Where is the water go?

[BruceUSA]

I am having a water disappeared problem in the reservoir that I can not figure out where the hell is the water go?. I have been water cooling PC for about 12 yrs and I had never seen water disappeared like this. I am using a 300ml ? 10 7/8" almost 11 inch tall reservoir. When the reservoir is full and will lose 1/2 of the water in about 5-6 weeks and I can not find any wet spot. This is freaking nuts.

 

[freeagent]

Permeation maybe?

 

[BugFreak]

That is the PC gods taking their sacrifice. Don't ask questions and move on...

 

[EarthDog]

Permeation maybe?

This.

 

[BruceUSA]

I don't know what permeation meaning but I google it. I checked every fittings that has tubing connection and I can't find any wet surface. I am absolutely at a lost. I guess I will just have to continue filling the reservoir. I currently have 2 system both are watercooled. No problem with losing water on the other PC.

 

[EarthDog]

???

You don't see/feel it. It's like evaporation.

 

[Woomack]

In the closed loop, there is still pressure. When the water is at some point hot enough, then it evaporates. Closed loops are barely ever perfectly sealed. Lower the liquid temp = slower the evaporation.
In the last small loop, I noticed about 20% of water missing in about 3 months of work. It was because the water temp was clearly too high.

 

[Keith Myers]

I am having a water disappeared problem in the reservoir that I can not figure out where the hell is the water go?. I have been water cooling PC for about 12 yrs and I had never seen water disappeared like this. I am using a 300ml ? 10 7/8" almost 11 inch tall reservoir. When the reservoir is full and will lose 1/2 of the water in about 5-6 weeks and I can not find any wet spot. This is freaking nuts.

I just had the same problem. Half my reservoir disappeared. I never found any sign of leakage anywhere, no puddles, no wet spots, nothing. I found the issue to be a slow leak at the rotary joint at the return on the reservoir. The reservoir is attached to the front of the case behind two 200mm fans. I found the slow drip when I was leak testing on the kitchen table with the system unpowered. No fans running. I surmise the small drop was being evaporated by the constant airflow from the front fans, so never could build up a drop that would drip. Probably four months since I last looked at the loop. Had a WTF moment when I took off the side panels and noticed half the reservoir volume was missing. Replaced the rotary joint and will continue to monitor.

 

[Nebulous]

I remember when I had the swiftech mini res and every 3 months I had to top off. I noticed I had a slow leak because my fluid was blue and it was coming from the D5 collar's O-ring. There was a dried blue booger under the D5 where is was difficult to see unless you moved the pump aside.

When I replaced the O-ring, I lubed up the O-ring with silicone grease to prevent it from drying out and causing a leak again. No more leaks. I got into the habit of lubing all the O-rings with silicone grease. Every time I tightened a fitting, the O-ring would either roll and break or pinch and break. Silicone grease helps with making a better seal and prevent the O-rings from drying out and breaking.

https://www.amazon.com/Trident-acc577-Silicone-Grease-2oz/dp/B0000DCVZL/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=trident+silicone+grease&qid=1675263774&sr=8-2

 

[ssjwizard]

Needing a top off after 4-5 months is pretty typical Id say. My loop has some age on it now and Id say about twice a year I have to top it off. I wait until I hear the first sign of an air bubble in the res and its usually about half empty(based on D5 pump inlet position). 1 drop of biocide and a couple Oz of distilled and away it goes. Fortunately I build my system with easy access to the fill port in my res. Just need a butter knife and a long funnel to service it.

 

[BruceUSA]

Dann finally found it. It's a very small leaks at the bottom of the reservoir cap. Its seems to get worse because I now can see wet spot on the dual pumps housing. Now I am loosing 1/2 water in 2 weeks. The bottom cap did have a o ring in it. Perhaps the o ring wore out a little that causing the leaks. Thanks every body for trying to help find it.

 

[BruceUSA]

This reservoir is 12 yrs old never has a leak problem before. 6 months ago, I disassemble the bottom cap for cleaning and when I put it back together. The o ring is no longer sealed correctly. This has caused the leaks I am getting now.

