getto chiller.

[vlad]

I've been slowly putting together the parts needed for a fairly serious chiller when i got a little impatient & decided to throw together a getto chiller to hold me over till the real deal is done.
I'm a metal fabracator & my current gig is working for a national
waste disposal company. not the most exciting job i've ever had
but the pay is ok & the bennys are good, plus there are side benifits like an almost endless supply of discarded frig's freezer's
dehumidifier's & AC's. so i grabbed a small appartment frig/freezer with a 1/12hp compressor, it took me an hour to cut it apart without breaking any lines & an hour to bend the evap to fit into a egloo & attach everything to a 1x3 foot sheet of plywood
. my 1st test with the freezer control set to the warmest setting gave me a no load temp of -3c. after a quick rap on the WB's & looping a few benches & cpu burnin it gave me a load temp of 16c
@ 2480mhz. nothing to write home to mom about but great for almost free. total investment $20=egloo i bought 8yrs ago & 2hrs
my time.

[Gary Lloyd]

Good job, vlad.

I'll bet you had fun bending that evaporator. Those things are extremely easy to kink, break, or puncture.

[bowman1964]

yep great job.
starting from scratch is a great way to learn the basic's and understand how it works to enable you to build a better one.

GREAT JOB

[vlad]

yea it was fun. lets just say i had my safety glasses on the whole
time. a kid @ work had a few pop on him before he got it right.
@ 16/17c cpu temp (epox usdm) i was able to run sandrasoft @
2505mhz 12.5x200fsb. i'd been able to boot @ that speed but the coldest i could get it with ice was 20c but i couldnt bench just work in windows. it scored better @ 11x225fsb, so i have everything ripped apart for a good insulation job & while its apart
ill sand the NB a little more. maybe ill be able to hit 2.5ghz @ a higher fsb. theres definitly a new learning curve the colder you get, like strange boot problems"now she boots & now she dont".
reminds me of going from a carb/bike to a turbo. a diffrent set of rules, but thats ok i like learning new things, if it was easy everyone would be doing it. thanks guys. :thumbsup:

[xxORBxx]

Thats awesome man. I wanna try something like that.

Looks like a lot of fun, and for 20 bucks, why the hell not

[vlad]

It's done & all set up. ill have pic's soon(need a better cam).
water temp is around -5c. cpu temps(usdm) are 14c idle 19c load
@2497mhz w/2.150v vcore. not the best temps but you cant beat the price.

[vlad]

Here it is. total investment in the chiller is now around $50.
insulation foam spray,laytex spray, pipe insulation tape & foam, 2gal distilled h2o, 1gal propylene glycol, 1/2 hose & 1 can brown
spray paint.
i had to at least match the room a little. that big orange egloo would look a bit out of place in a 125yr old house full of antiques.
my wife is pretty cool with my addiction tho. how many wifes would put up with not 1 but 3 computers in their living room
:smileysex . well everything looks good so far. i think i need a little more dielectric grease around the NB. after turning off the room AC i had a few tiny drops of water around the base near the agp slot for such a small compressor it keeps up with the load very well. i thought id see an increase in temps after a few hours of burn in & benches but even after 5 or 6 hours the load temps never changed. i going to swap pumps around to see how higher & lower flow rates effect the temps. thanks for all the ideas guys, keep'em coming & bowman i love your modshop thread. later guys:thumbsup:

[xxORBxx]

Do you have any bigger pics ?

Looks awesome, is the pump inside the res/cooler?

[vlad]

No problem. hows this? & yes the pump is in the res. it a 325gph
pond pump. thanks this is just to hold me over till i can build something better. i hope to get well below freezing with that one.

[vlad]

Heres one of the res with the top off. i've been working 12hr days
lately so its been off. normally theres a 1" thick layer of ice around
the evap. i may up the percentage of proplene glycol. so far the pump hasnt complaned but the pump maker said not below freezing. when i asked if i was running a liquid that wouldnt freeze how cold could the pump run before sh*tting the bed they couldnt tell me. i gess they dont have too many people using their
pond pumps for computers. haha

[Gary Lloyd]

When ice starts forming on the evaporator, all of the system capacity will be used to make ice instead of cooling. In other words, the temperature stops right there and can go no lower until you strengthen the mixture.

[vlad]

Thanks. thats what i thought. i fugured thats what was keeping
it from going below -5. my friend @ work is running 100% windshield washer fluid & his water temps or -16. but he uses 5/16" hose so i dont think hes getting full use of it. hes running a 2400 & 2500(diffrent step then mine) & he cant get it stable @
2.5ghz. thanks gary. you & bowman are a lot of help.:thumbsup:

[Gary Lloyd]

Windshield washer fluid is a weak mixture of methanol and water. If your friends coolant starts slushing, tell him to dump a can of gas line anti-freeze in there to strengthen it. Gas line anti-freeze is pure methanol.

