New Tool Free Ghost Fitting

[MrSlacker]

I thought you guys would be interested in checking out these new fittings. This is the first really different and original fittings I have seen.



There are more pics and some details here.

What do you think?

[nikhsub1]

They look nice, but I like my barbs to be screwed in tight... only hand tight can result in the barb coming loose :/

[Mickey Padge]

As it has no "lip" so to speak, when you tighten it up, what's to stop the O ring distorting and popping out, so that there is no water tight seal?

[joecop120]

i almost thought it was a compression fitting at first look due to the knurling.

[Nate P.]

As it has no "lip" so to speak, when you tighten it up, what's to stop the O ring distorting and popping out, so that there is no water tight seal?

You can only tighten it finger tight, and I don't think that's enough force to distort the o-ring.

[TheJollyFellow]

They look nice, but I like my barbs to be screwed in tight... only hand tight can result in the barb coming loose :/

but a very neat idea for something like a test bench, where barbs are taken on and off regularly...so long as the tubing isn't exerting too much torque on the barb, it shouldn't turn loose that easily.

[DarthBeavis]

That Geno has some out-of-box designs . . .

[taowulf]

You can only tighten it finger tight, and I don't think that's enough force to distort the o-ring.

Sure it is. Those O-rings look pretty beefy, but I was able to distort the o-rings with DD High Flow barbs by hand. Not that i was TRYING to...it just happened.

[MrSlacker]

I mentioned this thread to Geno (the guy who designed the fitting) and he said:

The correct/standard/accepted/best practice for O ring fittings like the barbs we use in water cooling is snug and then one flat more which is a sixth of a revolution or 60 degrees. The mot common mistake those new to water cooling make is over tightening fittings that use an O ring for a seal which deforms or displaces the O ring. How an O ring works is by having more pressure applied downward then the pressure pushing outward.

Since our water cooling loops run at or bellow 5-6 PSI, obviously not a lot of pressure is needed. As for the poster curious about the "lip" or shoulder that forms the flange for the O ring, there IS a shoulder there, it is just sized for the O ring and not wrenches we really do not need.

The fittings were designed to be easy to use, (for novices and old hands alike) and to be invisible for those into case modding. They are called Ghost fittings because the tubing slides over the ENTIRE fitting, including the O ring Shoulder and is flush against your sexy block or reservoir etc.

The Fittings were tested at length to be sure before they went into production. My 5 foot tall 100 pound wife can easily tighten the fitting properly.

Just for those of you who do not know me, I have been building mods and water cooling since the days of cross drilling copper slugs. I have key chained more then my share of CPU's =) and have installed at least a hundred cooling loops...the point being I wouldn't put my name on a crappy part.

I am compiling a list of respectable guys to send samples to that will give them a fair shake so watch for reviews.

Thanks to Slacker for posting this and as soon as my account here is working I will check back.

There ya go. Also there are more pics in the thread I linked to in my first post up top and one does show the fitting installed.

[nikhsub1]

Not to argue but IIRC the spec for G 1/4 fittings is to have a channel for the oring... without the channel it is just a BSPP with an oring slapped on it... that is what the tool less fitting seems to be. Also, regarding hand tight, I have also been doing this a long time as well (longer than i care to remember), I have had my fair share of G 1/4 fittings coming LOOSE, one very recently while testing the Aqua Computer DI water block... water everywhere but luckily nothing fried. Anyhow, look at D-Tek's barb for proper o-ring channel. You could tighten that sucker with an impact wrench and the o-ring is going no where.

[MrSlacker]

Nikhsub—thanks for the input and I know your just expressing a differing opinion and not trying to argue so no worries. I am posting on MrSlackers account still because I can’t seem to get my old one here working and the email for the new one still hasn’t arrived and I didn’t want you to think I was rude and ignoring you—you took the time to comment and I really do appreciate that.

Admittedly at forty I am not as good with searching the net as most, but I could not find any spec, official or otherwise for G1/4 on Google, Wikipedia, or Global Spec. I design a lot of water cooling parts so if you could shoot me that link or post it, it would be a huge help to me. I did ask around and most people seemed to think that G1/4 referred to thread count and pitch, much like the US equivalent ¼-20 or 6-32, and they mentioned that in England you can buy regular G1/4 nuts and bolts for vintage motor cycles and bicycles—obviously no O ring on those and thus no channel, and the Last P or T in BSPP and BSPT were also just like the US equivalent, parallel and taper—like our NPT. I also noticed that many (most in fact) of the fittings in my Solid Works program (the 3D engineering design software I use) do not have the channel but are called out as G1/4. All the reputable old companies that sell water cooling parts like Danger Den, Swift, Koolance etc also have sold G1/4 fittings for several years without the channel, so at least I am not the last one to get corrected for once =)

You’re also correct that the fitting I designed is basically just a BSPP fitting with an O ring “slapped on” I guess speaking in strict terms. I would like to think though that I spent enough time trying to design a really great water cooling fitting that we could use a nicer term lol.

Your comments on hand tightening actually got me thinking. In engineering and design there is a principle sort of jokingly referred to as the Stanley Rule/test. Stanley tools makes aluminum ladders and there is a sticker that says something like do not exceed 250 pounds. Of course Stanley probably tested the ladder to failure and that was something like 500 pounds. My worry was that maybe I didn’t test the holding torque strenuously enough because I have never had any brand of fitting come loose.

