Upside Down Heater Core

[Bad_CEKTOP]

It would cancel out in a regular mount where the inlet and outlet are at the same level. In sideways, you are fighting gravity since you are pushing the water up (if you have the outlet at the top).

It would be good for bleeding if you can make a custom rad that doesn't have any cavities, but then you wouldn't have to bleed it, so making the outlet at the bottom would make more sense since you will not have to fight gravity.

 

[slater3333uk]

Yes but you have to look at the loop as a whole.

If you have the inlet at the top then you have to use energy to get the water to the top in the first place and this will cancel out any energy gained when the water is helped by gravity in the rad

 

[Bad_CEKTOP]

Depends on where you mount the rad. The friction within the rad is greater than tubing, having gravity help you on the way down is a good thing. Convection wise, cooler water also falls in comparison to warmer water.

Mounting your rad exit and pump at the same level as waterblock intake may be best.

 

[thorilan]

Basicly it makes no differance at all.

bet me.
by having the inlet at the lowest point and the outlet at the highest point your system facilitates self bleeding because the air is pushed along the same direction and will travel out of the core .

 

[slater3333uk]

Well feel free to test it

IMO it does not matter how the core is oreantated it will require a cirtan amout of moving it around to get the air out. Whatever way you put it up air will be trapped and it relly depends on the design which way will work best. i can see what you mean about self bleeding tho

 

[Bad_CEKTOP]

I'm not going to beat a dead dog, well, maybe just poke it and turn it over.

Why would you mount the outlet at the top after you've blead the loop?
Yes, a top outlet does promote bleeding on a standard rad, however, it doesn't make sense to leave it that way unless you expect to have a lot of air come into the loop so you can bleed it.

 

[weapon]

I have tested heatercores (with single 120, dual 120s, dual pass and single pass) running sideways, upside down, horizontal, diagonally (just for the hell of it) and just about every other possible mounting position and, provided there is no air in it, the temp difference (if one even exists) is so small that it cannot be measured.

A heatercore with water running through it does not suffer from any great performance loss due to the mounting position - at least not with any of the gear that I have used. Now, if we were talking about a phase change condenser, we would have performance issues related to how the heat exchanger is positioned.


hmmm...just because I am bored, I will add "air bleed" mod to the list of things to try on a heatercore.....a shrader valve or two in the right spot should do the trick.

 

[Dubbin1]

Could allways mod a bleed screw into the top

Thats what I would do. Very easy to do also.

 

[Bad_CEKTOP]

So I guess the answer for RadRacer is that after it's bled, you can mount it how ever you want, if weapon says it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter.

Judging by weapon's posts here and in xtremesystems actually experiments with cores a lot more than most of us.

 

[thorilan]

the problem is not every system will stay are free. micro cavitation by the pump it self tends to build up over time and create air bubles

there is no requirement saying that you have to mount it on its side but if you have the ability to do so you can make your life a lot easyer , especialy if you change water without taking it out of your system

 

[weapon]

I can think of one mounting location that resulted in better temps -- it's a horizontal mounting with the core laying lengthwise, the fins facing straight down. It's directly over the a/c vent in my office - dual 120s help suck the air thru the fins. Oddly enough, that made a noticable temp difference.

 

[RoD]

i mounted my core like this as it allows for maximum heat disipation. crappy image warning haha

 

[Moriquendi]

i think cavitation cancels out. the pump may produce little bubbles at areas of low pressure but they collapse as soon as they leave the area of low pressure. besides they are full of water vapor(steam) not air.

moriquendi

 

[thorilan]

nope. i have seen the actual effects like i said about a month ago with a completely clear pump housing and mach up res and rad .

 

[Moriquendi]

i spose with a res you could get an overall change in pressure. could be that the low pressure around the pump forces disolved gasses to bubble out. out of curiosity were you useing distilled water and were there different metals in the system?

moriquendi

 

[thorilan]

no metals in the system as it was a mach up res and rad and water was distilled