First serious planning for water cooling, have concerns with case and mobo layout

[Hooded]

What the hell is a Nub? Do you mean rivet?

Agree with grinder nice planning.

Really getting your Mod On!

[Grinder]

Watch out for those watercooling Nubs!

I suspect Hooded is correct that these were rivets. I drilled out about two dozen of these when I removed the top and bottom of my Fractal Design XL R2.

[Hoki]

Hey guys, I'm back!

I tried the corrugated plastic and it was nowhere near strong enough, and it also arrived with a high static charge, so I scrapped that idea.

Instead, I got my dremel on! Rolled steel sheeting reinforced by a gutter-guard rail.

Its annoying that cases are starting to ship with vertical drive mounts already, but this one was considerably more work, but mine is removable with easy maintenance ports cut in.





What do you guys think about the thicker 360mm radiators? Are they worth the room?

I'm looking at either the Admiral or the Triple DarkSide Radiator - DS360-P, both of which should fit fine.
A I'm thinking pull configuration with a veil because I've heard those can make a positive difference.

I'm going to get a d5 pump + res kit and do some more homework on commonly overlooked maintenance aspects of water cooling.

What parts are removed more than others, how to best set it up for draining, etc. If you guys have good references or ideas for that, please let me know.

Thanks!

[Hoki]

Hey guys, its been a while.

Unhappy with the ghettoness of the HDD tray, I redid it with with carbon fiber sheet.



The pic on the left is after some cable management/modding, the one on the right is before cable management and before I shaped the radiator's carbon panel, so its like a mirror.



Here is the tray outside of the case. This ability turned out to be super important, and one which I didn't plan for, but damn thankful for it, since it is impossible to plug the HD wires in when both the HD tray and the radiator assembly are installed. The HDD cables must be plugged in while the tray is outside of the case, then the tray inserted into it's resting spot.

At first the carbon fiber sheeting sort of scratched against the bottom of the case from time to time, so there is a 4mm strip of sorbothane that the HD tray rests upon (inside the green square) which silences all HDD tray vibrations.
The disk drives are also attached with rubber washers to reduce vibrations. The SSD is attached with velcro.

[Jeff R 1]

The carbon fibre sheet really adds some sophistication.

I have a weakness for carbon fibre too...

[Hoki]

Here is the radiator assembly mounted to the front of the case.



The radiator, while it has superb performance ratings and excellent input/output options, uses #4-40 machine screws. Yes thats a standard size, but none of the hardware stores in ATL have 2" #4-40, nor 1/4" #4-40.
So literally every screw going into the radiator had to be ordered from bolt depot.



It fits! *crowd cheers*
And it actually fits with a good few mm of breathing room, which will come in handy when wiring up the fans.



Here is the front. As you can see my dremmel work is horrible, but thankfully I'm 100% complete with the dremmel work.

It actually breaths quite well and completely silent. I tested airflow with the fans using their silent adapters and the front door closed just to make sure I wouldn't have any airflow probs from the front.
Was very happy with that outcome. The shrouds made a noticeable difference when the fans were on low power. When they ran at normal speeds, it was less noticeable.

The two quick disconnects will act as the fill ports for the loop. If everything goes as planned, the pump wont even need to be cycled in order to fill the loop except for shaking the air pockets out of the radiator.

Thats all for now. The pump assembly is almost complete. Also have some more cables in the mail for the second videocard. Its funny how I didn't plan to do so much cable modding and management, but this project showed me that it was a necessary prerequisite in order to fit all of this stuff into a mid-tower case.

[Hooded]

very nice mod.
Looks dam good

[bungwirez]

HOKI!!! long time mate!

this is really a great mod. the white rad contrast is super cool.

Keep at it!

[Hoki]

late night update, finally got all of the parts I need to install the CPU block but needed to test some things first.
Heres what its like to fill.

Fixed the leak and have been running the computer with the loop powered up. Im running it right now but its just not cooling anything.

I can see air bubbles in parts of the loop and it makes it look like it isn't running. I'm sorta glad I 'wasted' money on the flow meter, its the only way I can tell that its running atm.

I'm going to drain it tomorrow, rip out the H100i, and hook up my supremacy evo white.