So I slapped some of my Ghost fittings into a few different blocks, hand tight and tried to duplicate your experience. Obviously just bending the tubing back and forth wouldn’t be enough because it would be a radial load (twisting the tubing) that would cause a fitting to come loose. So I attached 16 inches of PrimoFlex Pro to one fitting and 16 inches of standard old clear tubing to the other. I then folded the other end over a ruler and secured it. I could easily get 2 or 3 full rotations and all that happened was the tubing twisted up like the rubber band on a balsa glider. Obviously it would be REALLY hard to twist multiple rotations on the tube like that if it was attached on both ends…as it almost always is in a cooling LOOP. So I figure so far, there is a 400 pound guy on my ladder.

But I wanted to be really sure so I borrowed the neighbor’s kids, a 14 year old girl and her 16 year old brother. I gave each of them a block, 2 lengths of PrimoFlex Pro about 2.5 feet long, a pair of the Ghosts, and a single written page of instructions like the ones that I wrote for the official product page. They installed the fittings and slipped the tubing on. I put on the clamps, and on one open end an air pressure gauge, and on the other a check valve. They carried them out to my shop and we pressurized our “mini loops” to 15 PSI—roughly 3 times the PSI in a PC cooling loop.

For our 500 pound man test I led them out to the front lawn and had them use the loops as jump ropes—which was too scary lol. Half a pound of copper on the end of 2.5 feet of tube is a great way to get a knot on the back of your head. Both held the 15 PSI and just to be sure we went back to the shop for a shot of leak detector (aka dish soap) and a dip in my leak detection tank (aka an empty 5 gal drywall mud bucket). No leaks.

I was unable to repeat your problem. I think even a roll down a flight of steps wouldn’t cause a fitting to come loose in the case, mine or any other quality brand, if installed correctly. The picture of your cube tells me you’re a meticulous builder that obviously does well above average work so I would have to discount user error—especially as you mentioned many instances--once maybe, but many times...doubtful. The only thing you don’t mention is which fittings you had a problem with. Knurled capture style pressure fittings could be considered tool free even though the base does wrench on, but we are discussing barbed fittings, and I can’t recall any other brand of knurled tool free barbed fittings. It sounds like you had a problem with wrenched fittings coming loose then? (This is where the eating your veggies joke would normally go

Taowulf is absolutely correct in saying that it is pretty easy to tighten the fittings tight enough by hand. I am a 220 pound 6 footer in decent shape for an old man, but my 5 foot 100 pound wife had no problem (admittedly she is much stronger then an average woman). Neither did a rather petite 14 year old girl or a 16 year old boy of average geek stature. Scientific testing? Not by any stretch, but the best I could do at home over the weekend.

Obviously Ghost fittings are not going to be for everyone—no fitting is. I know they work great and that case modders in particular are going to like them. I am actually quite proud of them and it feels good to contribute a little.

Thanks again very much for taking the time to post nikhsub1—especially because it made me reexamine how I was looking at my testing. I don’t want to seem like I am pitching the fittings in here (even as the designer and not the manufacturer) so I am not going to post on this again, but I would welcome your further input in our forums. Thanks also for posting this MrSlacker.

***EDIT*** Just looked at the post and it's a freaking BOOK--sorry guys

[coolmiester]

I love them and will be seeking to bring them to the UK in numbers if possible

[nikhsub1]

No worries Geno, I only argue to try to make things better Anyway, my most recent barb come loose was with the AC DI block, I use masterkleer tubing which is dreadfully rigid... primoflex is very soft, it won't budge a barb Anyhow, since the DI has a specific orientation, I wanted to rotate the block 90 degrees without disconnecting the tubing... bad idea! One barb came loose and leaked. No doubt this was MY fault but 99% of leaks in systems are user error. In regards to the channel being a spec, I thought I read somewhere it was, it very well could be my imagination running amuck. I will tell you that you should incorporate a channel to hold the oring, you are very correct that if you over tighten a channel less barb the oring will distort and a leak can occur, I have seen this with old DD barbs and Swiftech barbs. AS a matter of fact, when I designed my RESERVOIR I deliberately grooved around the barb thread ports to hold the o-ring in place because at the time, I had no discovered any barbs with channels to secure the orings. I then discovered EK barbs...

Anyway, I really do like the look of your barbs, they can be tightend carefully with a pliers if need be, the one thing to make them nearly perfect would be the addition of the oring channel.

[ElEctric_EyE]

Lubing the O-rings with vaseline will help to evenly seat them without pinching, if you like to add an extra turn or two when tightening.

[philbrown23]

well, I guess I dont understand how these things actually work? could someone explain how the tubing goes on?

[Waterlogged]

well, I guess I dont understand how these things actually work? could someone explain how the tubing goes on?

You push it on all the way to the block, the knurl on the fitting supposedly holds the tubing in lieu of any clamps, thereby making it look like you have no fittings.

[Zaskar]

Why do you people necromance old threads, when an identical thread was started today ...???

Was linked in the other thread, probably just followed the link and read the posts and responded to it, nothing wrong with that.

[Waterlogged]

This forum has been inundated with necromanced threads lately, it's getting tiresome...

...So is "FTW".