My Water-Cooling Setup is no more efficient than Air

[Neptune]

Okay, I setup a water-cooling system for my Athlon Rig (currently @ 1133mhz) and I'm disappointed. I spent a lot of money and It appears that the only advantage is that my PC is a lot quiter than the Delta 38CFM fan that I was running. It's disappointing to see that my temps are nearly exactly the same.

Here is my Setup:
Large 12x5 Radiator with two 80mm Sunon Fans
Maze2 Copper Waterblock from DangerDen
Aluminum Water tank with a 200GPH pump.
Everything has 3/8" tubing
Water mixture of Distilled Water and Redline Water Wetter.
Some old Arctic Silver (getting some fresh A. Silver II soon)

According to MBM 5 Im at 42C typing this and at peak loads i hit around 50C

This seems pretty high for a water system. If anyone has suggestions, please speak up.

-Neptune5k

****My Rig****

AMD Athlon T-Bird @ 1133mhz
Iwill KK266
512mb PC133 CAS2
Ati Radeon 64mb VIVO
Sound Blaster Live!
46GB IBM HDD
2 CD-RW
1 DVD

 

[Colin]

My first thought is are you sure your block is mounted properly?

 

[dimmreaper]

Yeah- what Colin asked? Those temps are very high for water-cooling.

Another thing, did you turn the pump on and cycle water through the block before you mounted it. Air bubbles really hurt waterblock performance. I know this from expirience. So it's definately a good Idea to move the block around a bit while filling the system, just to be sure you don't get any air pockets.

 

[Neptune]

Colin (Mar 13, 2001 11:02 p.m.):
My first thought is are you sure your block is mounted properly?

Yes, the Maze2 Block uses the 4 holes around the ziff socket, so it's pretty hard to mount it wrong.

http://www.dangerden.com/Instructions/MAZE2.htm

I will see what i cant do about air in the line....

 

[William]

something is wrong in the system(well duh!). Umm, the mounting I would make sure of, is it level on the CPU? Air could be it, are your fans blowing onto the radiator vs. sucking air. I really think your mounting has something going on as Colin suggested, as this is the most likely culprit here.

 

[Neptune]

dunno260 (Mar 14, 2001 01:17 a.m.):
are your fans blowing onto the radiator vs. sucking air. I really think your mounting has something going on as Colin suggested, as this is the most likely culprit here.

I have the radiator mounted on the top of my case. I cut 2 80mm holes out of the top and placed the 2 sunon fans so that they pull air into the case, throught the radiator. This way the radiator benefits from the cool ambient temp.

I took the waterblock off the cpu and tapped air bubbles out and reseated it, this time with a little less pressure (my retension method uses springs) and so far everything is working a bit better. I am using "CPU Stability Test" to warm the proc and it seems to be sitting at 41C/105F. Better, but i think that I can still do more.

 

[dimmreaper]

Neptune-

Are you the neptune from F@H Team Eggroll?

 

[dimmreaper]

Neptune (Mar 14, 2001 01:13 a.m.):

Colin (Mar 13, 2001 11:02 p.m.):
My first thought is are you sure your block is mounted properly?

Yes, the Maze2 Block uses the 4 holes around the ziff socket, so it's pretty hard to mount it wrong.

http://www.dangerden.com/Instructions/MAZE2.htm

I will see what i cant do about air in the line....

Is the water Inlet placed directly over the core?

 

[AKDUDE]

Hmm, why are you sucking air into the case through the radiator? I would think that this would warm up the air, and in turn warm up the whole case.
AKDUDE

 

[Colin]

41 C is more like it. Mine tops out at 39 with an ambient temp of 22.5C. The other critical thing with the Maze2 is orientation on the chip. I am sure you have addressed this. Sounds like the bubbles may be part of the problem. How much Water Wetter is in the coolant?

 

[Neptune]

Jeff - No I am not the same Neptune

Colin - The block is possitioned properly, dumping water directly on the core that is. I am using about 2.5 ounces of Water water in a half-gallon mix.

Thanx for the feedback guyz, If anyone has more suggestions, let me know. I'm thinking of adding a pelt down the road, when funding for the project becomes available. My main concern here it taking the time to waterproof my board and power the damn TEC...but that's another thread in the future.

 

[Fink]

Neptune (Mar 14, 2001 10:00 a.m.):
Colin - The block is possitioned properly, dumping water directly on the core that is. I am using about 2.5 ounces of Water water in a half-gallon mix.

Sounds like you have the right mixture and your temps are looking pretty good. Cheers!

 

[Snuffleuppigus]

Neptune (Mar 14, 2001 10:00 a.m.):
Jeff - No I am not the same Neptune

Colin - The block is possitioned properly, dumping water directly on the core that is. I am using about 2.5 ounces of Water water in a half-gallon mix.

Thanx for the feedback guyz, If anyone has more suggestions, let me know. I'm thinking of adding a pelt down the road, when funding for the project becomes available. My main concern here it taking the time to waterproof my board and power the damn TEC...but that's another thread in the future.

two things... one you might want to change your set up. like try putting the fans to suck air out of your case. also i have a similar sized radiator i use on my water loop i use for cooling my northbridge&vid card as well. i use 2 120MM fans on it. if you are going to consider pelterizing an amd processor you will want a bigger set of fans so you do not end up boiling the water and you really don't want all of that heat dumping in your system... kind of counter productive.

 

[NUTNDUN]

Right now with Folding running my temps are 41C cpu and 23C ambient, I am pretty pleased with the temps considering the ambient temp right now. It idles around 31-33C depending on ambient. Plus I have my Y.S. Tech 120mm 131cfm fan cut back to 7volts and that is my 1 and only intake fan so I am pretty happy.

 

[surlyjoe]

with these hot @SS T-birds ,thats about all your gonna get out of an aluminum block. Not to worry ,your CPU temp is likely several degrees cooler than what MBM states it to be,seeing as it reads from under the chip

 

[BigAir]

Howabout trying a couple of TECs on your radiator? That should cool the water down a bit.