I have to agree with the above statements video avoid mixed metal loops. These tent to cause a lot of issues. It's also why aluminum rads are getting hard to find.
The port can be located anywhere it's easily accessible. Where it is in the loop isn't as important but some will say it should be after the pump so you can use the pump to drain the line. The issue with this is you can't use the pump to fill. On that note, NEVER run you pump dry, even for a few seconds.
Oh well. I will use one pump to fill and one to drain, I wasn't thinking about the drain. And ye, never run a pump dry, this should be stated more often.
I know that a 60 mm thick radiator made out of copper is way better in all of the ways you look at it, but hey, these aluminium rads are cheap as hell. I got all of them for less than 100$ and if I'm right they will perform similarly too 60mm thick rads, so even if it's aluminium, I should get good performances out of them.
Same thing applies for the waterblocks with integrated pumps. I know a single standalone pump may perform way better, just starting by the fact the pump itself heats up, but these are replacement parts for AIO units, they are bloody cheap, more than a pump and a waterblock.
Id cooling is the first one to make a full AIO system for GPU + CPU, called Hunter Duet, with a single 2.120X30 aluminium rad. They are chinese, but they got positive reviews. Or, I consider positive a review stating that it's ALMOST able to support a full overclocked system in silence, which is what I expect from a single radiator like that and something good for an expense of 170$ which comes ready to mount. When they released the blocks singularly, I realized how much bang for your bucks they give you. Also, they are making the first AIO kit for SLI cards.
I'm sorry, I only look at performance/price rateo when it comes to PC, I'm cheap ******* and I know it
@Lochekey May I ask you to further explain why I should put them in series, performance wise? I think I should maximize flow, not prevalence, for a radiator.
Good performance, sure. That was never the issue with aluminum rads. The problem is that as the aluminum is eroded by the water and carried into other parts, those parts will start to deteriorate at an accelerated rate. This will cause all kinds of problems, and the parts will fail prematurely.
@Lochekey May I ask you to further explain why I should put them in series, performance wise? I think I should maximize flow, not prevalence, for a radiator.
Allright.
It will take a long time for all the pieces to arrive at my home and come back with datas and ****, so I think I should explain better how I intend to build my little experiment up.
I can give you the sketch I did to help me shop. Remember my pumps functions also as waterblocks.
Soooo. First thing to clear out: the two rads can't conduct heat from each other, since their temperature is driven mainly by the water in them, and it's the SAME water, they will be at the same temperature.
This avoids conduction heat transfers that destroy the performance in stacking two rads in series.
One bad thing that it's correctly pointed out is that each radiator will recive half the flow. Pity. Since the dissipation power is linear with flow, they will have half of the performances in dynamic cooling power. But I have 2, and afterall I have doubled the passageway, so it should perform a trifle better.
So what I'm trying to do here? Look at the fans. They will run both radiators in serie. Rad 1 will surely run a little bit hotter than rad 2, but I have doubled the surface of heat transfer to air. Air coming out will be hotter if confronted with a single radiator? Yes, so water will be colder. Not doubling performances, but I personally extimate a 150% if confronted with a single rad in a ton of calculus I have on paper and no real capacity to prove since based on basic readings over my manuals, which don't really deepen a lot. And yes ****ers putting all the rads on 6 separate fans would have worked better, but it defies the lanbox concept.
But I'm an honest man. I don't hope for that much, since 150% is only in the performances of the radiator itself, not in the system, and this assumes fans have no problems pushing trough 60mm of dissipator, which is not true and I then give up to extimate and throw numbers and legitimately hope for a 120%, which IS something afterall. And I can probably get a good performance gain if I put 3 more fans and push pull the ****, but I have enough toys for now.
Another thing I'm sure got your attention are the valves. Since I have a so little space, I plan to use an external reservoir for system fill up and cleaning. This way it's easy as pie to drain, fill with cleaning solution, drain, rinse and fill again, I have a hose that sucks and one that blows if I close the valves, it should help things out. I know this whole thing is a flow restriction, but it's needed, I have purposely designed the reservoir really small... Because it is, and so it's useless when it comes to filling, I need an external one. I was tempted to run without for maximum flow but then I reasoned.
And of course I'm going to disassembly the handle of the valves after use, so they can't be closed as the system runs.
The last thing you may want to know are the numbers on the sketch, it's the inner diameter of the tubes."Why should you dumb *** want to go in the pump with a smaller tube?" Because it comes in 6. And after all, this should move the hot water quckier away from the waterblock-pump for less conduction transfer backwards, but this is another trifle.
What is the fpi on the rads you bought. Most 60mm thick rads have a mid to low fpi so as to work well with a range of fans whereas most thin 30mm rads have a higher fpi to help maximize heat dissipation. If you are stacking the 2-30mm thick rads and they are high fpi you may want to look at a good set of fans to push through that. Otherwise you will limit your cooling gains as you will not be able to push air through them adequately. You are also going to want to try and keep the fins between the 2 rads in line as much as possible otherwise this will induce even more backpresdure on the fans.
