Thinking about building a tower.

Ok, so I've done a little (and I do mean little) research on the subject, and have what I feel are some really good ideas I want to run by you folks.

First, I'm planning on making a BIG tower, like 6' of actual water-fall tubing or more (8' ceiling in here), coupled with probably 6 - 9 inches of reservoir / base. (I don't want to have to be filling the thing up every day.)

Because the distance from the waterblock (close to ground level) and the dispersing device (haven't decided between nozzle array, drilled plate, or shower head) is going to be at least 6 feet heigh differential, would I need a fairly high GPH high head pump? I'm concerned that if I drop $50 roughly on a high flow pump vs a medium more sedate pump, flow might be TOO much, and noise might be unbearable. On the other hand, I don't want the thing struggling to move water up to the top of the tower.

Second, since it'll be open air, I will of course need an algecide, preferably one that wouldn't kill me.

I grew up in a house with a swimming pool. Swimming pools grow alge unless... you use swimming pool algecide. A few bottles can treat 40,000 gallons of pool water without being a toxic danger to swimmers. I figure a capful should be MORE than enough for the amount of water needed to fill my planned tower system, and the leftovers should last me for years. Thoughts?

Dispersal method: I'm toying with the idea of either using a shower head like most people do, or building my own, essentially, by fitting the top area of the tube with a sealed plate (mid-cap design) with bunches of holes in it, except for the middle 2 or 2.5 inch circle of the plate, which will be open with a raised center (to pool water and allow airflow). Obviously, I'll have to tweak the hole design to ensure the plate flows more water than the pump does, to prevent overspillage, but does this seem like a good idea? Picture a bowl with a flat bottom with hundres of holes in it to drip or stream water steadily, or picture a REALLY BIG shower head.

That's my first choice. Second choice would involve a lot more work, and would consist of an array of several pressurized nozzles to mist the water down the tower. I think the number one killer for this would be noise.

For the very top of the tube, i'm thinking of a shroud to hide it, and inserting several scotch bright pads or wire meshes, in a staggered not-quite-sealing-the-tube fashion, but still placed in such a way that air will have to flow through them, much like a mazed water block. This will be to recapture some of the moisture in the air, Thoughts?

For the waterblock, I'll probably go with the newest maze from DD. Anything perform WAAY better without costing WAAY more?

And lastly, I want it to be visually stunning. To that end, where can I get a (minimum) 6' x 8" (roughly) diameter clear lexan or similar pipe / tube? Anyone know? I want to be able to array LEDs or Cold Cathodes around the bottom of the tube to light up the waterfall, I think that would be freaking awesome with the lights turned off, and would turn my girlfriend into a submissive love slave on account of how cool I would suddenly become.

WOW! very impressive idea!

I'd KISS and go with a showehead. Make sure you have a MONSTER pump as head loss is going to be the full height of the tower, and not many pumps deliver a good flowrate through a restricted opening at 6 foot height! Lift capability in this case is MUCH more important than flow rate so much so I would consider a diaphragm pump rather than centrifugal

Other than that I think you will find it pretty easy the algaecide will be tricky... I have heard people suggest VERY intense UV light... it kills most things so if you can seal a section of tube into a blacked out box, and instally a VERY VERY powerful UV source it would work, and never need to be topped up!

yes, you can get clear poly tubes that size, but beware they're expensive.

as for your dispersal method, definitely keep it simple stupid and go with the showerhead. if you're worried about noise, what you can do is stick a piece of bowed plexiglass at the bottom and have some holes around the edge. that way the water will strike the plexi rather soundlessly and roll down the sides of the tube instead of showering on the water at the bottom and making assloads of noise.

go with a high head pump, forget gph. you need something with at least 8 ft of head if you want to go with a 7ft tower. look into www.marinedepot.com for a lot of pumps, including many high head ones that arent that expensive

as for the algicide, BE CAREFUL. pool stuff usually uses acid in their algicides. while this is fine for a stagnant pool with few corrosive parts, its not fine for computers and not fine with showers. the acids will destroy your computer fast and probably your pump/showerhead too. what you want is a non-acidic/non-basic neutral ph algicide. make sure you get the right thing. aquarium stores sell it if you fall short at the pool store

neet idea buy your gonna nedd a seriuos pump, I would recomend either the danner-5 model or the 7. The 5 has a max head of 10foot and moves 500gph and is $50 at marine depot, and the 7 moves 700 with a 12foot head. thats $55 at the same place. I hope you make this coz it would look soo cool, i dont really know about algicide but the UV thing deffinatly sounds cool even though i dont know anything abut it..... Keep us posted!

