My first(first successful anyway) WC rig

[striker85]

Ok, so I had tried watercooling before. But after leaks, blown motherboards and lots of frustration, I gave up. But recently I had been getting back in to overclocking and pushing my computer to the limit. I had gotten pretty far, I ordered a Scythe Ninja, which performed EXCELLENT for air cooling. But I had gotten my A64 venice core 3000+ only so far before even that wouldn't cut it. So I started looking in to water cooling, doing research on setting it up the right way. I began searching Ebay and looking for parts. I decided on the following:

1 cpu water block: Swiftech Apogee picked up from Ebay for 40 dollars
1 pump: Pondmaster pondmag2 250gph, 7' height max, 120v AC magnetic drive pump (I am pleasantly surprised at how well this pump functions and how quiet it is)
10' of clear vinyl tubing: had some lying around from my last WC project
1 gpu water block: An old Zalman ZM1(I believe) block (which I have yet to put on due to the lack of ramsinks)
1 heater core: this one took some research, I didn't want to spend a crapload of money on some big brand name thing from zalman or dangerden or whatever. I got a heater core for a 1976 Corvette which looks a lot like a core from an '86 chevette.
1 reservoir: this part I thought would be stupid to purchase, so I made one! 1 empty canister of Folgers coffee later....one new reservoir

Now the tricky part was getting all of this stuff to fit together. The tubing I had was 3/8" ID, so that was gonna have to be it. So, I have a water block with 3/8" barbs, a heater core with 3/4" and 5/8" barbs, a pump with threaded 5/8" female and male inlet/outlet. This was gonna be a job. So I went to my local Home Depot, once, twice, thrice...to get the proper fittings. The heater core was by far the hardest part.

picture:
[img=http://img321.imageshack.us/img321/8103/core7te.th.jpg]

I wanted to just cut the barbs and sweat on some copper fittings, in order to make it more simple. But I was afraid of damaging the core, so I went the safer, more ghetto, route. I put a length of heater hose on each barb and got a 5/8" barb and...oh, wait, they dont make 3/4" barbs, D'oh! Ok, improvisation time. I get a 3/4" to 1/2" copper reducer. Sweat a 1/2" pipe to 1/2" thread piece on and screw a 1/2" to 3/8" barb on. Ok, one side done. The 5/8" side was much easier, the parts I needed was a 5/8" barb, coupler, and a 5/8" to 3/8" barb. Cool.

Now, I need a reservoir. So I have one folgers canister that looks like a good candidate. I drill a couple of 5/8" holes in the lid to put some barbs in. Put an o-ring on either side, and thread them in. Voila! one home made, water tight reservoir. On the interior side of the lid I attached a couple of barbs to attach a piece of tube in order to not churn the liquid too much.

picture:
[img=http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/3237/rescore3nq.th.jpg]

Excellent, that wasn't too bad. But I need a pump to make this all run. No biggie. Just go to home depot and get some threaded barbs, put some teflon tape on and you're done.

picture:
[img=http://img321.imageshack.us/img321/6687/close4qt.th.jpg]

Awesome, I'm done. Now the fun part...finding out how to make it all fit. I knew that I wanted the pump to be secured inside the case. I had a couple of long screws and nuts to mount it. It just happened to fir perfectly over a 80mm fan slot. I put some carpet padding behind it to deafen the vibrations and that's taken care of. The heater core was just way too big to keep in the case so I cut out the other 80mm fan hole and ran the tubes through it. Put a homemade shroud on it (thank you tupperware, and ocforums for the idea) with a 120mm fan and everything is set.

The thing I love about reservoirs is the ease of bleeding the system. Just flood the inlet of the pump and turn it on. A word of advice to anyone beginning in water cooling...when bleeding the system, shake the hell out of the radiator because those things trap air bubbles like crazy.

So here is a complete view of the newly water cooled computer.

picture:
[img=http://img321.imageshack.us/img321/2038/bigrig7cd.th.jpg]


Any comments, suggestions, complaints or praise is welcome. Just thought I would share my experience with the ocforums crew.

 

[Valk]

Thats awsome ha ha. why do you have your pump suspended though? wouldnt it be easier to just have it sit on the floor of your case or somthing? more tubing but then it isnt like.. hanging there

How much did this cost you without the deaded hardware?
First time watercooling is so much fun. you dont have to worry about tight bends or anything, just let it all fall out where it will heh. you have plans to try to build a unit that will fit your case? what are your temps like?

My first timer setup used a 30litre rubbermaid res heh. nice to see you went through the effort of actully constructing one. T lines can be a real bish.

 

[thorilan]

just a few questions to illistraite a point made in another thread

yes or no please

1 are you happy with your pocket book ( amount of savings for how oyu did it

2 are you happy with your hearing aka noise level

3 are you happy with your STABLE OC of your comp

4 are your eyes happy with the setup


if you answered yes to at least 3 of these then i would say congrats as that is what its all about.

btw did oyu leak test prior to installing this time round?

 

[striker85]

1: yes
2:yes
3:haven't tried pushing it any further than what was proven stable on air yet
4:yes(but will be happier when I shorten the tubes a little

I leak tested the crap out of this thing, there are for sure no leaks, except for the reservoir(I think) which is why I haven't put it in the case yet.

Oh yes, the temps, I forgot the most important part.

air:
idle:33~34C
load: 41~42C

water:
idle:24~25C
load:32~33C

I am very pleased with the performance of this setup. I have to tweak the tube lengths a little. As for having the pump suspended, I had to since I didn't have enough space open on the bottom of the case. If I could have, I would have put in plop on the floor, but hanging it where I did was the only option for putting it inside the case.

Total cost was about what I expected for a self done water system with the amount of research I put in to it. I knew that if I was to go out and buy the high quality stuff off the shelf, I would most likely be spending well over 200 dollars, totally unaccpetable. Most costs were layed out as follows:

cpu block: 40 dollars
pump: 40 dollars
assorted hardware: 15 dollars
heater core: 16 dollars
tube: free
shroud: free
fans: free
liquid: free

So, for about 110 dollars I pieced together a system that functions rather well. I am interested to see how it performs one I add the gpu to the loop (considering it's an x800gto).

 

[EvilT]

love the res