View Full Version : Homemade Hoilday Water Cooling
Over the hoildays having a little too much time on my hands I decided to try to build a water cooling system for my computer.
The first thing I to consider was the heatsink not wanting to reinvent the wheel I looked in my big box of junk to see if I
had anything I could rework to do the job. The first thing that got my attention was an old Thermaltake (round with lots of
fins on the outside). I took the thing out to the garage and drilled out the interior to about 3/4" of an inch diameter
down to about 1/8" from where the core touched the other side. Without a whole lot of effort I made a top and punched in 2
lines to run coolant through. Now I had to come up with a pump....I remembered my wife had one of those funky waterfall things
that had a submersable pond pump in it (she never even knew it was gone). The rest seemed easy I hooked up the pump to my new
HS with some tubing threw it in a bucket of water and HEY it worked (so it seemed). I did leak tests till I was about blue in the
face and finally the moment of truth came WOULD IT WORK ON THE COMPUTER ? (by now everyone thinks that I have gone nuts). I hooked up everything
and ran the first test. Temps were down from 118F to 110F (650 duron OC to 866) needless to say that was not what I was looking to see.
I messed around with it for 4 or 5 days. My thinking was the water was not cold enough. I mixed a soultion of antifreeze and
water and stuck it in the freezer till it was well below freezing and pumped this through my contraption. The results were a
disaster.Little did I know that I had cooled the aluminiun HS to the point it had shrunk so much it lost good contact with
the processor. Temps actually went to 130 plus, but as soon as the HS was back to 60 - 70F the cooling got better. You ask how did he know
what the temps were? That's easy go to your local hardware store by one of those cheap indoor / out thermometers.
You can place the single lead any where you want, if you take the thing apart (most of these are dual temps) the other sensor is on the
circuitboard (a little micro surgery and you have two remote temp sensors). Back to the story the results from the aluminium HS tests
did not stop me I went looking for their new copper HS (sells for 29 bucks). A1136 (DRAGON ORB 2). I took the fan off the
unit and went to the local machine shop. I had them bore out the guts of the dragon to 1/32 from bottom 1 and 3/16" diameter
(basically a copper cup) the lid was another common item, a cap that fits 1 1/4" copper pipe. The inlets were punched in
at the bottom of the ORB at 45 degree opposing angles (this way the water has to swirl naturally to get in and out).
Once I got my HS back from the machine shop I got out my trusty Dremel tool and polished the inside of the ORB to perfection
as well as the copper plumbing cap and the base of the ORB. I set the cap as well as inlet and outlet with marine epoxy.
To get get the best results set your oven to 200F and cook the thing for 10 to 15 minutes once done let it cool off slowly
and your should have a good bond if you cleaned the mating surfaces good. I set up the system and set the ORB with
silver paste. The tank is a large radio control plane fuel tank that holds my pond pump (specs 45 GPH). I backed all this up with a
dry sump 12 volt pump it replenshises the pond pump tank with cold water when needed. After leak testing (again can't do
that enough) I set the Water ORB ran the lines and fired it up. The results were UNBELIEVEABLE !!!!!! Room temp water
my CPU was 10 degrees higher as time went on the small tank heats up so I pumped in fresh cold from the drysump. I got bold
over the next few days my antifreeze water mix was tested with the coolant at 20 degrees I held my processor below 50
degrees AT WILL. The latest set up I have gotten a small fridge that sits under my desk (holds the coolant and the beer).
Last night I tested my 650 Duron it crashed at 987 MHZ (I think) I thought I was going to make to to one gig,
but it will run 866 with no probs all day long at 60 degrees. So the point of my story is cheap watercooling can be done
if you have the imagination..what I like about this is nothing.. I hear nothing now no screaming fans nothing....
but a few bubbles. I have 3 case fans now and they are on a switch (just in case I get nervous plus I do run the ORB factory
fan, but it's nothing compared to 10 fans. Sorry for the typo's guy's and I not telling anyone to try this, but hey the Water
ORB rocks and it's cheap.