Also tell him to keep a tight lid on it. Methanol is flammable and the fumes are not healthy.

You're welcome.

[bowman1964]

yea the only drawback to using washer fluid is evaperation of the liquid.
allways keep the lid of very tight.if you could make a gasket for the top and screw it down tight it would help in keeping the evaperation down to a minimum.
the better grade washer fluid you buy the more methanol it will contain/the washer fluid i was using would handle -27c temps and look like water going though the lines.

[vlad]

those are the reasons i didnt take that route. refering back to my drag racing days, we used methanol a lot. neet stuff as long as nothing goes wrong. it has great cooling propertys. in fact when we used it with nitrous we had to enrichen with gas to bring the combustion chamber temps up or they wouldnt be too cold. it cooled so well we filled the engine blocks with epoxy & pumped coolent only thru the heads. im going to stay with the mix im using
just up the % untill theres no more ice forming on the evap. thanks again guys! keep'em coming. later.:thumbsup:

[KennethChong]

Im using alcohol/water at 90/10. Seems to be working pretty good so far, doesnt slush up at lower temps like some does.

Anyway good job with that, looks clean!

[freeloader]

vlad....that's incredible work. You should right an article with lots of pictures, describing how you insulated everything. I tried to use foam to insulate my maze 2 waterblock, but no luck. Building the waterchiller was fine, insulating is a §§§§§! I just can't seem to get it right.

[KennethChong]

http://www.phase-change.com/index.ph...s&id=25&page=1

Thats one of the best articals about condensation proofing, it was made by our own bowman. For insulation on a waterblock i use that spray foam, works fine even with -20c water.

[vlad]

Well i've been playing with the mix. i was running 2/3 distilled water 1/3 proplene glycol.3gal total. i removed 1gal & added 1gal
denatured alcohol. the evap doesnt ice up as much, the res was @ -5c before now i dont know how cold it is because the thermometer im using doesnt read very well below -10c, but my cpu temps went from 14c/19c to 10c idle 16c load. it's running
stable @ 2507mhz . it hit 17k in 2k1 with the card @ default. ill burn in a bit more before maxing out the card. just for the hell of it
i bumped it to 2541mhz(11.5x220fsb) it ran some pretty decent
#'s in sandra soft but kicked out in the last test in pc mark & the 1st test in 2k1. ill burn in some more & give it another try. but for now 2507mhz is ok with me.

[vlad]

I got a digital thermometer now & it shows the no load res temp is -15c. but now @ the lower temps im having more condensation problems but on the upside 2507mhz is completely stable & im working on 2541mhz(11.5x221fsb). it past
the post test @ 2604mhz but kicked out of windows, it just a little more time. i also have a few more ideas im going to try to get the temps lower once i conquer the condensation problem.

THIS IS BETTER THEN CRACK!!!!!!!!!!!!:thumbsup:

[vlad]

I've been playing around with sealing the reservoir better. i got evap of the alcohol to a min. i got alot better air flow across the condencer & now the res temp is down to -19c . but! since its been so hot ive only been able to get the room temp to 23c & no matter how long i run the AC its still very damp. so now my problem is condensation forming on the back side of everything.
when i started my "getto chiller" i didnt think i was going to get the temps this low so the only insulating i did to the back side was a thick layer of dielectric grease & up till now its been enough. on the upside she booted @ 2600mhz(12x217fsb)
loaded windows fine but the condensation forming on the video
card was too much so rather then hurt it i shut down. ill rip her apart & do her up right this time.:thumbsup:.

[Gary Lloyd]

If you slow down the fan speed on your A/C it will pull out more moisture, but if it is too slow it will freeze the coil.

Is this central A/C or a window shaker?

[AcEmAsTr]

thats insanely cool!(pun)

whats the lowest temp u are possible to acheive?

[[SLC]Tachyon]

Nice setup- on the cheap too!

[vlad]

Originally posted by Gary Lloyd
If you slow down the fan speed on your A/C it will pull out more moisture, but if it is too slow it will freeze the coil.

Is this central A/C or a window shaker?

Its an older window unit around 12000btu/115v/R22 my wife doesnt know it yet but it may be my next chiller.another i may use for a chiller is 18000btu/220v.the old owner left us 7 window units. the house
125yrs old, below the wood floor in the basement is dirt & with
all the rain we've had lately its damp. even with the AC in 1 room & a dehumdifier in the other its still damp. the good thing about the basement is in the winter its heated by a wood stove so its
very very dry & no matter how hot you get it the temp on the
floor is always 60f , the rest of the house is oil heat. thanks for the help. ill have to check out your website soon i see theres a forum for overclockers.