Homemade watercooling

[jaawood]

Anybody got a homemade watercooler and wants to teach me how? I'd buy one, bu t too much money right now...I just upgraded my computer.

Thanks

[Charles Wirth]

Well, what is your computer? mobo/cpu/video

Did you want to keep the watercooling inside the case or hang the radiator out the window this winter?

A couple of good items up on ebay to consider

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3100073785

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1925072804

[Hardass]

Another route would be to pick up used parts at different forums, which is what I did. Good Luck.:)

[alwayslate]

I would assume that if budget is your primary concern that you would be flexible on other areas such as whether it fits entirely in your case.

I just built a home-made solution for somewhat cheap.

Assuming you are pretty handy you may be able to do something similar to what I did:

- Radiator - Chevette heater core. Heater cores are all over ebay for about 10-15 bucks (US). The chevette is about the smallest core and can barely squeeze into a midsize case. Mines outside the back cuz I'm lazy :). I bought some brass 3/8" barb fittings (about $1-2) and soldered them on to my core with a torch. If you have no pipe-soldering experience (e.g. like household plumbing ) you might want to pay $30 for a core from dtekcustoms.com-- they already have the barbs on them.

- Pump - Eheim submersible for $23 from dtek. It's 150gph and is very quiet. I didn't plan on a resevoir system but for a $30 savings over the inline eheim pumps it seemed like a good decision! Also, I have been toying with a second WC rig using a fountain pump from my local hardware store-- 150gph submersible (not eheim) for $19. Should work fine too.

- Tubing - I have both vinyl tubing and tygon from dtek. I have to say I think tygon tubing is sooooo much better than vinyl. It's got much thicker walls, resists kinks, and ages much, much better than plastic. Worth the $20 for some tygon from dtek.

- Resevoir - stole one of my wife's many tupperware containers :)

- Block - bought the TC4 from dtek for $47. Was planning on using the Swifty MCW372 r2.0 from cooltechnica but they took too long with my order so I bought the TC4 from dtek. This again is another area where I think it makes sense to spend some good $$... As handy as I am I don't want the headache of engineering something that "might" work as well as an already-tested design and don't want to deal with leak worries. Don't know how much a custom block from someone like Cathar would cost.

- Fan shroud for radiator - custom made from sheet metal bought at home depot

- Fan - one of my many fans laying around. If you want to save money check ebay, forums, or a local PC store... they usually have junk bins with many fans laying around. My guess is <$5. Many louder fans run much quieter on lower voltage. I found that I can run my radiator fan at about 1500 RPM with the shroud for near optimal cooling (added an inline resistor from rat shack).

Everything else like silicone sealant, anti-freeze, etc. were already around the house. That includes the tools I used-- propane torch, dremel tool with cutting bit, and tin snips.

Hope that helps. My goal was to have a system rigged up for about $100. I would have come in around that goal had I not switched to the TC4 block. Don't know about the perf differences between the swifty and TC4.

Good luck.