The Overclocker
12-28-01, 05:40 AM
nice, i made a waterblock out of a plug - total cost=0 i just wish i had made it before i bought a block from america
iggybaseball
12-28-01, 07:23 AM
can we get some pics?
Sorry guys I ment to post these last night, anyway here they are. Today I got more copper tubing the fridge setup will be done later today I'll keep you posted on the results.
Big Mike
12-28-01, 02:57 PM
Two items to note:
Be careful with that super cold water, condensation would bring your CPU and m/b to a untimely end if your not careful. Secondly, you said you polished the inside of the cap and orb where the water flows? Thats actually not a good thing, smooth surfaces dont have nearly the surface area that a nice rough surface would have, id hit it with some gritty sand paper and then just clean it out good with water. I dunno if your design would allow for taking it back apart at this point though. But at any rate for future reference...
-Mike
The reason I polished the inside of the unit was that the rough surfaces seemed to trap air bubbles (they clung to the surface of the chamber). Condensation has not been even a problem the radial fin design will evaporate most of it. The only place I saw even the slightest bit of condensation was on the center of the unit (very slight) the stock fan takes care of this. Either way I''ll keep you posted as things go. the Fridge unit is set up and cooling down now I'll test it in 3 or 4 hours
Pepsi
UPDATE:
To who ever might be interested. I got the fridge unit cooled down and coolant to -4C. I did one more leak test and somehow one of the inlets to the converted Dragon Orb leaked. I had to cook the part to loosen the inlets and reset them. I replaced them with aluminium tubing (bends easier). The parts are cooling off now and if the set is good I'll fire up the fridge unit in an hour or so. If the past results are the same as what I expect I should get 45 to 50 F. The big change was I ditched the tank in the case and the pond pump. The dry sump seems to handle pushing the coolant some 30 feet from the fridge through the copper coils and back to the tank in the fridge. It is a nice clean look just two tubes moving the coolant in and out of the case instead of the octopus I had before (seven tubes). Condensation I don't know how that will work out. I'll post some pics tomorrow as soon as I get a chance.
Pepsi
Antec Case and PWS (350 watt)
650 AMD Duron OC to 866 (I have a 1400 going in as soon as the bugs are worked out of the cooling)
MSI K7T Turbo (ms-6330) MoBo
40 Gig West Dig HD 7200 RPM
Yamaha SCSI Burner
Adaptec SCSI card
NVIDIA 64 meg agp card
19" Misu monitor
Blaster Live w/Cambridge speakers
Kenwood 40x CDR
32 fans (now in a box)
15 feet Cooper tubing (1/4")
1989 Fridigaire (3 cubic foot)
and about 22 other things
Tbird man
12-29-01, 10:06 AM
You may have hit on a good idea here by converting a HSF and still keeping the base part functional you are not only cooling with chilled water you are using some of that wasted energy that normally only cools the surface of the cap and buy blowing air across it you chill that air and than blow that below ambient air across the HS fins gaining additional cooling. so your cooling with both cooled air and cooled water.
Humm I think that you could be right. One thing I have noticed is that there is little to no condensation anywhere on the unit maybe due to fact air is flowing over the fins on HS and getting rid of it. The setup is done it took a little longer than I thought getting it put back together. The little fridge holds the coolant at 20 to 23 F when the pump is running. The temp at the converted Dragon Orb is 40 F. I shortened the lines to the computer and wrapped them in insulation to stop some of the temp loss. The BIGGEST stupid mistake I made was not enough antifreeze in my coolant, (I had the coil freeze up) so as of the moment I have the thing defrosting and plan to go to a 50% mix of water and anitfreeze to fix this. Then more tests bla bla I'll keep ya posted on the results.
That is a REALLY nice DORB conversion you did there pepsi.
