HELP! Sprung a huge leek during test!

HELP! Sprung a huge leek during test! - Comp dead?!

My MB is now covered with water... Thank god for UV die as I can actually find the crap! D*** Swiftech GPU block and it's gay socket things leaked all over my expensive Christmas present. (well, the expensive parts were) Even with towls in the case, it got on tons of stuff.

What was in the loop:
Distilled water
Dye-Lite UV die
Denaturalized (sp?) alcohol (just a little)

What go wet: Mother board (general), Northbridge, RAM sockets, MAYBE the CPU socket, but I cant really tell. Maybe the videocard, but I cant find any water on it. Case and floot got a bit as well.

Now what do I do to recover? I've cleaned up all the water that I can while it's in the case, and I'm in the process of tearing it down so I can get every thing out and dryed off. Other then just drying all the water up is there any thing else I can do to try and save my hardware?

Any help would be appreciated..

Was the computer on when this happened?

I would suggest separating everything, including the Northbridge HSF and letting them all dry separately; don't want any bits of water hiding in a PCI slot or in the CPU socket. Aim a fat at all of it. I'm not sure what that dye might do. Perhaps some things should be rinsed perhaps not. Maybe someone else can say.

Man, I've seen 2' Texas Instruments PCBs fully submerged in water before, then dried and running. So I think most of the stuff will be ok. Cleaning the slots and all will be the hard part.

Take the side off the case remove everything except the mobo and put a fan on it over night.

Once one of my cpu hoses leaked onto my video card and went into the socket!! I was lucky and some how after drying it still worked!

The computer was off, I was starting up the initial leek test on the thing so maybe I could start it up tomorrow, after SOOOO many days working on it. Looks like that's not going to happen.

Thinks I know lived: Video card ($300), RAM ($200), water stuff (ALOT), the case ($80)

Things that may not work: My WinFast 9150K8MA ($80), X2 3800+ E4 ($340)

It's not looking like I can pull the MB out of the case. The water cooling setup keeps it from beeing removable unless I remove THE ENTIRE THING. Seeing as there is still a lot of water in the loop, that does not sound like a good idea to me right now. Best I can do is separate the pasts, and fire up the air compressor and attack the MB with it in the case. SFF systems and water cooling dont mix too well. as I'm finding!

I'd wash it in alcohol and then let it dry. That's good that is was off........as long as you don't make unwanted connections...... clean and dry is the key now.

sir_pyro said:

The computer was off, I was starting up the initial leek test on the thing so maybe I could start it up tomorrow, after SOOOO many days working on it. Looks like that's not going to happen.

Thinks I know lived: Video card ($300), RAM ($200), water stuff (ALOT), the case ($80)

Things that may not work: My WinFast 9150K8MA ($80), X2 3800+ E4 ($340)

Click to expand...

Well I cant see how anything will go bad as long as it was off. I spilled juice on a tv remote once. As soon as it dried it worked fine.

Any suggestions on if I should pull the CPU or leave it in? Getting it out, then back in is going to be a serious PITA, but having the CPU die would be even worse. Water only barley got up against the socket, on one side (the one facing down on most of your MB's, or to the left when looking at the front of it in a SFF/MB is on the bottom layout). I'm not getting any signs of UV die under the socket, and there is no die nor was there water on the actual CPU or it's board either.

PCI and PCI-E slots are glowing though... So are the first two RAM slots, though the ram only had a small drop in each stick after I pulled it. I'm going to try compressed air to fix that.

Northbridge looks clean now, but I don’t know if any seeped up under it. The sync will be off for a little while nonetheless.

Oh, and thinks every one for there help on this! I’m a little less freaked out now. Time to get the Alcohol out and go at it on the board.

Separate everything!! Soak it in alcohol. Then use a hairdryer on cool for the CPU socket and in the PCI slots etc. Then i'd recommend leaving the mobo in a warm place like an airing cuboard, upside down, for 3days to a week.

Jimbob7 said:

Separate everything!! Soak it in alcohol. Then use a hairdryer on cool for the CPU socket and in the PCI slots etc. Then i'd recommend leaving the mobo in a warm place like an airing cuboard, upside down, for 3days to a week.

Click to expand...

Wouldnt the PCB's warp?

Sorry to be a kill joy.

no - don't SOAK the motherboard - pick up a few bottles of high-purity isopropyl rubbing alcohol, and give the motherboard a bath, using a new, soft toothbrush in the slots and hard-to-get areas, dry it off with a hairdryer after that and blow out all the slots with some canned air, then let it sit a day or two to make sure it is COMPLETELY dry



and btw... isn't the point of leak testing to remove all components during the test so something like this doesn't happen?



edit: no the PCB won't warp - its not like a sheet of cardboard

Sorry to hear of your bad luck on this. I do hope everything works out for you.

