it CHEAP)

as for pumps, i would just get regular pumps for watercooling, as its fairly similiar in consistency to water (a little thicker), so your pump wont get its max GPH rating.

as for cooling the liquid, i would just use a radiator. the thing about mineral oil, its FAIRLY close to water in its cooling and pumping ability. there shouldnt be many variances. i also saw a guy who just used 1 tank for his mobo, and other BIG tank for the fluid. where the mineral oil was held, it was HUGE, allowing for a large amount of it, AND a large surface area to cool off. with submerging, you dont have to worry about bubbles or air getting into your system as much. so creating bubbles in your reservoir tank would help disperse heat. active cooling MAY not be necessary for a submerged design. (dont quote me on that ;-)

hell, try some stuff out. but mineral oil is quite viscous.

(viscousity: a fluid's ability to flow through a medium.)
syrup has low viscousity, oil has a lot.

well just to clear some things up

Viscosity for stupid people like me (http://xtronics.com/reference/viscosity.htm)

mineral oil is 15 TIMES more viscous then water, no kidding. thats 15 times THICKER. thats 15 times worse. and thats at 25C. as it gets colder, it gets worse... ALOT worse.

check it
http://www.furrowpump.com/Products/Comparativeviscosities.htm

as far as it's thermal properties, it's actually alot worse then water but not too bad for the purposes of this.

so if you're hunting for a pump, just plain old avoid the term "magnetic impeller" all together as they have a much harder time with pressure and thick substances.

Pancake syrup has a viscosity of 2500 cP at 20C
Mineral oil has a viscosity of 15 cP at 20C
Antifreeze has a viscosity of 13 cP at 20C
Water has a viscosity of 0.98 cP at 20C
(lower is better obviously)

alrighty, have fun and good luck!!!

[i_like_penguins]

For pumping, you might have to use a larger flow pump with more pressure. since oil is slightly thicker than water, it will take more work to pump. a bilge pump might work well. I do not thing that you can get to high of a flow rate with a flooding rig. since everything is in a tank, it will take a while for all of the liquid to circulate in and out. Here is an idea. For a resavour take an old dehumidifier and build a tank around the evaporator coils. These things actualy have a fairly heafty compressor in them. They might be up do the job of cooling the computer to fairly cold temps. They are also capable of running for extended lengths of time.

[Crash893]

if its going to be exposed why not use a water screw
and have it run down hill onto your mobo