I made a similar mod to a Dragon Orb:
As soon as I saw wild_andy_c's mod of a chrome orb, I thought I could do something similar with a new Dragon Orb. I had a hole (it was 5/8" i think) drilled through the center at the university machine shop. I added barbs on each end and used plumbers weld to seal. I used refrigerator water line hose (they fit inside the barbs and I used Welder to seal) and some tubing I bought to convert the diameter to 1/2" copper tubing. A 10 foot coil of 1/2" copper tubing sitting outside in the winter cold is my radiator. See my sig for specs of system. Now that outside ambient temps are cold (~20F avg and colder at night) my OC'd Duron never gets over 30C running Folding 24/7 with the stock DORB3 7K fan. To make it quieter i put only a very small northbrige-type fan on the DORB and temps never get over 37C. Pepsi your design is capable of cooling with water only, isn't it? My design doesn't allow the water to touch enough surface area to run the hs w/o a fan under full load (I don't like the temps to be over 40C), but the little fan is almost silent ( I can actually hear the IBM 40GB and it is a quiet HD). The Air Cond. condensation pump (15 foot head) that I use for pumping the water/antifreeze mixture (~65% water) is enlosed and covered with insulation and carpet remnants so that it is barely audible. I run my system w/o a case, so no fans except the one on the vidcard, the northbridge, and the hs and they are all barely audible. Sorry no pics yet.
Well done Pepsi.
Im well impressed.
How much do you think the whole lot cost you in the end ?
Its allways nice to see somebody making it themselves and having it work out good.
Good luck with the system and keep us posted.
Very nice indeed, you sound like me! Got to find a way to do it with spending the LEAST amount of money! :D
I have a few questions here, sorry if I make you repeat yourself.
The red fan is used to cool around the blue right? Have you been able to tell if that causes any kind of temp drop?
Have you been able to tell if it might help your cpu from frying if the pump failed?
How is the set up with the fridge setup? I got it that it was under tha table with the case on it right? How do you have the hoses going into it?
Is the water just on the inside? or is the cooler of the fridge hooked up to the water lines?
What is the temp of the water?
What is the diameter of the inside of the lines?
Sorry for the bug, Im just curious! :D thanks :D
Dragon Orb Conversion Update:
Another opps my test Processor AMD 650 Duron has been added to the wall of shame. The 1400 won't go in till the bugs are out of the fridge system (GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR) My poor 650 usually ran at 866 or better (not really stablee%$^& bla bla bla). Like a stinking clock(yea right). Reseting the heat sink 9000 times killed it. Oh well it was one year old and basically was in and out so much it took a killer beating. Tomorrow I'll go to the shop and buy a new lab animal for testing.
Questions:
total cost 9,000$
time invested (including time spent laying awake dreaming this up) 9,000 hours
actual cost 29$ for the factory HS Dragon Orb
Machine Shop 90$
Fridge (got lucky here) nothing my brother in law had it sitting in his garage with 9,000 feet of dust on it. It is a tiny thing 3 cubic foot maybe made about 1975.
Parts to date.....200$....... if I'd of known exactly what to buy and skip all the mistakes...25$
Specs:
The Converted Orb has a copper core with a 1.625 hole punched in the center of it to .187 from the interior floor to the exterior where the the letters AMD touch. It has two aluminium lines .250 diameter punched in at 45 degree opposing angles with the interior ends bent to insure the fluid makes a full circle in the Orb (basically two tubes the last 1/2 inch is bent at a 45 degree angle). It actually works so well it makes a killer sound when you fire up the pump (kind of like a toliet flushing...bad phrase.. more like water getting sucked down the drain..yea that's it). From there it goes a set of fittings to quick disconect the computer from the mother ship fridge. Those lines are a heavy poly.... like milk jugs are made from. They go through 1/2 inch holes I punched in the side of the fridge. The high pressure line runs from a one gallon bottle to a 12 volt dry sump german made pump made for pumping nitromethane mix to large radiocontrol model aircraft (my other hobby) the pump draws 1.8 amps it runs off a little 5 amp power supply I pulled out of my junk box. The pump is actually ideal it's a gear driven pump made to work in extreme conditions. It sucked slush out out of test