Pump-Off

A test of selected waterpumps – Joe

SUMMARY: System resistance takes a BIG toll in waterpump flow rates.

The good guys at Xoxide.com were nice enough to send a bunch of waterpumps to test out:

• Eheim 1048 – 10 watts
• Eheim 1250 – 28 watts
• Hydor L20 – 14 watts
• Hydor L30 – 23 watts
• Via Aqua 1300 – 28 watts

Eheim is a well known brand in watercooling circles, Hydor and Via Aqua less so. The Via Aqua is noteworthy for all its accessories:

I particularly like the ball valve with “fill tube” (upper left) – for a closed loop system, this greatly simplifies bleeding the system; this can also be done using the intake nipple shown as the bottom left. Considering its price is about half that of the others, the Via Aqua deserves a look.

I assembled two watercooling setups:

• High Resistance: Koolance CP-200G waterblock, Iceberg radiator (5/16″ ID tubing)

• Moderate Resistance: Twinned 5″ radiators with 7 loops total, BE Cooling copper waterblock (7/16″ ID tubing)

Each pump was fitted with supplied intake/outake nipples; the filters and filter housings were removed.

I then immersed each pump completely, ran each until all bubbles were cleared and then timed how long each took to fill a quart container (three times for each pump). The only difference was the pump – everything else remained the same for each pump. In addition to the pumps listed, I included a Beckett G150APCP (not a current model – 60 watts) – a centrifugal pump rated at 150 gph (the rest are mag-drives).