Guide To WaterCooling and Leak Testing - ALL New WaterCooler's Read Before Posting!

[MaxxxRacer]

lol.. then send em over.. lol.

[Squid_Spit]

Excellent Thread very helpful

[MaxxxRacer]

thanks, i spent quite a bit of time on it.

[racinjimy]

Hello everyone, this is my first post, all the information I have ever needed to set up my system I have found amongst the various forums in the WC community, by far this forum has been the most informative. I very much appreciate the time and effort everyone puts into this place.

Now, after the mandatory a$$ kissing session, here is the meat of the post.

The above guide is fantastic as are a number of the other stickies. The hard thing is to figure out where to get all of the stuff everyone talks about. The local “Depot” has only certain things, fittings tubing, screws, tools etc.

An indespensible web site is McMaster-Carr they have every fitting, tool, screw or nut a modder would ever need. They even have “clinch” nuts which are awesome when mounting a fan or a shroud as they press fit into the metal/plastic and stay in place. These are the nuts used by Lian-Li in their newer cases.

Lapping kits are also really hard to find and after seeing the bottom of my polarflo TT GPU block (I know Maxxx is cringing at the thought of someone using an aluminum top block) I knew I needed a lapping kit. Easypckits has them.

I am not trying to advertise anyone’s products here but these are two really great places to find modding supplies that have me up and running on my first water chilled PC .

[MaxxxRacer]

nice setup. i cnat tell but that looks like a G4 or G5 that you got there.

Either way its a nice system.

Mcmaster is godlike.. there is nothing those freaks dont have.. its really awe insprining.

[racinjimy]

It's a Dtek WW.......

I was surprised as to how nice it looked when I got it. Perfectly smooth glass like bottom. Nice shiny top. I would have liked different barbs (black plastic) but hey them's the breaks.

I am torture testing this thing right now and my wini doesn't look like a good oc'er

[MaxxxRacer]

yah, new winnnies are nortoriously bad. b ut its ok. venice is our savior. i saw a review wehre a guy with a 3200 venice got it up to 2.8ghz on stock cooling.. now how crazy is that. and it was stock volts. now im guessing with a little more volts and some good watercooling 3ghz is very well within reach of a 3200 venice... mmmm...

[OvaKilla]

very helpul, nice work maxxx!
/runs off to read the pump thread.

[mercyless]

hi all,great thread,wish i'd looked in sooner, my first post so here goes,
i have 6002 w/block,dd res, dd maze 4 gpu block,mcp-350 pump, 2x 120 rads(25mm),loop is res-pump-cpu-gpu-y spliter to 2 rads inlet-2 rads outlet y spilter-res,
do you think its ok or i could use the rad better like res-pump-rad-cpu-gpu-2nd rad-res
temps are 38 idle 44ish load on a fx-55@2.9

[MaxxxRacer]

ur setup looks fine.. but u would be best off to get a reservioir that had two inlest so u dont need to y splitter them back together.. better flow that way..

but paralleling radiators has been found to nto really be beneficial but it wont hurt u much either so its not a big deal.

[mercyless]

ah ok, cause the dd res i have ,has 2 inlets ,1 already blocked but can easy be opened
i'll give that a go , thx

[Couch]

Very nice! I almost took the plunge for a water cooling kit-but after reading your guide I definitely need to put more thought and $$ into a proper system.
So I thank thee!

I'm getting edgy waiting for my 3800 venice.

[MaxxxRacer]

Very cool couch. Just make a thread when you are ready to build ur system. If i dont respond to it and u want my input on it just PM me.. ive been really bizy so i dont respond to alot of threads lately

[vapb400]

im going to have a BIP mounted in the top (going for silence) would it be better to have this:

mnpctech grill>case roof>radiator>shroud>fan or
mnpctech grill>case roof>fan>shroud>radiator?

i would probably use the coolshroud.
thanks.

[MaxxxRacer]

well it depends on which way you want the air blowing. just make this rule. always have the fan sucking air through the radiator and not pushing through it. if you follow that you wont have any issues

[Couch]

Much appreciated MaxxxRacer. Hopefully it will be in the near future. :thumbsup:

[sokarul]

Nice rightup. I have a question, Does $200 sound like a price for a beginer level water setup?

[MaxxxRacer]

ya that is a good starting price. that wont include a gpu block though. only cpu. and a moderate size radiator.

[sokarul]

ya that is a good starting price. that wont include a gpu block though. only cpu. and a moderate size radiator.

Thats what I had. Since im new to water I dont knwo if i want to put water to my brand new x800. On the radiator, is a 120mm heatercore or radiator better? The ones from dangerden. I read about how the heater cores are cheap and good, but just a 120mm one still good?

[MaxxxRacer]

a 120mm heatercore will beat out a 120mm purpose built rad when used with a relatively powerful fan.

[Cathar]

Out of the two designs the non-impingement will end up being cheaper for the same performance, but if you have to have the maximum performance go with an impingement style block, but be prepared to bit the bullet on a higher priced pump.

Hmmm - perhaps want to rephrase that?

Hydraulic power = pump output power. Eheim 1046 ~= 0.5W Hydraulic Power output. Graph is derived from Procooling test results. Of course in a full loop not all of a pump's output power gets spent in the waterblock, but typically around 50-75% of the pump's power does for a majority of single-block setups.

[MaxxxRacer]

I think i will rephrase. I didnt say waht i wanted as clearly as i wanted. what i mean for mid range performance a non impingement generally are lower restriction allowing a bit higher flowrates which helps out to keep the gpu and rad running more proficiently.

BUT if you can cheaply keep ur flowrates around 1.25gpm with an impingement block then there is no reason not to.

any suggestions on how to reword it.

[Cathar]

I think the point is again re-inforced by the following graph:



i.e. the impingement blocks still hold their own even with weak pumps when the radiator is factored in.

Throw in a GPU block and the stories may change, but then again maybe not, as now the truly open-flow blocks will be starting to suffer from the reduced flow rates.

How to re-word? Maybe like so:

Out of the two designs the non-impingement designs tend to be cheaper and offer better bang-for-buck, but if you have to have the maximum performance go with an impingement style block, but be prepared to spend a little bit more for it.

i.e. just remove the pump comment, since it's invalid, or rather is only true on a case-by-case basis. You can't make a sweeping generalisation like that.

[MaxxxRacer]

ok will do. thanks for the input stew. if you see any other things in the guide that you dont agree with pls let me know.

[K.I.T.T.]

Excellent guide!!
I should have read it earlier!!