bottle before I realized what was going on. I have to check the specs I think it's around 100GPH. It's very small about the size of ...let's put it this way it'd fit in a pack of cigarettes. All run off a remote switch I mounted in one of the blanks from the front of a drive bay on my Antec. Anyway pump to Orb.... Orb the goes to the fridge cold plate (icemaker) 15 feet of copper coil back to the bottle (past the 6 pack of beer)(which I put in tonight and dropped the fridge temp 20F) (but hey it's overclocked beer then right ?) The little fridge is pretty old My HVAC man thought at least 20 years. It will hold the coolant at 18 F only because the back coil has two 105m fans zip tied to it (basically the heat exchanger, fans are 110v) The coolant reaches the processor at about 10 degrees F above fridge temp @ 20F @ Fridge the 650 ran @ 45F @ 50F it will run 70F. This is where it gets weird UP to a point the coolant temp and the processor temp work toward each other meaning the coolant temp rises and the processor temp lowers. I said something about this earlier (expansion and contraction thus = better contact) aluminium was a nightmare literally the colder I got coolant the HOTTER the thing ran. Copper is so much better. So we could assume once I get my system up and running it would easy to find the ideal temp where my copper meshed with the processor perfectly depending on how good of a job I did getting the surfaces mated I could get some great temps at the core or really rotten ones. That is really the big lesson I have gotten out of the whole process (building this ..wife ****ing off contraption) air cooling or water if the HS is not set perfect it doesn't matter how many fans you have, how cold the water is you have set the HS right the temps you get will reflect it. I am really thinking hard on ideas like setting the processor on the HS before even mounting it to the Mother board. With zero resisitance the stinking lever and all I'll take any ideas you guys have on that. Ok that's enough thanks for the interest guys I'll post pics tomorrow of the finished product and if anybody out there has a couple of processors lying around they could spare SHIP THEM ME PLEASE!
Pepsi
P.S. Does the ASUS P2b-f support a HD of 40 gig I don't think so.
pepsi i know how you feel. i have killed 2 tbirds and 1 duron on my my oc quest. my ability to destroy is why i am only running a duron600 right now ($27 - what a deal!). but my overclock at 866(really 864.64 MHz) is ROCK STABLE as shown by the following screen shot:
http://sweb.uky.edu/~ddfoye2/screen1.jpg
Prime95 ran the self-test and runs fine.
Sandra Burn In completed.
Folding runs 24/7.
Right on brother! The 650 Duron is a great lab rat. To date I have killed some great (expensive) processors (RIP) The little Duron has a big heart I love working with them. The price is sweet 30 bucks and it runs 866 very well. With a Vantec HS I had mine running @105F it was just the other 10 fans generating so much noise I just had to stick a Fridigaire in between. I can't tell you how nice it is to hear the hard drive running and nothing else. It worries me......I think I might be getting addicted.
You should drop Joe, and Ed a line perhaps write up an article for the frontpage, I mean you have most of your content already written anyway. Take a peek at the frontpage, and you should see Joe and Ed's e-mail on the side, on the top there is a submission guide on how to submit an article. I think it would be a nice article to share with the rest of the OC.Com readers. Very well done job, and thought out process too.
J
.......thank you for the nice compliment... I'll take a look there and drop an email. I really just wanted see how a stock heatsink with the right work could do the job, without dumping a ton of cash into it. Once I get a new lab rat I'll post some decent pics and stats of my converted Orb / fridge project, and hey it might be worth sharing. I certainly don't people running out to buy any of things I have used I'd rather they do what I did just solve a problem with the least expense, blow up a few things on the way and learn. If not I'll continue blow things up and post the results with several pics. AH all kidding aside thanks again.
Pepsi
Well as things go I did not get to the store and get my new lab rat before they closed NYE. They have a 700 Duron for 49 bucks. Not bad I guess. I spent the last hoilday trimming up things. I put in my test board (Biostar) and fixed a few things. First thing tomorrow I'll get my project running again. Anyway with no new news I thought I'd post a few pics of the Convered Orb / Fridge Project enjoy!