The water blocks just came out and may be a week or four before I get all the parts for that.

Also I fixed the leak and figured out that noise was air trapped in the radiator. Cycling between 5 and 1 eventually dislodged the air and isolated it in the reservoir.

[Hooded]

System looks really nice. Sleeving is looking good

A tip or two on filling your loop.
You have two tubes coming out the front ports of the rad one on each side. For this to work as a fill point you need to close the front port on the one side of rad. Open the two top ports on your rad and the one on the top of your res. This gives you breather ports that will allow the air to escape the loop while filling. Looks like your currently fighting air lock issues all the way through your current filling setup. You should be able to pour coolant in almost with out stopping. You will need to watch your res closely it will need to be closed first then keep pouring until you see the fluid coming out of the rads two top ports, then close them. Your loop is full. Start running your pump.

The noise from your pump is normal at first and will go away after you get the loop properly filled and all the air bubbles out.

Final filling will need to be done through the top port of your res, that is where the air will collect. It will also collet in both sides of rad at the top. To get the air out of the top of your rad. While the pump is running and your res is full loosen one of the rads top plugs, as soon as you start seeing fluid tighten plug. DO NOT REMOVE PLUG only loosen. Repeat for other side. Shut down pump and top up your res.

Hopefully this is of some help and not just confusing the hell out of you.

[Hoki]

System looks really nice. Sleeving is looking good

A tip or two on filling your loop.
You have two tubes coming out the front ports of the rad one on each side. For this to work as a fill point you need to close the front port on the one side of rad. Open the two top ports on your rad and the one on the top of your res. This gives you breather ports that will allow the air to escape the loop while filling. Looks like your currently fighting air lock issues all the way through your current filling setup. You should be able to pour coolant in almost with out stopping. You will need to watch your res closely it will need to be closed first then keep pouring until you see the fluid coming out of the rads two top ports, then close them. Your loop is full. Start running your pump.

The noise from your pump is normal at first and will go away after you get the loop properly filled and all the air bubbles out.

Final filling will need to be done through the top port of your res, that is where the air will collect. It will also collet in both sides of rad at the top. To get the air out of the top of your rad. While the pump is running and your res is full loosen one of the rads top plugs, as soon as you start seeing fluid tighten plug. DO NOT REMOVE PLUG only loosen. Repeat for other side. Shut down pump and top up your res.

Hopefully this is of some help and not just confusing the hell out of you.

Thanks Hooded. Finally got the cpu block in and all of the air bubbles out.

The temperatures aren't much different, but thats something that dazmode prepared me for with that 'how much radiator' video.

Before I was running a H100i on my i7-3820 @ 4580ish, and hovered around 42 celsius with two fans as low as they'd go.

Now with way too much radiator for a CPU that is now @ 4675 it idles around 43 celsius, but my pump is on lowest setting.

Im running a prime95 heat torture test on it now and its slowly rising. My asus temp readings are different from realtemp's readings by quite a bit. One of my cores seems to stay about 5 degrees hotter than the others.

My ambient room temperature is 24 celsius.

Fans are configured to ramp up from 1000 @ 60 degrees to 1500 @ 70 degrees.

Also my heat probe doesn't fit in any of the fan headers. I don't know what to do with it. :\
Its got spaces for two fan pins and the gap is too narrow for a fan header. Its a monsoon temp sensor fitting.

[Hooded]

You need a LED Temp display or a Fan controller that will allow you to plug the temp sensor into it.
Your motherboard doesn't seem to have any temp sensor inputs to use like some others do.

https://www.dazmode.com/store/produc...sensor_-_blue/ that temp LED display would require some small wiring mod to attach your sensor. Cut the cheap sensor off the LED display then remove the plug from the Sensor, solder the temp sensor to the LED display wire.
A fan controller wouldn't require any modding and the sensor could plug straight into it.

[bungwirez]

Insightful video Hoki. very creative loop construct.

[Hooded]

You'll get better temps running your pump at 4 rather than 1 or 2. The D5 I have running on 12v power is always set to 5 for best over all flow and temp results. If your running off 24v power, then you will have a larger flow curve to work with.

[vieuxchnock]

Very nice job,man.