 

[ssjwizard]

This reservoir is 12 yrs old never has a leak problem before. 6 months ago, I disassemble the bottom cap for cleaning and when I put it back together. The o ring is no longer sealed correctly. This has caused the leaks I am getting now.

Glad you found the leak!

 

[BruceUSA]

Upon inspection I also found my 12 yrs old dual pump rectangler housing the top cover where the tny screw holding the top cover down are also leaking. So I ended up using the hot glue gun to sealed all the scews. See how long it last.

 

[EarthDog]

Guess you found the wetspots..!

 

[Nebulous]

Upon inspection I also found my 12 yrs old dual pump rectangler housing the top cover where the tny screw holding the top cover down are also leaking. So I ended up using the hot glue gun to sealed all the scews. See how long it last.

My XSPC V1 res leaked from the top screw holes as well. I used flex seal paste to create a new O-ring and torqued the screws down tight. Then I used the spray stuff to seal the top to the body. Hasn't leaked since right up until I upgraded to the Monsoon.

Hot glue might work, but I'm not certain it will hold up over time. When cool the glue will harden and doesn't flex. The constant leak may break through the contact between the glue and the res. Keep an eye on it. Also see if you can place a folded up paper towel under the res so if you can't see the leak, you can still catch it when the paper towel gets wet.

 

[Woomack]

Many reservoirs or even CPU blocks made of plexi, start to leak in some time (usually after about a year) as under pressure are appearing little cracks (often a bit too tightly screwed fittings). I had that with most blocks where tops were made of plexi and the fitting holes were not protected (metal rings or something similar). The exception are graphics card blocks where are almost always tops/replacable terminals. I haven't seen them cracking after a long time of work.

Some blocks are not designed for higher temps. Like previous generation of Aphacool CPU blocks was leaking when CPU was running at high temps and the liquid temp was higher than 60°C for some longer. This is also the reason why some manufacturers clearly say in specs that the liquid temp has to be below 60°C. I don't know exactly what was the problem but I saw two different Alphacool blocks leaking after longer usage in SFF where temps were higher than supposed to be (like 60°C+ liquid temp).
I also had leaking Phanteks block. The top was fine when I installed it. After ~3 months were a lot of little cracks and dried liquid that was dropping on the graphics card. Simply material quality was not the best. The same story was with cheap Chinese reservoirs some years ago.

If I buy any blocks nowadays, then I try to search for good looking full metal or acetal series. I'm not a fan of EK as their products are expensive and not always looking as good as on pictures, but they have the widest offer of acetal CPU and GPU blocks. Most other brands have almost only transparent GPU blocks. It's hard to find any reservoirs other than transparent regardless of brand. Most brands have metal/acetal CPU block series, but not reservoirs. At least these well-known brands are making improvements each generation, so plexi is much stronger than it used to be a couple of years ago.

 

[WhitehawkEQ]

Are you sure it was not your dog drinking the water?

 

[ssjwizard]

My XSPC V1 res leaked from the top screw holes as well. I used flex seal paste to create a new O-ring and torqued the screws down tight. Then I used the spray stuff to seal the top to the body. Hasn't leaked since right up until I upgraded to the Monsoon.

Hot glue might work, but I'm not certain it will hold up over time. When cool the glue will harden and doesn't flex. The constant leak may break through the contact between the glue and the res. Keep an eye on it. Also see if you can place a folded up paper towel under the res so if you can't see the leak, you can still catch it when the paper towel gets wet.

Same thing happened with mine. I have the V1 nylon reses and after I ran it real hot for a couple months the lid warped and started leaking. I forget what I glued it back on with but that was like 8 years ago and its still going strong.

 

[Farwalker2u]

I had a pin hole radiator leak in my water cooling system where the water seemed to simply disappear. The pressure of the pump sprayed a fine mist that never accumulated on anything I could find. Yet over a few days the water level diminished noticeably and I had to add water. I did this for perhaps three months until I tore the system apart and tested the radiators (two 480mm) to find a significant leak in one radiator.