My first WC - A Diary

[D3Railur]

It's coming along quite nicely. Since starting this building of my first water cooling system, I've learned some carpentry, all about water cooling, and how to braze! Haha. This is my first baby step. I would eventually like to add a water chiller and then pelts, that is why I'm choosing to set up this system externally. Here are some pics of the progress. I'll add more as I get further along. Thanks for all the good info here.


http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/rad1.JPG
Rad in its raw state

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00037.JPG
Chopped and ready for grinding

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00040.JPG
Under the Knife

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00047.JPG
Brazed and ready

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00049.JPG
Another angle

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00044.JPG
Squirrel cage fan being prepared for mounting

[Reflex1]

kewl, gj !
shud be nice thread. give us more pics as u go along :D
what rad. is that?

[kommando]

/me waits for update

Looks good so far.

[D3Railur]

Originally posted by a5h
.........
what rad. is that?

Dunno, I picked it up from AutoZone. They were nice enough to let me go through their stock in back and pick one out :)

[D3Railur]

Update #1

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00052.JPG
Failure - Success BlowHole

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00053.JPG
Back Side of BlowHole

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00054.JPG
Failure - Success Rad Panel

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00057.JPG
All Seams Glued For Air-Tightness

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00061.JPG
Rad in it's Home - Note Notches in 1x1 So It Fits Flush With Outer Board

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00062.JPG
Rad Fins / Enclosure Intake

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00064.JPG
Squirrel Cage Fan Sitting in Dug-Out Area of BlowHole

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00067.JPG
Fan and Pump Mounted

[C0bra]

Looks nice! how powerfull is that fan?

[D3Railur]

I believe the actual rating is "An assload of CF/Min" I have no idea but it doubles well as a way to blow all the saw dust off my drive :)

[D3Railur]

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00068.JPG
Mmmm! Pickles....

[D3Railur]

Pics down fakk

[D3Railur]

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00069.JPG
Mmmm! Resevoir....

[Slay3r]

Pic links are dead :(

[D3Railur]

utterly awful

[Reflex1]

pics dont work :(

[Techmasta]

Works fine now.

[Firelord-OCHW]

No pics here....

[Arkangyl]

Same, no pics...

[R-Tistic]

yeah, no pics here either.

[D3Railur]

Sorry about pics guys, I had them on liquidninjas which is down now. Then I put them up on a free angelfire site, bandwidth overload now.... I think my thread is doomed lol. However, the wc is done now. My idle temps have improved from 47 cpu / 28 case to 33 cpu / 26 case.
Ill be checking out load temps tonight thru tommorow. Ill post them when I get em. And hopefully LN will come back up so I can post some pics again.

[D3Railur]

Ok Im seeing if my free webspace from my ISP is gonna work. Im keeping my fingers crossed. Lemme know what you all think.

[D3Railur]

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00085.JPG
Weather stripping applied all along lid to form airtight seal.

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00080.JPG
Finished blowhole and on/ff switch


http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00072.JPG
All components inside

[D3Railur]

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00075.JPG
Lets fill her up and see how she works!


http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00074.JPG
WAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!! Im friggin cryin here!!! Most of the water in there is from my tears.

[D3Railur]

Ok so my initial test was a disasterous failure. So I pulled out the teflon tape and resealed the joint that was leaking......
http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00076.JPG
Whos the man!!! Me Baby Me!! no leaks now


http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00083.JPG
Heres how I routed hoses through the casing. 3/4 spade bit....perfect


http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00084.JPG
From inside

[D3Railur]

http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00077.JPG
Final leak test with windshield washer fluid. All is ready.


http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00079.JPG
Final resting place of all components. I went with the res on top of the pump so the res would be the high spot in loop. The spot where the hoses pass thru its lid was NOT water tight so i wanted to avoid any further disasters.

[D3Railur]

The concept was for me to build a seprate enclosure for my rad, fan, and res. The enclosure would be airtight so that air coming into it would only pass through the rad fins, and air going out would only pass through fan. All in all I was able to that.

It wasn't without it hiccups along the way. As for the lid, I hadn't thought it out much due to my lack of experience in carpentry. In retrospect, a single piece of plywood wasn't the best material for a lid. I should have reinforced it with 1x1's.

Another thing I would have done differently would be to NOT put a switch in the power line. I have a 4 year old and she could potentially turn it off with PC running, not a good thing hehe.

My cpu temps are down 20c case temps down about 4-5c. Ive learned an ass load of skills doing this project. Next is to bask in its success and start thinking about setting up a water chiller.

Thanks go out to my neighbor, Rob, for his help and use of tools.

Please post any and all comments about what you see here. I even encourage criticism as thats the best way for me to learn from what Ive done.

