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Hard Pipe Deform caused leak.

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Revv323

Registered
Joined
Oct 16, 2016
Location
Sydney - Australia
Hi all.
I recently sprung a leak in one of my hard tube fittings right above my lovely 980 Ti hydro copper and soaked it. Managed to bake it and get it working again (after trying many other cleaning/drying techniques) which is good. Before i reconnect
my loop though, i wanted to see if anyone has had the same issue that caused my loop to leak. On the CPU water block (EK Acetal) both acetal pipes had deformed slightly causing the o-rings to not provide a good enough seal. It is really strange in that the pipe looks slightly flared at the end before narrowing into a thinner "waist" and then returning to normal pipe OD. They were cut and fitted perfectly when i made them so i can only think that heat must have caused them to deform.... Has anyone seen this before?? My pump never stopped and the system always stayed below 50 deg C even under stress. Just wanted to put it out there in case anyone has something to add before i bother putting my loop back together only to have it happen again in 6 months and destroy a $1k video card. Thanks in advance.
 
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:welcome: to OCFs!

Sorry to hear about your misfortune. It can happen unfortunately. Can I request for some images to better help us investigate.
 
Sure. The first pic is a "normal" pipe end. I had it connected from pump to inlet of video card. The second is the deformed which was on the outlet of the CPU block. normal.jpg deformed.jpg
 
Can we get a little more information about your system? We know you're running a 980Ti, but what of the rest? How much radiator are you using, and what are you using to monitor system health?
 
Can we get a little more information about your system? We know you're running a 980Ti, but what of the rest? How much radiator are you using, and what are you using to monitor system health?

+1

What were your CPU, GPU, water and ambient temps like on idle and load, etc.
 
+1

What were your CPU, GPU, water and ambient temps like on idle and load, etc.


CPU and GPU run at about 45 deg C under load (long gaming sessions) with ambients of around 25 deg C. Idle temps are around 30 deg C. Temps never got really high. I have Corsair Commander mini controlling pump and fan speeds. The only time pump turns off is when the PC goes to sleep. Could it still be getting hot then?? Would not have thought so.....
 
Can we get a little more information about your system? We know you're running a 980Ti, but what of the rest? How much radiator are you using, and what are you using to monitor system health?

Sorry, i am still trying to figure out how to have my system info show under my posts..... Have set up system info in account and added to signature but still cant see it?? Will get there. To answer your question:
CPU - i5 6600k ~ Board - ASUS Z170I Pro Gaming
GPU - EVGA GTX 980 Ti Hydro Copper
RAM - Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB (2x16GB) 2800MHz DDR4
Cooling - Custom Loop. 5 x Noctua 120mm Fans. EK XRES 100 DDC.
SSD - Samsung 850pro 512GB
HDD - Western Digital WD Red 4TB
PSU - Corsair HX750i 750W
AUX - Corsair Commander Mini Fan controller.
RADS - 2 x EK-CoolStream SE 240

System never gets hot even under stress. Highest i have seen is 50 deg C (CPU) and that was when i first built the loop with inlet and outlet of CPU block reversed. See photo. pipes.jpg
 
Did you use the same brand of tubing as the fittings? Reason I ask is hard tubing and hard tubing fitting sizes aren't standardized between all the manufacturers. Just a thought.....
 
Hi all. Sorry for the slow replies, i have been in and out of hospital for a few weeks.... I finally had some time to bake out my video card and re-bend some pipes to get the system going again. Good news is that after a cook in the oven, my GTX 980 TI is working again sans DVI port. This doesnt bother me too much as it forced me to finally shell out for a new monitor, which i had been wanting for a while. Say hello to Acer Predator XB271HU !!!! Anyway, after putting the system back together and getting things running again. I noticed that my DDC pump would stop sometimes for no reason. It would start with the PC and then slow down once Corsair Link had saterted (so control is good) but sometimes just stop. I can tell now that i have added a flow indicator . (see pic) Weird??? I unplugged the control for the pump so that it runs flat out, which i am ok with as my loop has a fair bit of loop resistance. I can only assume, that the pump stoppped before and the fittings got hot and deformed the pipe..... Still not sure why the Corsair COmmander Mini is playing up. I have not been super impressed with it as it still has some bugs with LED flashes and fan PWM fan control is not awesome.... Any one else had issues with the commander mini or the link software???

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back together.jpg
 

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Welcome back and hope you're doing well.

Ok, so you gave us some great information. Glad you got your GPU working again. I would have warned you about the Corsair Link if I would have known prior. It's very unstable and has been for years. I gave up on it years ago and never looked back. I now use a more premium priced Aquaero 6 XT with all the bells and whistles it's capable of. It has its own learning curve because of its complexity but well worth it.

Steer away and get that link away from the pump. I now suspect the link stopped the pump and allowed the fluid to get warm enough to warp your tubing which then created the leak. Who knows how hot it had to get but I bet it was high.

Just use your CPU's PWM header as your controller and control it via BIOS / OS. If you need a fan hub for all your fans, look no further then to SPLITTY9 from Aquacomputer.
 
Welcome back and hope you're doing well.

Ok, so you gave us some great information. Glad you got your GPU working again. I would have warned you about the Corsair Link if I would have known prior. It's very unstable and has been for years. I gave up on it years ago and never looked back. I now use a more premium priced Aquaero 6 XT with all the bells and whistles it's capable of. It has its own learning curve because of its complexity but well worth it.

Steer away and get that link away from the pump. I now suspect the link stopped the pump and allowed the fluid to get warm enough to warp your tubing which then created the leak. Who knows how hot it had to get but I bet it was high.

Just use your CPU's PWM header as your controller and control it via BIOS / OS. If you need a fan hub for all your fans, look no further then to SPLITTY9 from Aquacomputer.

Not super keen on using bios control if there are other options available. I might do what you said for the pump though as that also gives me alarming if the pump stops etc. Any other suggestions for fan controllers? I am using the corsair link for led control as well. I like the setup, the small size (dont have any bays on my case...) and the software (usb header connected) is actually quite good to use. I like being able to modify fan curves etc from within windows and change profiles if i use need to. The corsair is just buggy as hell...... I had the NZXT Grid+ V2, but no PWM control which sucks as i specifically bought the PWM noctua fans....
 
The option to shut the PC off if temps get too high on the CPU is the first defense. That is a true hardware function , hehe or as close as you can get. No need for Corsair link or anything else.
 
The option to shut the PC off if temps get too high on the CPU is the first defense. That is a true hardware function , hehe or as close as you can get. No need for Corsair link or anything else.

Yes, but my CPU temps were not getting that high. Even still water will cool for ages as it will absorb heaps of heat from the cpu and the entire loop will warm up via conduction (maybe even a small convection current?) even without a pump. What happened was that the fittings got hot and deformed the pipes even though the water temp and cpu temps were still within acceptable limits. We know that we can run a 6600k up to about 80 deg or so without problems, but if your entire loop including pipes and fittings got to 80 deg C, then i imagine things would start to fall apart (literally) very quickly.
 
I remember my soft tubing I use has a threshold of up to 65c in water temps iirc. Chances are as you said was your fittings getting too hot since there was no circulation for heat dissipation.

I believe there is a way to control you pump through the OS. It just won't be with the crappy link. I trusted my system for a couple years on it and was lucky nothing went wrong other then my fans doing whatever they felt like. You could possibly use the fan controller via MB software through windows or see if maybe you could use Speedfan.

As for the LEDs, you could keep link for those and only those. Again, I wouldn't trust the link with my pumps or fans.
 
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