Nice idea. A couple of suggestions/comments:

1. Instead of using the bottom of your tubing as a reservoir, you should consider mounting the tower in a 5-gallon bucket. This lets you keep a huge amount of water in your reservoir. Also you can submerge your pump(s).

2. With regard to the pump, you'll need a high-head pump (as several others have already mentioned). You also might want to consider using two pumps: A high-capacity one for raising the coolant to the top of your tower, and a smaller one for circulating coolant through your cooling system. A high-head pump will have higher water pressures, making leaks more likely. Adding the second pump reduces the possibility of leaks inside your PC. EDIT: A second pump also allows you to maintain a higher flowrate in your coolant loop without having to maintain the same flowrate up to the top of your tower.

3. A 6' high tower in a room with 8' ceilings? Be careful you don't end up with a wet spot on your ceiling.

4. Like the others, I believe that a showerhead is the best alternative, but I can see the appeal of rolling your own.

Great responses, very helpful!

Some notes:

SavageHenry: I reread what I wrote, and it looks like I meant to use the bottom of the tower as the reservoir, but I meant 6 - 9 inches of some other material (And larger than the tower) as a res. I hadn't even really thought about WHAT I would use, but I'm going to want it to be attractive.

To all, on the pump: Great help here, cleared up a lot and I don't know if I'll do the two pump right, but that sounds like a pretty good idea. I'll mull it over and try to figure out if I want to effectively double the cost of the pump budget or not. A high pressure leak in the case would surely suck, though.

Re: dispersal: My reasoning for building the dispersal plate is this: A showerhead will either have a very directed spray / flow, not taking advantage of the full cross-sectional area of the tower, or too wide of a spray, ending in the same result with water striking the sides early, and not falling free.

As for noise, I forgot to mention that I was going to build a staggered baffle system into the bottom of the tower, to deflect water and have it angled down into the reservoir. From other discussions and plans, I knew that having the water striking the res directly would result in a lot of rainfall noise.

I'll try to get into photoshop some time this weekend and flesh out the concept in my head. (Have to first work, then play tonight.)

Sorry, I missed the part about wanting clear lexan tubing . . . McMaster (http://www.mcmaster.com) has 8" OD Lexan tubing. It's expensive, though ($31.20 per foot). They also have 8" OD cast acrylic tubing (only available in max. 5" lengths - for $182.70). They carry clear PVC, but only up to 4" ID and even more expensive . . .

An alternative might be to buy regular opaque tubing and 'mod' it . . . cut holes in the sides and cover them with thin plexiglass. It might be tricky getting this to seal well and look good at the same time, though.

Another alternative is to build a single piece tower/reservoir out of acrylic or lexan sheet. It would have to be square shaped and be difficult to seal, but would end up looking really cool.

For the reservoir: If you're looking for something clear, check out http://www.usplastic.com. They carry a wide variety of plastic containers. Also, a 5-gallon water jug (used in office water coolers) may be a good base for making a reservoir.

I think after looking at prices I probably WILL fashion my own tower, and make it square. I've worked with plexi before and it's not too difficult if you take your time and measure 50 times, cut once.

Cost savings will more than offset the lost of a circular tower.

Great links, btw, I've bookmarked every one posted so far.

Just gotta wait for my tax return now, and draw up some plans in the interim.

http://teabag.tehinterweb.net/towerAlpha1.jpg

That's a link to my alpha design plan.

Instead of making it a proper bong with an angled pipe for the intake fan, I'll probably make it so the fan sits on top of the reservoir, blowing air down into it, which is forced up the tower and out the top. The water level will be high enough to reach the bottom of the lower deflector, and fan will be placed in the open area, to force air up the deflector and hence, the tower.

Like the image says, building it out of plexi (which is fairly cheap, and which I probably already have access to at my dad's house) will allow me to make it as big as I want, allowing as much area inside as I want. Wh00t.

I didn't make it clear in the picture, but the angled colored squares will be sheets of plexi fitted to the inside of the tower for top) baffled mist collector and bottom) angled water collector / deflector for noise reduction.

MAN am I excited about this. I've always wanted to get into water cooling, and I think my first foray will be a serious undertaking.

[Hardees]If you're going to go, go all out![/Hardees]