Water Chiller idea involving TEC's?

boorishid · Dec 3, 2008

I dont know much about tecs but i had this idea come to me and i was wondering it it was possible.

Take your standard WC setup get a quad rad and mount two 220watt tecs on the radiator. Then mount two hi end heatsinks on the hot part of the tec like an s1238 or a TT tru, those are suppose to be able to disapate 220 watts right? Put some antifreeze in and distilled water in the loop insulate the board and watch it go.

Im not to sure about how tec work all i know is you need to cool the hot side and you have to hook them up to a power supply. Im thinking this setup would be able to take 440watts out of the water correct? Maybe giving you close to 0c on a no cpu load?

aja · Dec 4, 2008

A 200 watt TEC will need to be cooled by something that can cool 200W PLUS whatever the TEC is cooling.

So a 200W TEC and a 200W CPU will need a cooling system that can handle 400W.

Also, you cannot just stick the TEC to the rad. You can only attach it to a cold plate or similar so that conduction may occur.

TEC chillers do exist, but they work like this:

CPU loop -

standard water cooling setup, but with the radiator replaced with a waterblock connected to the cold side of the TEC.

TEC loop -

Waterblock connected to the hot side of the TEC and connected to a rad to cool it.

Air cooling a TEC does not work. Thermaltake tried this with their subzero thing long ago. The hot side gets too hot, you overshoot the TEC and it actually heats up your CPU like a toaster. Air cooling a TEC only works if you are using like 36 watters

This should explain everything:

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=309722

- The Critical Element: Controlling the Temperature of the Hot-Side -

As we have seen from the example above, you must control the hot-side’s temperature to achieve a given temperature on the cold-side. This, however, can be more difficult than it seems.

Let’s say Bob wants to cool his XP 2000+ which generates 60-watts of heat. Bob just so happens to have a ‘Magic Heatsink’ that magically cools a heat load of 60-watts to room temperature (in this case room temp is 25C, remember that). Not a bad heatsink (must be a Thermalright). So Bob figures, “If I attach this bad boy to the hot-side of my 226-watt TEC then I can maintain room temperature on the hot-side of 25C, then the cold-side will be -26C assuming a Delta T = 51C.” Bob is about to get a rude awaking.

What’s Bob’s problem? The heat load generated on the hot-side of the 226-watt TEC is not just 60-watts anymore (the original heat output of his CPU). It is the original heat output of the CPU (60-watts) plus the Cooling Power of the TEC (226-watts). 60watts+226watts = 286-watts of heat generated on the hot-side of the TEC. That’s enough watts to heat 1 liter of water by 4.1C in one minute. See Bob’s problem? Well, it’s about to become yours.

THL = Heat Load + Max Cooling Power

-THL (Total Heat Load) = The heat load generated on the hot-side of the TEC in watts.
-Heat Load = The heat generated (in this case) by the processor measured in watts.
-Max Cooling Power = Maximum TEC rating in watts. (e.g. a 226-watt TEC)

So even with the TEC, your back to playing the same cooling game as you had been before. Except this time you have a few more watts of heat to deal with. Remember, you can get much better results using a TEC with good water cooling than you could with good water cooling alone.

boorishid · Dec 4, 2008

ahhh seems that in the end this idea would not be very cost effective and akk te part would add to about the same price as a phase changer.

aja · Dec 4, 2008

If you are keen for some TEC fun, might I suggest:

http://www.arcticspider.com/index.php?l=product_detail&p=4
http://www.arcticspider.com/index.php?l=product_detail&p=2
http://www.arcticspider.com/index.php?l=product_detail&p=1

But it will cost you a pretty penny.

boorishid · Dec 4, 2008

I have a 1200 watt psu im sure i could just splice two of the standard 12 volt molex rails in togather is seies to power that thing? I dont have any problems doing this ive worked as an electrician for a few years till i recently quit to go back to school for computer engineering. Im acually asking this question becuase im not sure how a computers psu work. I just know it read 12 volts when you meter the red and ground so it seem to me if you spliced two togather you could get the 24 volts you need run that pelt, i guess its 26 volts but those two volts arent gonna make a diffrence when cooling your cpu only with that thing. Also theres four fittings on that block are they suggesting you run two loops throught it, that kinda goes with the question below.

As far as this chiller goes from what you are saying if i want to run two 220 pelts the water cooling to cool them needs to be able to keep them at ambient while they are dumping 440 watts of heat in the loop? If im understanding that correct then you could just build a wc system to disapate 440 watts and use that, it would have about the exact same cooling effect as the chiller if there were acually 440 watts of power dumped into the water. If im only dumping 220 watts into the chilled water i would most likely have sub ambients though?

Water Chiller idea involving TEC's?

boorishid

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