Bill Adams waterblock test
Owen’s Thoughts About His Multi-Hole Waterblock:
This water block was inspired by one made by Superior Cooling Methodologies. You can see my write up of the block’s creation HERE.
I liked the increased heat transfer surface area that the fins create and the higher internal volume from all the holes. It wasn’t as easy to make as the ‘copper-cap’ one but it was easier than my earlier blocks with a milled channel. The construction was done over the course of three days. I thought that the results looked really very promising. I like the massive amount of copper on this 3/4″ x 2″ x 3-1/4″ beast!
For me it was a fairly big effort to make and took a lot of fairly expensive tools. I bet it could be made with a lot less if you are inventive (but it’s always great to have an excuse to get more power tools!). This particular job was very rewarding and for me, the fun is in the making of the blocks. I still have a few more designs in my head that I want to try – stay tuned…
Just remember to be safe and wear your safety glasses.
Owen
A big chunk of copper indeed; 630gms dry, 658gms wet. And a bit overly long, but nothing my grinder could not handle. But those leaking barbed connectors – bad; I had to replace them and in so doing, encountered Owen’s NPT threads, which had been cut with a cold chisel. Just joking a bit, but seriously DIYers, do good work – I can’t be fixing these things after they flood my bench!
Flow testing indicated that the Multi-Hole had a very high flow resistance. (Upon disassembly after testing, I found a bead of sealant around the connector ends; necessary due to the threads, but impairing the flow somewhat.)
But when tested for cooling efficacy it did quite well indeed:
Combining the “C/W” and head loss data indicates that it cools very well, but requires something above average of the pump’s pressure capability:
Owen’s waterblock is better than almost all commercially available
waterblocks, although its performance is dependant on having a large pump.
DIYers interested in testing their own waterblock can find out more HERE.
For the metric challenged, the above graphs in Avoirdupois (aka US) units:
be cool
Bill Adams and
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