my petcock - no pain drain...

I thought I'd share how I'm going to drain my system without the mess. I saw this on another site somewhere[can't remember] and I think they used the DD fillport to drain. When using the DD fillport to drain, water/af will come pouring out and you can make a mess if you're not carefull...kind of reminding me of changing the oil on your car. So I decided to make a 1/2" PushOn barb to 1/4" Petcock drain [like on auto radiators]. I used a Y at the bottom of my rad and connected it to the barb. The barb/drainvalve is held in the case by a 1/2" rubber grommet. Since the Petcock is in the lowest part of loop draining will be a breeze. Now all I do is hook up a 1/4" tube, put the other end in a bucket, twist the Petcock and voila! No mess draining. I also wanted to not have to open the case if I didn't want to.



here's a pic of a pair of 3/8" compression fitting to 1/2" PushOn barbs and one with integrated 1/4" Petcock drain. This is for a friend that will have his BIP3 mounted to a RadBox on the rear. The 1/2" barbs on the rad meet right where the 3/8" tubing he is using from his Swiftech kit thru the pci pass thru. He should be able to drain his the same way as mine. Notice I angled the Petcock on his so he'll have better clearance from the case/pci slot when opening the drainvalve

looks good

Damnit! I never thought about that! Awesome idea

Nice one

great idea .... i am going to integrate that into my geothermal folding farm system.

I am thinking i will drain the water system in the winter and switch back to air so i can heat the house in the cold months.

Draining water system should be a breeze. A lot easier than switching all the WB's out for the hsf's :

pscout said:

great idea .... i am going to integrate that into my geothermal folding farm system.

I am thinking i will drain the water system in the winter and switch back to air so i can heat the house in the cold months.

Draining water system should be a breeze. A lot easier than switching all the WB's out for the hsf's :

Click to expand...

i was thinking........ You're gonna get some insane temps in the winter with your geothermal setup. You wont even have to stop it during the winter.

Very nice. A T would be less restrictive. Did you use a Y instead of a T because that was what you had?

Great idea I was going to incorporate it into my setup. But I couldn't figure out a way to do it without making it look like crap so I scraped the idea. The way you worked it in looks very nice. Well Done.

Otter said:

Very nice. A T would be less restrictive. Did you use a Y instead of a T because that was what you had?

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Judging from his setup the Y makes the setup a whole lot cleaner looking then using a T.

Otter said:

Very nice.

Click to expand...

thanks!

A T would be less restrictive. Did you use a Y instead of a T because that was what you had?

Click to expand...

I don't think restriction will have any affect on it. the bottom of my rad is the inlet and the top is my outlet. A T probably would not be as clean an install. Notice how the loop stays in a curve. The use of the Y is for a drain only.

Seems to me it would be better to have a straight path through the fitting and let the tubing bend a bit more, but it's a minor thing.

Electron Chaser said:

Great idea I was going to incorporate it into my setup. But I couldn't figure out a way to do it without making it look like crap so I scraped the idea. The way you worked it in looks very nice. Well Done.



Judging from his setup the Y makes the setup a whole lot cleaner looking then using a T.

Click to expand...

thanks EC! I feel the same way

pscout said:

great idea .... i am going to integrate that into my geothermal folding farm system.

I am thinking i will drain the water system in the winter and switch back to air so i can heat the house in the cold months.

Draining water system should be a breeze. A lot easier than switching all the WB's out for the hsf's :

Click to expand...

Off topic comment:

There would be no net increase in your house's temp if you switched from water to air. The same heat load is dissipated into the air with both methods, it's just that with water cooling it is done with a higher deltaT and at a location far removed from the heat loads. A good analogy: Take a little "cube" type heater, turn it on high, make note of how quickly the temperature of the room hits X. Now, put a large box fan in front of the same little heater. The fan decrease the temperature just past the heater dramatically due to air flow, but ultimately the room will reach the same temperature X in the same amount of time (discounting the heat generated by the box fan of course).

Yes, but he's talking about piping the heat outside of the house to the earth. Heating the dirt would be a waste of energy in the winter.

AH.... I didn't notice that. *DOH*

Hmmm. Wouldn't it be easier to just switch to a radiator for winter and leave the blocks on your CPU's? A large car rad and a box fan should handle the heat load.

Otter said:

Hmmm. Wouldn't it be easier to just switch to a radiator for winter and leave the blocks on your CPU's? A large car rad and a box fan should handle the heat load.

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Good Idea! And it should be quieter, better/more stable OC temps, and easier to direct outside air feed to the rad!

I still need an outside airfeed due to the concentration of so many rigs in 1 small room (really just bathroom sized).

If the window to the room weren't so small, I could mount the rad right in it or even outside in the window well.

But perhaps even better would be to mount the rad in a wall blowing into the rest of the house ... put a bit of insulation in the room and keep the whole room cold for the rest of the components.

It would make a less drafty, more constant heatflow into the house. That was my wife's main complaint this winter.

More food for thought

I replied in the other thread to avoid jacking this one.
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?p=4427377#post4427377

Looks good! I'm going to plumb my first wc setup in the very near future and I'm going to put a drain in mine too. I just went the route of a 1/2" barb to 3/8" threaded end w/ a brass 3/8" pipe cap. I got a T to splice off my main line... but I like the Y you used... when I get plumbing I may need to switch. good job!

Goodjob on the petcock. another way of doing this is using a DD fillport looks seksey too.

-aDaM^ said:

Goodjob on the petcock. another way of doing this is using a DD fillport looks seksey too.

Click to expand...

thanks.

the only thing I don't like about going the fillport way is it won't be as simple to drain. with the petcock I connect 1/4" tubing and put the other end in a bucket. Then just open up the valve and when it's done draining I just close the valve, unhook the hose and refill the loop.

with the fillport, it's just like changing your oil in your car. when you use the allen for the fillport the coolant will want to rush out and may spray when rushing passed the threads.

plus my way is tool less.