Sub Zero Liquid cooling without a chiller & Tower Cooling

[fart_plume]

I've working on some design ideas for a tower cooler that will be able to achieve sub Zero temps. Now i realize the nay sayers will say it can't be done. Well I'm here to tell you it can.

As some know the tower cooler(bong, which is a term i will not use from this point) uses evaporative cooling to achieve sub ambient cooling.

What most do not know is that the temps that the tower cooler can achieve a determined not by the ambient temps, but by the dew point, or wet bulb to get technical. The dew point of course is relative to the type of coolant used. With this in mind water's dew point is usually close to ambient, however alcohol's dew point is much lower, as are any number of other volatiles.

Part of this threads purpose is to discuss potential coolants, mixes that have a sub zero dew point and to find one that is the least dangerous to work with to achieve the goal of sub zero liquid cooling.

The other part of the purpose is to discuss designs for the system.

nay sayers are not welcome in this thread, only sincere and Xtreme minded people who want to find a way to accomplish this goal.

[NaeKuh]

evaping alcohol has soooooooooooooooooooooooooooo many risks associated with it fp.

Your stepping into uber dangerous territory here bro.


To make it short, you know how we joke about a plume with ya, well, you'll seriously have one.

[fart_plume]

That's why i want a discussion is to find alternatives to the dangerous coolants.

[TheGanG]

It would be a great idea doesn't use such words like danger, flamable, poison, explosion, fire... There is alot of nice guy there, with their good ideas and xtreme minds... Talking about new ideas are much more better then talking about danger, flamable, poison, explosion, fire... Isn't it?

"Sub Zero Liquid cooling without a chiller" sounds interesting!

[faster3200]

I actually built a tower cooler not too long ago. It worked better than a rad however, I lost coolant really quickly and it was also quite noisy when compared to normal WCing. If someone can come up with an idea I think it would become much more viable for use, unless you only plan on using this for benching.

[fart_plume]

This is why I want alternitives to volitile liquids for sub zero cooling.............

@ Faster 3200, benching is the main goal, cooling towers even on power plants have a great water loss, but thats the nature of how the system works.............

[Soulwind]

Honestly, I don't think you're going to find one.

Problem being, I'm relatively sure that any liquid you're going to find that has a sub-zero dew point, is going to be volatile (ie especially dangerous in gaseous form).

Not to mention that you still have the problem of ambient water-vapor condensation/freezing and have now added the reactivity of the coolant with your plastic/acetal/acrylic parts and tubing.

I don't really know enough about evaporative cooling towers to say whether or not you could actually achieve sub-zero temps, but I do know enough chemistry to say that you are definately crossing into dangerous territory (volitile vapors + components generating enough heat to cross the flashpoint and/or potential electrical arcs = bad news)

It's certainly an interesting idea in theory, but in reality I'd stick with phase-change (even liquid nitrogen cooling would be safer).

[fart_plume]

Exactly why I want to discuss it before building or trying something that can get me killed. as far as parts pcv,vinyl and nylon don't react to some volitiles, but I want to avoid volitiles if I can.

[fart_plume]

one of the design aspects I want to play with is whether forced draft, inuced draft, crossflow, or a combination of these designs will produce the best cooling.

[faster3200]

@ Faster 3200, benching is the main goal, cooling towers even on power plants have a great water loss, but thats the nature of how the system works.............

Alright, I thought this was maybe to replace rads. If it is for benching I will try to contribute any valuable thoughts I have.

[fart_plume]

At this point i can't see any practical way of making one for 24/7 use, you have to design a colletor and recondense the evaporated coolant and return it to the res, and you would still have some loss of coolant to the air.

[NaeKuh]

news @ 7pm.

unknown chemical gas explosion occured in OK. Info still being collected.

Has something to do with sulfer explosion and alcohol as gas.




FP i seriously worry about ya.

[HotGore]

What about just using anti-freeze, or just pure glycol?

Or am I being a idiot?

[fart_plume]

@Naekuh so does my shrink,Muhahahaha

@ hotgore the question there is where is the dewpoint relative to water? no your not being an idiot it's a reasonable question that needs to be answered and maybe the only way to get an answer is to build atest system and try it.

[aspire.comptech]

What about just using anti-freeze, or just pure glycol?

Or am I being a idiot?

The idea being to get a coolant that evaporates at a lower temp or more readily than water.

Antifreeze doesn't fit that bill, it boils at a much higher temp than water 180C or thereabouts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifreeze

[[XC] riptide]

Right. See can you get a solution of somthing. Something that in solid state is like salt. Where in solution is highly ionic and this will help the water evaporate at lower temp. Now it ahs to be somehting that will be nice with metals etc and won't deposit much. I think by its nature this might be tough.

[hotdun]

Check it: LINK

[fart_plume]

Some nasty stuff on that list, some of which I've had to use in industry. Thank you for link it's helpful! too bad it didn't list MEK(nasty stuff too), good list of stuff to avoid, eek!

[aspire.comptech]

There are issues with all of the ones with low boiling points. the only one that isn't physically dangerous (explosive) and has a relatively low boiling point is n-Hexane, but thats a anethestic and can produce a mild state of eupohria in it's gaseous state...

Can you say, drug induced overclocking sessions?

[gurusan]

or overclocking induced drug sessions.

could go either way with a setup like that lol

[aspire.comptech]

Ahahah!

[fart_plume]

Well at least if you fry the chip you won't care,lol

[-Acid-]

Hi got invited here, this is one topic i could almost call myself a forum expert on !!!

Cooling towers are fantastic, cheap easy to make and limitless cooling power (they just dump the heat load into vapour)

I,ve made loads for people all shapes an sizes and depending on persons needs how much they need looking after too.

Few questions for you

1. Most important what is the humidity levels were you live as cooling tower's work by dumping water into the air. If you live in a high huimidity location then they become much less effective as the air is already holding a high water percentage.

2. Is this for everyday running, benching crunching ect

I would only use plain water in the tower, chemicals are too risky and you can really mess up you lungs long term.

Downside's to this are you have to strip and clean more often the a normal water cooling loop and you are maknig a ideal breeding ground for alge ect (uv lights slow this down loads tho as it kills it)

They can be quite big and not very movable.

but enought with words lets dig out some picts !!!!!
messing around with salt @ sub cooling chambers


stock


I made loads of these ones and i think this is what your looking for friend only a wee bit bigger that the lexan one i made with the led fans (looked great at night)

[fart_plume]

The black one is that designed as a crossflow design or as forced draft design?

[fart_plume]

Ok, here's a tech question the TDP of a quad core is approxamatly 250watts, is this 250 per minute or per hour? I need this info for btu conversion, as 1lb of water can remove 1,000 btu of heat in the tower type system, therefore 1 imperial gallon weighs 8lbs can remove 8,000 btu, so a 500litre /hr pump can move 132.5 gallons of water/hour x8,000=1,060,000 btu/hr.=310.7kw/hr