Choosing The Best Pump for Your WaterCooling System

[Byron]

There is also the Eheim 1260 for max performance but tbh, even a L30/1250 will do fine with those two waterblocks...
Or you can put two L30's in series to increase the head pressure
You can find 2 L30's for the price of one 1250Eheim here in UK :P

[Gogeta]

You can find 2 L30's for the price of one 1250Eheim here in UK :p

Thats because the L30 is a piece

[Byron]

A piece?

[Torin]

a piece of

[Byron]

Heard many stories yeh... but mine works OK so far (6months now).

[Gogeta]

I only call it a piece because I used one for 5 months in a loop where it ran 24/7 before it died a horrible death. Lucky for me, the PC was off.

[Byron]

Cant say no, my first one died after 5 months as well running 24/7 but had done some experiments with my first watercooler during a clean process with bleach and some other things... the impeller shaft got rust and the impeller cracked at a point making it noisy
Since i received a replacement, 6 months so far works ok and quiet.

[Tedinde]

I've always recommended the danner mag 3 since it pushes 10.5 feet of head. but if you want the best start lookin at the iwakis and pumps of that caliber

I've been using a danner mag drive 7 for 4.5 years in various rigs and it's still going strong. I can wash my car with this pump!!!

[MaxxxRacer]

Rainbow pumps can be had here

http://www.marinedepot.com/aquarium_...ne.asp?CartId=

Price from 25 up to 140.

I dont suggest these pumps as they are designed for high flow in an unrestircted enviornment. They would perform horridly in a pc cooling loop.

[=[PULSAR]=]

I see all this talk about great pumps and agree they lower temps, but doesnt it come to a limit of what the blocks and tubing is pressure tested at? Whats an average blocks max pressure?

[MaxxxRacer]

well danger den blocks are tested to 85psi.. there is no pump alive that can produce 85psi. atleast none that we can hook up to our cooling systems. So the limit is not in there.

[=[PULSAR]=]

0o0o0o0o in that case I think I'm gonna try a 2000GPH pump...lol

[MaxxxRacer]

u mean the md-40rlt... sure why not...

[slavik]

gen-x pcx-30 looks like a good pump, any reliability issues?

also for consideration is the blueline hd20 and the little giant pumps ...

EDIT: the Little Giant 'Quarium Series Magnetic Drive pump 2-MDQ-SC has 14.4 max head in feet, 510GPH at 0' head (450 at 4'), costs 85USD ...
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/Produc...565&in_merch=1

[MaxxxRacer]

The blue line pumps are wonderful pumps, based of iwaki designs. The 2-MDQ-sc seems liekthe way to go. It has roughly the same specs as the iwaki MD-20, but it uses 1/2inch npt fittings which means for us that it is meant to be on 1/2inch and wont immdialty get restricted down by it. I will edit the fact with this particular pump when i get home.

Havnt heard anything on the gen-x pumps. Maybe someone has one that could give me some worth while info to put into the guilde. If so, I would be happy to put it into the extreme pump section.

[Weapon]

Rainbow pumps can be had here

http://www.marinedepot.com/aquarium_...ne.asp?CartId=

Price from 25 up to 140.

I dont suggest these pumps as they are designed for high flow in an unrestircted enviornment. They would perform horridly in a pc cooling loop.

actually, marine depot is only half right with that listing - that is the Pentair Aquatics version of the Rainbow Quiet One - it looks neither looks like original nor functions like it. The original RLQO is an isolated wet rotor pump -- the isolated wet rotor was one of the best features as it kept the heat dumping to a minimum. Additionally, they were mostly made of metal and were in no way, shape or form designed for an "unrestricted environment" - if that were true, I doubt they would be capable of moving 600gph at 9' of head.

While many aquatics shops will try to tell you that the new 4000 high head model is the "direct replacement" for the orig. RLQO, none of the performance numbers match up and the original beats it across the board as far as I can tell.

Still, if you look at the 4000HH, it is definitely not meant for an unrestricted environment either. The "HH" in the name stands for "High Head" - according to the chart for that pump, it will move 600gph at 9 feet and it has a max head of 13ft. For that matter, all of the new model Quiet One pumps from the model 3000 and up are rated for 10 feet of head or above. Despite their ratings, they do not live up the original which is the best H2O pump I have found (and that includes the Iwakis in my collection )

[moosturdsoed25]

Actually, at 16v, two Laing D4 pumps can match an Iwaki MD-40RZ. Hmmmm, they are very powerful in series and compact. Plus, they run off of 12v DC power supplies. Something to consider...

[The_Dark_Hacker]

how do you run them at 16 volts

[Torin]

The blue line pumps are wonderful pumps, based of iwaki designs. The 2-MDQ-sc seems liekthe way to go. It has roughly the same specs as the iwaki MD-20, but it uses 1/2inch npt fittings which means for us that it is meant to be on 1/2inch and wont immdialty get restricted down by it. I will edit the fact with this particular pump when i get home.