Pepsi
The front of the case has three digitals
first one: processor temp and MoBo temp
second one: coolant temp @ the core and Coolant temp fridge
third one Fridge air temp and case temp (switched) the bottom reading is for humidity in the case.
The fridge has heavy insulation with a copper coil on the cold plate above and to the right of the bottle. The pump is wrapped in insulation and on the shelf behind the bottle.
Last pic. Eitherway I'll keep ya posted on the first serious run in as soon as it blows up..(somthing is bound to break I'd bet a years wages on it). Happy New Year!
Pepsi
wolfsid
01-02-02, 09:20 AM
DUDE nice Oc and Mod i was thinking about doing the mod with the fridge but I was going to put my mobo inside it just fill up a tank of some nonconductive fluid and trow my mobo in there and freeze it see what I can do with that, I will get back to you..
FizzledFiend
01-02-02, 08:52 PM
I hear mineral oil is non conductive...plus electronic cleaner should get the oil off nicelly if need be.....your mobo your choice ;)
wolfsid
01-02-02, 09:37 PM
Originally posted by FizzledFiend
I hear mineral oil is non conductive...plus electronic cleaner should get the oil off nicely if need be.....your mobo your choice ;)
yes I can use that but then I have to coat my capacitors and resistors so they don't get wore out by the oil.. I was thinking if there was some other king of liquid I can stick it in with out having to go Thu all that trouble covering everything on the board..
Humm interesting Idea there. To implement it with my system would take a whole 10 minutes. My Mobo is out more than in lately. What about straight glycol the stuff they fill expensive gauges with, I also heard somewhere cooking oil would work. Hard to imagine though. Update on my project for those who are following it. I got a 1 gig Duron and put everything back together. It looks as though both of my test MoBo's are junk now. Rats! Today I'm off to get a new one I'm thinking I am getting sick of cheap MoBo's I might possibly go for an ASUS A7A 266, but the 200$ price tag......... I found out it takes the little fridge 3 days to cool down. The air temp inside is a steady 7 F the coolant is at 18 F. I insulated the complete exterior of the fridge and got a few degrees out of it. Once it get it up and running tonight if condensation is a problem the submersion idea kind of interests me. Anybody out there ever done this or know details?
Pepsi
wolfsid
01-04-02, 01:57 PM
yes here is some info on it I also want to try this..tell me what you think and maybe we can put our data together and find something really cold.. http://www.koolance.com/shows/comdexlv2001/ http://forums.overclockers.ws/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=47387
I really want to do this my oc watercooling and pelter is not enough i want some subzero temps...:D
Well finally for all you small fridge fans I have good news. After crashing two MoBo's as well as processors I replaced them and got the fridge system up and running. I decided on the MSI KT7 Turbo II Limited for the MoBo.( I set the 1 gig Duron in silver paste VERY CAREFULLY). I goofed off yesterday after getting the MoBo in and successfully booting the system (at this point another failure would have ended the project). The system booted and at this point I shutdown and decided to look at everything that had failed in the past and what I thought could fail (plus reading the MoBo manual 20 times). The fridge works great for the past three or four hours I have burnt in the processor made CD's and finally have some hard data as far as cooling goes. The WORST part was the first boot I watched the converted ORB frost up (like I mean considerable frozen stuff on the outside of it) Thinking the coolant was to cool I placed fans paper towels whatever to keep the frost soon to be water off the new MoBo. As the pump ran the heat exchange was too much for the little fridge(I expected this) the temps rose (idle/off) 19F coolant and 9F air temp fridge. What I wanted to find with my fridge was the point these two equalized. Once the frost hit the road I got to work. No OCing here just stock everything. After 3 now near 4 hours the coolant has setted at 70F the Processor will not climb over 80 F no matter what I do. So in pursuit coolness from fans and noise 80F I'll take that. Plus I am thinking of more coils and more coolant to slow down the rise in temps. The submersion idea is lurking in the back of my mind. Oh man my wife is going kick my %4# when she sees me dunking my MoBo in Crisco. I'll keep ya posted men meanwhile don't pass up those little fridges at garage sales.
Pepsi
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