As for the tubing size you are overthinking it. If anything 6mm tubing is mighty small. That is not even 1/4 inch tubing which is the normal minimum recommendation. If anything you will be hindering yourself with extra backpressure from tubing that small. As long as you maintain 1 gpm+ you will not have heat transfer back through the loop due to conduction.
Closest I could find is some testing done over at xtremesystems, looks like if you have really high sp fans you may be able to gain something but with normal fans you actually do worse.
Soooo... After a long wait, abundant blaphemy and tears I ended up building the most unmaintable and ugly water cooling mod man has ever recorded.
I never cared about the look of this mod, but I didn't realize what horrible cluster of tubing I was creating.
And NEVER EVER use the kind of clamps you see here... Those are razors around your case, and cutting them worsen only the problem.
To whom suggested me to get a bigger case... YOU WERE RIGHT. Working in that tiny space was horrible.
Still, I'm pretty proud of it. Draining and filling this system is defintely not a problem.
YES, I putted a goddamn gardning valve in there, two actually. The one with the handle blocks the path to water and forces it to go trough the reservoir. When opened, it works as a bypass for it, which should be a good thing for flow.
The second valve got it's handle removed, it's in the top left corner of the picture. When closed, it forces all the water trough the drain tube, easing flushing of the reservoir and the system. Closing both of them will block the system, so guess why the handle found a spot in the case but nowhere near the drain valve
The hardest part of the mod, anyway, was to fix the radiators and the fans in a way they weren't clearly intended to be used. And using screws to fix those was out of the question, if I didn't drill a hole right trough the radiator itself amd found incredibly long screws.
No, I didn't do that. I ended up pulling 2.5 mm cable ties trough the holes, fins and radiators and packing it up with the head bit of another tie. It looks bad and installation and maintenance is a real pain in the a**, again, don't follow me kids.
And of course I had pleanty of room to mess around with the ties while fixing them to the case.
But... now there it is no metallic path to connect the radiators to anything, they are fixed in foam, ties, rubber tubing, fans and thin air. So, no current can circulate trought them, which should block any dielectric corrosion
When I had to first fill the system, I flushed a big amount of plain water trough the system and the drain hole to spit all dust and stuff, then I let it circulate an half hour with abundant winegar in the water, to kill any living being in the loop.
Then i flushed with abundant distilled water and added a copious amount of Purple Ice, which I diluited a few days after.
Be aware of purple ice. Bits of coating may detach from the pump and float around. At least that is what I think those sudden things that popped in the reservoir were.
Lets speak about these integrated pumps from ID cooling, China. They provide a sufficent flow togheter but I'd want more and I found some really unpeasant bits and grits where the processing units sits... But they are darn cheap and they offer a really wide compatibility. Let's say that I'd recommend those only for really tiny systems like mine and to use proper sized pumps when possible, but they do their job. Oh and they glow.
And let's conclude with temps. The system keeps my [email protected] under 75 C during Intel burn test, AKA Linpack. But it stays under 55 C in normal, intensive use, like 3Dmark Combo test, Linpack has really no chill. Oh and I should mention that I delidded it. I use Mx2.
The 970 is where the biggest improvement was archived, with an improved clock of 1.493 mHz it never tops 46 C.
Using them togheter makes no noticeable difference.
Fans have a really limited impact on temps, expecially in idle, and case fans almost pair with the radiator ones in effectiveness.
This allowed me to build a really smooth curve in Speedfan and to have a really silent system. When doing anything that is not linpacking, temps are under 50 C with fans at minimum. There is no need to spin them until water is hot, which usually never happens in everyday use.
Considering that the whole thing costed me less than 200 €, I'm happy with the result. I squeezed around 250 points more in 3DMark (10772) and gaming now is totally silent.
But hell is it ugly.
Screens and links on request.
Ya. Not sure where to begin. I'll start by saying nice things. I'm not concerned about the looks. I think sometimes we focus to much on aesthetics and miss the functionality.
Those clamps actually do work well. They are what I have in my system. The problem you are having is that you bought a size to big. The smaller clamps would have less of the band sticking out.
I still don't get the purpose of the valves, but if you're getting good temps and are happy, so am I.
Ok. Now for the hard honest truths. Did you say you're using speed fan still? Your motherboard is going to have better software pre-installed than that dinosaur of a program. Don't get me wrong, it's fine for old hardware, but for anything made after say 1998 not so much.
When I had to first fill the system, I flushed a big amount of plain water trough the system and the drain hole to spit all dust and stuff, then I let it circulate an half hour with abundant winegar in the water, to kill any living being in the loop.
This sentence. Good lord help me. This sentence has so much wrong with it I don't know where to begin. I'll break it down. Remember this is a learning experience right
1. You clearly did not read any of the stickies.
2. (If you had) You must rinse each component first. (Google rad dance) they machine many of the components during manufacturing. That's what all those bits are that you flushed.
3. Vinegar does not kill most living organisms. I'm hoping you meant bleach.
4. Purple ICE. I'm not familiar with but I'll assume it's a dyed coolant. This isn't wrong, but generally not prefered as it decreases the time between maintenance, could cause staining of parts, and will gunk up the loop as a whole.
So, I hope this doesn't come across to harsh. We're here to help if you want it but honestly if you want the best you'll need to do some more research.
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