I have a question concerning this whole leaktest thing. Hoperfully all of my parts will be in this week for my first wc setup. And to avoid these types of situations can you not test the setup outside of the rig?

Uncivil said:

And to avoid these types of situations can you not test the setup outside of the rig?

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That's fine until you spring a leak while installing the hardware. Most accurate leak test is to install everything like it will be when you run it, then run the H2O system separately without any power to the hardware at all.

I gave the areas that got wet a sponge bath with alcohol early this morning, then put a space heater up to the side of the case on low... Then I finally got to go to bed . It's not fun staying up ALL FREKEN night trying to clean up a mess like this. Unfortunately, it's raining HARD outside so I cant fire up the compressor to clean out the slots yet. I also broke a capacitor off my video card getting the tubing off of it this afternoon . At this point I'm wishing I went air cooling!

I'll probably pull the CPU out if I can, then blow dry the socket there. Unfortunately there was no way to test the rig without EVERYTHING installed, because of the cramped quarters of the case and the radiator keeping the MB from being removed. If I can fix this capacitor, then I might be ready for a second leek test tonight... While the first mess is still drying. There is going to be a LOT of alcohol in this next test run of the loop, I'll say that. Maybe a 25% concentration of the stuff... That way if I mess up again, it'll clean it's self .

Edit: Oh, and just to note that is was not THAT MUCH water, and it was probably not very conductive at all. I had towels in the case under all the water components; so it was just the little bit that made it through the first defensive layer. Think of it like a VERRY thin layer of water that kind of spread across the MB in a few places when I was trying to clean it up. It's not like water DRENCHED the thing, and then found it's way into every nook and cranny of the board. I’m hoping to get this thing dry enough to power it up tomorrow night, because I'm running out of time before college starts back and my old rig I had there died.

Back in my days of Entertainment Centers and arcades we had taken complete chassis and arcade game boards and run them through dish washing machines to clean off all the smoking gunk. Just dry well before powering up.

Sorry to hear about your bad luck, sir_pyro, but at least nothing got fried. What are you going to do about the broken cap?

Uncivil, I have to agree with Bad Maniac. The best way to test is in the case with the electronics unpowered. If you're really paranoid, do both. Test outside the case for bad leaks, then install everything and run it for 24 hours to be sure before you power up.

Well, good news. After letting the MB/case sit for 12h next to a space heater, was able to bet my compressor dry enough to power it up and blow out the sockets. Not a drop of water is it be found now . I'm going to wipe off the parts I know got the worst of it with alcohol, and then rebuild my loop. I'm undecided about how I'm going to do the tubes on the GPU block, as that was my problem last time.

Still havnet pulled the CPU, but it's looking good to go without it (I hope). Time to put the loop back together!!

Personally I would have pulled the CPU and made sure that the socket in there is good and dry. If water is going to get trapped anyhwere and things are going to fry that would be in the top 3 places for it to happen. Coming in 2nd and 3rd would be RAM slots and PCI/AGP slots

Ok, I pulled it just incase based of off all of your warning. No signs of water at all on the CPU pins (no UV die at least), so that may have been a waste. I put a hairdryer on high over the socket for 10 minutes or so, thus if there was any thing it's gone now.

Any suggestion in the next hour of what to run in my test loop? I have some good non-conductive stuff, but I'm not going to use it until my permanent res gets here. Long term it might be a day to two before I discover if my rig sprang a leek, so that’s why I’m using it then. Especially seeing as it’s going to be moved and transported once a month or so.

sir_pyro said:

Ok, I pulled it just incase based of off all of your warning. No signs of water at all on the CPU pins (no UV die at least), so that may have been a waste. I put a hairdryer on high over the socket for 10 minutes or so, thus if there was any thing it's gone now.

Any suggestion in the next hour of what to run in my test loop? I have some good non-conductive stuff, but I'm not going to use it until my permanent res gets here. Long term it might be a day to two before I discover if my rig sprang a leek, so that’s why I’m using it then. Especially seeing as it’s going to be moved and transported once a month or so.

Click to expand...

Well it is better to have done it and be sure then fry it and spend the next several weeks kicking yourself in the *** for not taking the time to check it.

I would check each and every connection and give each clamp an added turn with a screw driver. Then take tissue and wrap it around each clamp point. Power it up for a few minutes if the tissue is damp you know you have a leak and you have a very good idea where as well.

You dodged a bullet this time so take full advantage of your good fortune. Keeping my fingers crossed for you. GL