[Reflex1]

dude p!mpin shiz! :toast: good job :D
looks cool, nice to read. great first attempt.
but is the big ass box really need to be that big? it wud definately fit in a box less than half the size.
slap on some more blocks too ...GPU block coming?

[D3Railur]

You are correct, it doesn't need to be nearly that big. The reasons are two fold. One, when I started building it, I didn't have everything I needed - res, fan. So I didn't want to cut myself short on space. Two, I'd like to set up a water chiller in it eventually, hopefully I can fit it all in that box. And I do plan on getting gpu and nb blocks. But thatll be when I put this on my system that Im curretnly building.
This was a test so I dont fux up my brand new box if something goes wrong.

[pulverizer]

Yes, much better to have the space than try to cram everything in a space that is too small for everything.

[pulverizer]

Oh, looks good.
And what kind of air does the blower move, and how loud is it?

[D3Railur]

I dont know what its rated at but it moves quite a bit of air. I pulled it out of one of those air hockey machines you can buy at department stores. Its a bit on the loud side, nothing like the high pitched whine of a delta, but a little noisy nonetheless. Although the box does cut down on the noise considerably.

The temps under load have improved greatly. It used to run at 58c cpu / 30c case. Now its chuggin at 40c cpu / 26c case after running Sandra Burn-In and Prime 95 for 12 hours. Im gonna try to juice a little more outta it now :)

[Gogeta]

As far as the rad box goes, why is it important for him to seal it? Does this improve air flow?

[D3Railur]

It is sealed so that all air that comes into it passes through the radiator. Say for instance, I left the lid open on it while it was running. The fan would be pulling air into it and the air would be following the path of least resistance, i.e. not through the rad. The less air leaks I have in the case, the more air passing through the rad, the better my water is cooled.

[Slay3r]

Would it be better to make the case from sheet metal ?

Would have thought the wood would end up keeping more heat by the rad.

[Jabo]

Graet work dude!
The sturdiness of your box is highly commendable :)
My suggestions are as follows:
Looks: some funky paint job, window mod, lights mod (why not go with all the bells and whistles? ;) )
Praticalities: castors for ease of moving aroung (with rubber wheels if you have timber floors in da house)

Fantastic piece of carpentry and plumbing, respect m8! :)

[Reflex1]

Its a bit on the loud side, nothing like the high pitched whine of a delta, but a little noisy nonetheless

Cover the inside of the whole box with neoprene, using glue or double sided tape ...many do it on the inside of cases ...will dampen the noise dramatically. will look sexy too from inside ;)

[D3Railur]

Hmm sheet metal, even if it would be beneficial, I don't have the supplies nor the knowledge to work with it.
I could go for the paint job, that is definitely an option. But the windows and lights, prolly not as I have the box tucked away behind my computer desk. The neoprene idea I think is something I might do for sure, but Im not sure where I can get enough for the job at a reasonable price. But honeslty I think the majority of the sound comes out of the blow hole and there is no stopping that hehe. Thanks for the suggestions, keep em coming.
http://home.earthlink.net/~d3railur/DSC00100.JPG

[Speed_Mechanic]

Most all of the heat from the heater cooler and pump should convect into the surrouding air and then be blown out by the large fan/blower. Using aluminum instead of wood wouldn't do too much to lower temperatures in something like this. It would be just like trying to put heatsinks onto a heatercooler, kinda over the top and not needed.

Plastic water lines and electrical wires are always a good mix ;)

[D3Railur]

Not as good of a mix as 100's of dollars of computer equipment and plastic water lines :)

[kommando]

aha nice nice.

[trifler]

Nice work bro. Not lan approved though :P

How is that assload of fan treating your ears?


Just a thought: is it just me that is allergic to elbows?

[D3Railur]

Originally posted by trifler

Just a thought: is it just me that is allergic to elbows?

Eh????

The assload fan isn't bad. I can definitely hear it, but again, not too bad. Im going to take some advice that I was given and insulate inside of box with neoprene and see if that soaks up some of the noise tho :)

[trifler]

elbows = the things that makes the water path curv allot..

you have them on your rad and on the inlet to your pump.

I don't like em.. :P

I post my project here later, when im done hopefully today. And then you can criticise me.. Deal? :)

[D3Railur]

surely hehe

[Gogeta]

I try and shy away from elbows as well...too much added resistance if you ask me.

[eddy]

Did you ever think about using shut off valves so you can disconnect the water case from the computer case when you need to move it.
I know that idea isn't 100% perfect because when you disconnect everything, you will lose some water between the valves.

[D3Railur]

Yes, I will definitely need to do an upgrade in that department. it'll prolly consist of 4 shutoff valves, 2 on each line with maybe 6" of hose between them, that'll minimize the fluid I lose.