Two radiators in a row...

So I had a bunch of watercooling supplies all set and ready to go. I finally realized that my case would never fit watercooling stuff inside. I began to build an external box. I realized that the external box would not keep the cool look that I liked. I began to build my own case. That case is half finished, but its gonna be big and clunky and a pain, and it will be assembled during the summer when I have more time.

So.

I still want to watercool. I've had all of the parts (well, now I need another waterblock for the second processor :-] ) for about forever, just hanging around. I'm considering a slightly larger version of my case, one which could fit a 120mm radiator upright down in the front (where i would like it to be).

Now for my question:

Would running two radiators in a row help cooling? IE from front to back - Front of my case, Radiator, Shroud/Fan , Radiator, Shroud/Fan? All sharing the same airflow path? Also, the middle fan could be removed and just shrouded. I would assume that the air wouldn't be extremely heated to the point of having the second radiator be ineffective.. ?

I always planned on using a 2x120mm heatercore, but it will never fit in one of the cases I would like it to without a rediculous amount of modifications. Would two 120's in this configuration do the trick? I realize the performance wouldn't be quite as good, but would it suffer much?

Would one 120 be just as good? Would hanging one off the back of the case (swiftech radbox style) be so much better that my idea is foolish?

Thanks :-]

not really the diminished returns from using pre heated air from the first rad will lower your delta t and make the extra rad kinda redundant.

if oyu are building your case make it large enough for 3 water cooling systems and 2 mother boards like a rack system =)

Two radiators in a row like that really isn't a good idea. You didn't say which radiators you had, but unless they're a very open design you won't get much air to flow "through" them. And, without the airflow cooling won't take place. You could, of course, put monster fans on them to force the air through, but then you'll get a lot of noise that could have been avoided. It's much easier to keep the radiators separate using lower powered fans to keep the noise down to reasonable levels.

You could use them in series , but like the others said I wouldn't put them "together" using the same airflow.

thorilan said:

if oyu are building your case make it large enough for 3 water cooling systems and 2 mother boards like a rack system =)

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Well, its not quite big enough to hold two systems.. and what would I need that for anyway ;-]

But it is big enough to easily fit two 2x120mm heatercores.. and however many hard drives I find the need to use :-]

For the two in a row radiators - I planned on using the.. um.. chevette?.. The normal one that most people choose to use to modify.. I already have a few bonnevile cores for my other project, and they seem to be decently open / low airflow restriction. Is that too much restriction? Most likely I'll be using some Sanyo's on a fan controller.

So from the responses, I take it that its not a good plan. Oh well. Out of curiosity, do you guys think it would hurt? It might not help a whole lot, but would it actually hurt performance (Due to reheating, low airflow, lots o' noise, etc)?

perfectturmoil said:

Would hanging one off the back of the case (swiftech radbox style) be so much better that my idea is foolish?

Thanks :-]

Click to expand...

Yes. 2 120mm rads will help over 1, but the way you propose is no good.