Quote Originally Posted by Cathar View Post
Actually, if you read carefully, even this is BS.

They started with a supposition, and then incorrectly tried to tie the results of a meaningless test back to the supposition.

Their claim was that an aluminium radiator was more efficient. That's just a claim. They established some thermal conductivity values for the worst elements in a copper radiator, conveniently ignored the rest of the conductivity elements that are superior, and then proceeded to overplay the impact of the worst portions. A copper radiator does not use brass fins. A copper radiator uses copper fins, and copper has an 80% greater thermal conductivity than aluminium. Does Koolance tell us this? No. They have actually lied to us through omission, by not informing about the thermal transfer aspects in a copper radiator that are in fact superior to an aluminium radiator. In fact, the vast majority of the heat flow that needs to move around travels along a superior copper path. There is a very short path where the heat has to pass through brass, and the impact of this short path is truly minor in comparison to the "long path" of the fins.

So Koolance, in their introduction, have tried to overplay this aspect.
That's not true. Koolance explicitly mentions all three components of a brass radiator: brass tube, bond and copper fins, AND mentions copper's properties: "Since copper has a thermal conductivity 1.8 times greater than aluminum..." However they clearly state that water does not come into contact with copper, it passes through brass. And they state that the copper fins are soldered to brass, this means that we must consider the solder's heat transfer properties. So Koolance does not omit any information. In fact if it weren't for them, a lot of people would still believe their radiators were all copper.

Ironically, HWlabs is the one conveniently omitting information in their analysis, like I mentioned some time ago: they don't specify the brass heat transfer properties nor they specify the solder's properties. That is a big omission.

Koolance mentions that design plays an equally important role in radiator performance. I'm in complete agreement. I think the PA was successful because of the design rather than the elements. So, far from being an alu vs brass argument, I consider this being an informative debate. Sure there is hype and marketing, Koolance is guilty of that, and HWLabs is guilty as well. But both have worthwhile data, and I think Koolance has partially redeemed itself with this analysis. I just hope they don’t turn into arrogant pigs