Any idea on how loud this pump is? I've never heard of anyone using a Little Giant pump. I took a look at the pics of it, and I'm wondering how you would connect 1/2" ID tubing to those inlets and outlets, adapters of some sort no doubt. The price is right though, and if they are comparable to Iwaki and BlueLine, it would be a good alternative, as they aren't very large in size either.

[MaxxxRacer]

moosturd. I didnt list those in the fact, as they are cost prohibitive and a pain in the ass to setup. Yes they are insanely powerful in series, but you'll have more than enough fun just setting the pumps up. Cathar is the only one running those pumps in series to my knowledge. he loves them, but says they are a bit loud. I think he has them in a sound box. odd that he says they are loud though, as he is the only one that i know of with the noise issue.

Torin: There is one guy around here the uses a blue line pump. You would haveto ask him about the noise on it. I will look for his name so you can pm him or something. Freecableguy. That is his name. He posted in this thread before on page one.

Weapon: Those rainbow pumps listed, even the high head one is 13 feet of head. my iwaki does 14 feet of head and it isnt even the high head model. the high head model of the iwaki i have is 24feet of head. And it is 1 inch and 3/4. Looking at the intake nozle of 1 inch i would presume it would start to get cavitation as it needs alot of water to be going into it. With 1/2inch on it, there would be a heck of alot of restriction. Granted i am just presuming this from the specs that they give compared to other pumps on the market, but for the money to performance, the rainbow would be a poor choice. the high head model is 135 dollars and the iwaki wmd-20 can be had for 104 with higher head and smaller fittings (exhaust fitting is the same)

Dark Hacker: I'm not sure how cathard did it, but I would presume to use a dc power supply that they use for pelts. they are generic in design and have leads on the back of them to screw into. Many of them have voltage adjustments from 12 to 24 volts. If you dont want to do that im sure there is some way to mod the psu to putput 16 volts instead of 12 by replacing some resistors along with some caps to clean up the signal.

[Torin]

The 2-MDQ-sc pump is branded "Little Giant", not BlueLine. Are they the same thing? The pumps don't look that similiar...

[moosturdsoed25]

I think Gogeta also runs with blueline pumps, check my thread about a guide to watercooling.

[slavik]

no, they are not ...

genx pcx30, little giant 2-mdq-sc, iwaki 20-rtl, blueline hd20

are the 4 pumps which I think are the closest to performance with eachother that are on the market ...

also, when looking at power and how much heat is dumped, look at two factors:
power input (power used by the motor)
power output (power used to move the watter)

the rest of the power is wasted as heat in the motor coil and whereever else ... the more wasted power the higher the temperature of the pump and the higher the temperature of the water can be ...

for example ...
a 100watt CPU doesn't dump ALL of it as heat ... maybe most of it but not ALL of it ... 100watt rating is heat consumption, same with small coil heaters (one u drop in the water), they are rated by power input, not power output or power wasted ...

I saw a pump (don't remember which one), the power input was 360watts, the power output was like 160watts or something ... don't remember what pump it was

another thing to consider is the torque of the motor (the higher the torque the higher the head shutoff)

1watt is about picking up a glass of water from a table to your mouth in 1 second (watt = work done in joules / time)
1Calorie = amount of work needed to heat 1g of water by 1C
1Calorie = 4.19... Joules (let's estimate at 4 for easy calculations )

100WATTS of "heat" to be dissapated (heat is measured in Calories, not watts, watt is a unit of power) = 25Calories/second ...
which means that the source can heat 25grams of water by 1C in 1 second, with water starting at 25C, it will take a minute and 15seconds to boil that water ...

according to some testing by procooling, water heats up by about 0.5C as it passes through the CPU waterblock ... assume CPU wastes 80watts of power ~ 20calories/second (very rough estimates), means that 40grams of water pass through each second to take the heat

Sorry for this OT, if you consider it OT

The 2-MDQ-sc pump is branded "Little Giant", not BlueLine. Are they the same thing? The pumps don't look that similiar...

[=[PULSAR]=]

Just cruisin around marinedepot and found this pump 700GPH with 1/2" fittings only $55 and its a great size too, what do you guys think about this one?

http://www.marinedepot.com/md_viewIt...Product=DN1125

[saaya]

slavik, a cpu doesnt dump all its conumed power as heat, but its 99%

so it pretty much DOES dump all his conumed heat as power as do all ics.

and yes! dont underestimate the power dissipation of high end pumps. it can be as much as adding a mid end videocard or low end cpu to your cooling loop!

if you have a high performence pump i recommend you to try to run it before the radiator. if its a 1 pipe radiator then it wont harm the flow yet will get rid of the heat produced by the pump

if you run it after the radiator the water that has just been cooled down nicely and is moving to your pcu and gpu will be heated up again by the pump, effectively increasing the water temp in your loop, no matter how well the radiator works.

if its a multi channel radiator/heatercore it might hit the flowrate, but could still be worth a try.