Finally building my chiller....after 4 years. I have had a nice shiny new embraco compressor (honestly can't remember if it's 1/3HP or 1/2HP...been that long), a cube condenser, all the other stuff including vacuum pump, hoses, manifold, tools etc etc ready to go. Also have a still sealed tank of r507.
Here's where my questions start...within the text, will summarize at the end...
I want to build an 'on demand' water chiller. I will build a tubular heat exchanger. I was considering going for a plate, but I want the hands on value at the moment and will go plate later if its really that much better. I will be building a circuit here at work with a barometer, thermometer etc to find dew points and RH...all that. I want the system to be active at keeping things at ambient+1, but have the power to go subzero if needed. I understand these systems would be charged differently (...right?) but I haven't even gotten there yet. My load is my 24/7 system that I still haven't upgraded in a while. E8600 x48 2x 4850. I have been out of the enthusiast game for a while as my life changed there for a while
Ok, questions:
1. What's a good material to use for the outside tube in my hx? I was thinking about getting some wide diameter copper form mcmaster as we get stuff delivered here all the time from them, but then again, I find no reason to spend the premium on copper as it seems it won't do any good. I want the option to get my coolant down to -30C to -40C on just my CPU (seems like a stretch, but I'm patient and have some money) so I'd want tubing that's good down to -50C as I don't trust specs like that anymore.
2. Can I keep enough coolant in the lines and hx to do what I want? I'd like to avoid using a big reservoir as I want my temps to be on demand and completely controllable from my controller board I'm making. Will I need some kind of small reservoir or will be it (hopefully) unnecessary?
3. I've done tons of reading into the finer point of charging and all that, but I haven't seen a lot of more precise info on charging chillers, a bit on here, but maybe I've missed what I'm looking for...should have searched How will it be tuned differently?
4. I'm going to use either alcohol or alcohol+antifreeze. What do you recommend. I get that more water = more capacity for heat, so in my active system, more water would be better. But at say, -30C, is it ok to use a 60/40 glycol/water mixture? Wikipedia tells me I'd be ok, but would be be getting too viscous? I have a nice Iwaki pump, but I traded my other one away for this one and my buddy hasn't ever sent me the new impellar housing...which is obviously needed. Don't remember the specs...will fill in later.
5. Good, cheap waterblock recommendations? CPU+NB first as this is what I have the most experience with. I'm SO out of the loop, all pun intended, with this stuff. I still have 1A-cooling stuff from like 8 years ago. After stage 1, I'll go ahead and get the video cards going...with maybe another chiller
Thanks for reading!!!
Bookmarks