Is my Eheim 1046 pump good enough ?

I've recently redone my system by making my two radiators run in parallel. The sequence now goes like this;

Pump > Res > Y-splitter...

1. Heatercore > CPU block > pump
2. Radiator > GPU > pump

I've only a little Eheim 1046 pump, and there is alot of tubing and stuff for the water to get through. Water flow seems ok, but it's not brilliant or as fast as it was when I just had one rad and one block.

My thinking so far is that it should be ok. As I see it with my simple logic; as long as there's no real difference between the waterblock temp and radiator temp, then there is no need for faster flow rates. I know higher flow rates mean better heat transfer, but in a closed loop system (such as all watercooling setups) is the flow rate that important?

So basically what I'm asking is; is this pump ok for the job?
Would spending £30 on an Eheim 1048 be worth it.

Also, has anyone upgraded just their pump and seen real benefits?


Thanks in advance for any replies, very much appreciated, thanks!

pump>res>y-splitter

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is that really the order in which the water flows? if so, you do not want the pump to be pushing through your resevoir, you want it to be drawing from the resevoir. i would also place my heat exchangers after the cpu/gpu but this might be more a matter of preference.

flow rate is very imporant in a watercooling setup... to a point. after that point, you get diminishing marginal returns. with two blocks and two heat exchangers however, i would say you arent overdoing it for sure right now, and upgrading could possibly gain a couple degrees, depending on what your temps are now. what are they? room, case, cpu, or anything else you have a reading on.

im not sure what the spec difference is between the 1046 and 1048, but to see a noticeable difference in cooling results, there will have to be noticeable considerable differences in specs.

hope that helps. good luck.

why dont you do......

Rad- CPU- GPU- RES- Pump

it was originally an innovatek setup. With that the res is attached to directly to the pump. So sorry, yeah, the res is first with the pump drawing directly from it. They're so attached i just got confused.

I've sent the water thru the rads first as a means of convenience in my computer case. Plus even though it probably won't make a great deal of difference, I like to think my cpu is getting the coldest possible water.

My current temps are about 29°c idle, and 32°c under load. That's measured with a probe place right next to the cpu under the waterblock. Motherboard cpu probe gives 36°c idle, 41°c load. Though that probe always gives stupid results, plus it gets warmed up by the northbridge and even my psu (psu is just above and attached to case and so heat inevitably gets onto the mobo). The mosfets add heat too, but I digress...

The pump upgrade in question (from a 1046 to a 1048) would provide double the water flow (300 l/h vs. 600 l/h. Maybe that would give me better temps? Or is 300 l/h enough?

Considering I've two radiators, Ijust think my temps should be lower...

will_maltby said:

...So basically what I'm asking is; is this pump ok for the job?
Would spending £30 on an Eheim 1048 be worth it....

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Your numbers look pretty good. If your system is running fine as is, why change it?

BTW, when I had my water cooler hooked up, I did a PUMP > BLOCK > RAD > RESERVOIR loop and I capped at 7C over ambient running CPUBurn & Runprio on high setting (the worst torture test I have encountered to date). That loop works well -- I think Larry Browning notes in his "Brute Force Watercooling" article that he got a 3C advantage with this loop direction. So, IMO, you are set with your directional flow.

yeah, you're probably right, I should be content with what I have already. Idle temps are about 3°c above ambient, under load is about 5-6°c over. Actually looking at this is quite satisfying. I should probably learn to ignore that silly mobo probe.

But I'm a fiddler! I like to fiddle and perfect til no more fiddling can be done and after that I'll acquire some more stuff to fiddle with!

Overclocking is just glorified fiddling!

will_maltby said:

yeah, you're probably right, I should be content with what I have already. Idle temps are about 3°c above ambient, under load is about 5-6°c over. Actually looking at this is quite satisfying. I should probably learn to ignore that silly mobo probe.

But I'm a fiddler! I like to fiddle and perfect til no more fiddling can be done and after that I'll acquire some more stuff to fiddle with!

Overclocking is just glorified fiddling!

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A stronger pump will be better, but how much is hard to say. It depends on your needs/desires whether you want to invest in a new pump. I do think the 1046 is a bit overworked with multiple blocks, but the details of your tubing (length, diameter) are unclear.

Having said that, I might mention that as a fellow ex-Innovatek user I just bought an Eheim 1250.

FIZZ3 said:

... Having said that, I might mention that as a fellow ex-Innovatek user I just bought an Eheim 1250.

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Why did you stop using Innovatek stuff? Or did you just replace the pump?

scrappydog said:

Why did you stop using Innovatek stuff? Or did you just replace the pump?

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I'm about to upgrade my CPU and I figured it would be a good time to upgrade the cooling also. The Innovatek kit is good, but a custom setup will beat it handily.

