Planning a (massive) WC (2x 6970, 2x 6870, 4x cpu)

[hbee]

First of all, hello everyone. This is my first post on these forums. However I've been reading quite a bit about water cooling in general and I'd like to think that I have atleast grasped the basics. However I have a few questions regarding my (planned) project.

Radiator
As the topic says, I have been planning to watercool all my computers (with preferable least amount of parts, meaning rads&pumps). Components to be cooled consists of 2x 6970, 2x 6870, T1055, 2x Q6600 and a lone E4300, all with atleast some overclocking. For starters, how big radiator would be required? In my current plans there would easily be room for something like 60x50x(20)cm and it would be semi-actively cooled. I'm obviously thinking a car radiator with copper pipes. But are there any competitors with as good or better price/performance-ratio?

All the computers would be fitted inside a custom made wooden "rack"-cabinet. Here is a very scientific CAD drawing of it:


A sideview on the planned housing, fans in front and radiator in back.

There would be fan(s) in front of every shelf. Hopefully this would create a kind of wind tunnel that could be used to cool the necessary computer components and also the radiator. However, would it be a major issue if the air is already somewhat heated when it reaches the radiator? I would think no, because the most of the heat load would be carried by the water. But this is only a guess and I've been wrong before...

Loops
Then the most important part, designing the loops. The main piping is splitted into three loops (the drawing should be quite self explatory). Currently I've planned to use 3/4" piping in between the pump->splitter and splitter->rad->reservoir->pump. The rest would be 1/2". A splitter that contains 3x 1/2" connections and 2x 3/4", this would seem ideal for this purpose in my opinion but... Also I've been thinking if there should be ball valves in each of those three 1/2" connections? Obviously this would be useful feature to have during maintenance but could those valves be of any use in archieving a better overall performance (I'm thinking of balancing the different loops)? Also, should the splitters be positioned in the highest part of the loop? I would think this makes bleeding easier but does it really matter if the splitters are somewhere in the middle and then I just install a pipe/valve on top of the splitter? I'd also think that there is not much point in having a big reservoir unless the pump is submersible (and probably more quiet?).

Pump & budget
So what about the pump? I would be happy if all the parts EXCLUDING the blocks (and connectors)(edit: to be clear. included in the budget: pump, reservoir, radiator, all the piping and all the connectors except those connected to blocks) would be somewhere under 300 euros but obviously cheaper == more desired. The most expensive pumps might be out of the question unless they are really needed to accomplish the designed task.

I think this pretty much sums up my questions and thoughts. Am I on the right track? Anything else I should aware of that if missed in this post?

[CrazyNutz]

I think you will be hard pressed to stay under your budget of 300 euros.

You will want the least restrictive blocks you can find, the DD MC-TDX http://www.dangerden.com/store/mc-td...pu-boards.html would be a good choice for CPU blocks.
As for GPU blocks I dunno?

Laing D5 pumps at least two. Three would be more like it.
http://www.dangerden.com/store/dd12v...-by-laing.html

If you go with PC rads I would recommend XSPC Rads, as they are cheep, low restriction, and perform well.
To save money here you may be better off going Old School and use a bunch of car heater cores from a salvage yard

[vhaarr]

So what about the pump? I would be happy if all the parts EXCLUDING the blocks (and connectors) would be somewhere under 300 euros but obviously cheaper == more desired.

What would be included in the budget, then?
Pump, reservoir, tubing, fans, ...?

[hbee]

What would be included in the budget, then?
Pump, reservoir, tubing, fans, ...?

Pump, reservoir, radiator, tubing and all the necessary connections except those related to blocks. Also no fans in the budget. If it does go over 300 eur then it goes, the limit is not set in stone and this is still in design phase . I'm hoping to find some of the blocks used and there are plenty of reviews out there so I really don't see the point in having those in this discussion. I did a quick visit to my local hardware shop and with some math if found out that the total for ball valves, those splitter thingies and all the necessary stuff related to piping would be about 140 eur. That would leave about 160 eur for the pump and radiator.

[vhaarr]

Aw man I have no idea about car radiator prices :P
Perhaps there is a chop shop, a car graveyard or a fix-up shop near you? I'm sure you can find something old and unused for a few bucks.

[hbee]

Aw man I have no idea about car radiator prices :P
Perhaps there is a chop shop, a car graveyard or a fix-up shop near you? I'm sure you can find something old and unused for a few bucks.

Yeah well I need to make some phone calls at some point if there are any shops in the area. Being somewhat optimistic and considering that 50 eur is enough for the rad then there would be only about 100 eur left for the pump. 300 eur might be a bit low but as I said, it is not set in stone. However the question is that how big radiator is big enough for all this stuff?

[paulbagz]

I think you will want to save some money and add to that 300 Euro budget.

Fittings alone will set you back probably more then 50+ Euro.

-PB

[pby5cat]

Also most rads inlet and outlet is on the same side.

[Vicey]

You may want to raise your budget to about 800 Euros. Each GPU block is going to cost about 60 to 100 Euro and you need four of those. Then lets say 150-200 Euro for the CPU Blocks. About 100 to 200 Euro for the Radiator[s], 100 to 150 Euro for the pumps (I think you would need more than one due to all the pressure created by these blocks) then all the barbs, tubing and I'd recommend a reservoir.. you're looking at about 800 euros or more I'd say.

One thing I figured out when I first got in to water cooling is that it can get expensive fast. All the little things like barbs soon add up when you are buying a bunch of them and there will be problems that require you to buy more stuff even the most well planned out build will have some issue and your build is going to be quite complicated and large.

[hbee]

You may want to raise your budget to about 800 Euros. Each GPU block is going to cost about 60 to 100 Euro and you need four of those. Then lets say 150-200 Euro for the CPU Blocks. About 100 to 200 Euro for the Radiator[s], 100 to 150 Euro for the pumps (I think you would need more than one due to all the pressure created by these blocks) then all the barbs, tubing and I'd recommend a reservoir.. you're looking at about 800 euros or more I'd say.

One thing I figured out when I first got in to water cooling is that it can get expensive fast. All the little things like barbs soon add up when you are buying a bunch of them and there will be problems that require you to buy more stuff even the most well planned out build will have some issue and your build is going to be quite complicated and large.

Yeah, well. I just said that blocks are not included in that 300 eur budget.

[Vicey]

Yeah, well. I just said that blocks are not included in that 300 eur budget.

I apologise, my fault for not reading the whole post.

[vhaarr]

I think you just need to find out how much a car radiator will cost you and then you can build from there.
Problem is we have no idea where you live or what kind of shops you have access to. And even if we did, you can't expect to find someone on XS that lives in the same area and has experience with used car radiators :P For that I'd suggest a local motor forum of some kind or just simply going down and talking to a chop shop.

Once you have the radiator in place and know how much remain of your budget, we can talk. I'm sure there's 1000 users here who could list the remaining parts you need given an exact budget figure.

[Vicey]

He could probably use a Phobya 1080 radiator. It's practically the same height and width as a small car radiator. It is also quite affordable, atleast where I am (United Kingdom) I don't know where the original poster is. This is where I bought mine for £85. I think it would easily cool all that hardware. It includes mounting holes for nine 120mm fans on one side. You can buy another plate to fit 9 more on the other side if needed. I'd estimate it has about 2,500 to 3000 Watts of heat dissipation capacity. And based on the first posts diagram it would probably fit too.

[hbee]

I do know where to find car radiators. I'm just trying to figure how big(and/or other specs) I should be looking for . And also the pump is kind of a questionmark. I really do not see the point in having 2 or more small ones when there must be a model that is large enough to handle everything?