Actually those are just excuses to continue tinkering.

FIZZ3 said:

I'm about to upgrade my CPU and I figured it would be a good time to upgrade the cooling also. The Innovatek kit is good, but a custom setup will beat it handily... Actually those are just excuses to continue tinkering.

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Sounds nice. When I bought all of my wc components, the Innovatek stuff was out of my budget so I started piecing stuff together. The result was super ghetto, but it performed very well. What components are you planning on getting?

will_maltby said:

... just glorified fiddling! ...

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Oh yeah, and very addictive.

scrappydog said:

Sounds nice. When I bought all of my wc components, the Innovatek stuff was out of my budget so I started piecing stuff together. The result was super ghetto, but it performed very well. What components are you planning on getting?

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I ordered already- heatercore+shroud from DTEK, 1/2" tygon tubing (+Tpiece, no res this time), Eheim 1250, Cathar's White Water block and a single good 120x38 fan (ordered a YSTech but got no acknowledge so I'll order elsewhere, I like papst better anyway).
And I hope to put it all in my little case (see sig).

FIZZ3 said:

I ordered already- heatercore+shroud from DTEK, 1/2" tygon tubing (+Tpiece, no res this time), Eheim 1250, Cathar's White Water block and a single good 120x38 fan (ordered a YSTech but got no acknowledge so I'll order elsewhere, I like papst better anyway).
And I hope to put it all in my little case (see sig).

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Nice setup! You should post your before-and-after results.

[EDIT] I just read BillA's writeup on the Cathar White Water & he mentions that pumping head is very important due to the resistance in the waterblock. Does it concern you that the Eheim is not necessarily a pressure pump?

scrappydog said:

Nice setup! You should post your before-and-after results.

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Yah I would, but I'm switching CPU's too. :>

scrappydog said:

Nice setup! You should post your before-and-after results.

[EDIT] I just read BillA's writeup on the Cathar White Water & he mentions that pumping head is very important due to the resistance in the waterblock. Does it concern you that the Eheim is not necessarily a pressure pump?

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Not really. Cathar posted an explanation on how performance would be affected with various pumps. The Eheim 1250 will yield excellent results, also don't forget that it's a Big Pump already. I even think that while you could do a bit better with a super-custom pump, you would also face rapidly increasing diminishing returns, thus making the investment less attractive.

Hey and I gotta fit it all in my case, don't forget lol!

FIZZ3 said:

Not really. Cathar posted an explanation on how performance would be affected with various pumps. The Eheim 1250 will yield excellent results, also don't forget that it's a Big Pump already. I even think that while you could do a bit better with a super-custom pump, you would also face rapidly increasing diminishing returns, thus making the investment less attractive... Hey and I gotta fit it all in my case, don't forget lol!

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Ah. Haven't seen the pump info. Are you going to add additional blocks to the loop?

If you ever go for a higher head pump, the Supreme Mag-Drive 3 (aka Pondmaster) is a decent pump. It pushes about the same water volume as the Eheim 1250, but it offers better pressure performance (10.5', I think). It's small enough to fit in a case.

scrappydog said:

Ah. Haven't seen the pump info. Are you going to add additional blocks to the loop?

If you ever go for a higher head pump, the Supreme Mag-Drive 3 (aka Pondmaster) is a decent pump. It pushes about the same water volume as the Eheim 1250, but it offers better pressure performance (10.5', I think). It's small enough to fit in a case.

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No I'm not going to add more blocks. It would of course diminish the effectiveness of the most crucial part: the CPU cooling. Also, it adds tubing mess to an already cramped case.
I am furthermore not very convinced by the effectiveness of Northbridge watercooling except in very specific situations. If it comes to the point where the NB overheats, many mainboards will give out on other components already (mosfets, clockgens). Watercooling the NB cannot help out anymore then.
As far as videocards are concerned; only the gpu+2sides ram cooling blocks would do some good- without airflow on the gpu, the ram usually gets hotter, so that a gpu-only block isn't so great a choice in many cases. But even taking an 'effective' videocard block, the ROI is small. I have seen miniscule gains from overclocking various videocards in the past, and eventually landed on the conclusion that it doesn't benefit me either way, because I usually turn down the graphic details anyway if frames are *really* needed (read: in online competitive play). And if you're not having a FX card in there, the noise the tiny fan usually generates is negligible.

Thanks for the tip on the pump, btw. =)

FIZZ3 said:

... Thanks for the tip on the pump, btw. =)

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You bet. I considered GPU water cooling (for my system), but haven't done a lot of research on it. My key consideration is eliminating noise (from the fan) rather than the cooling performance. This seems even more prescient given how loud the newest generation of video cards are.