No competition, why only HWlabs?

[Les]

Originally Posted by Cathar

Les, from 2nd hand information given to me, the Thermochill 120.x rads are 24FPI and 32mm thick in the core, with 8mm in-between each flat tube. Tubes are 2mm wide (so 10mm from tube center to tube center).

In comparison, the Honda radiator is 13-14FPI, 29mm thick with 10mm in-between each flat tube. Tubes are 2mm wide (so 12mm from tube center to tube center).

Just wondering how that all fits in with matching BillA's data to the air-flow PD's you're calculating with the other rads. I assume that you've probably already made some adjustments?

Ta for info.
Was taking the HE 120's to be 50mm thick(from Therochill with unknown FPI.
Although have been using 14FPI for the Honda it is only a choice of convenience, so as not to conflict with your 14FPI
The P/Q curves calculated for radiators are for the dimensions shown.
"Billa data" is eyeballed "Billa data"
Maybe a simulation for the Serck will.....



Possibly thin thickness can be considered as a "Hydraulic Thickness"
The flow is laminar in all the simulations


Since, here, am only dealing with air-flow have not considered the spacing between tubes.This becomes important when considering the Thermal efficiency of the fins. Like wc the higher h(conv) the smaller the spacing and thicker the fins need to be.Hence included this in post re properties of a 240x120x12.5mm,30FPI x 0.1mm fin design :
"3.7Pa @ 1m^3/min .
h(conv) ~133w/m^2*c and finning efficiency ~80% with 8 tubes

Edit: Finning efficiency ~ 15% with 1 tube"

Edit: The Finning Efficiency is for Al Fins and no allowance for tube thickness.
For Cu Fins ~90%(8 tubes) and ~20%( 1 tube) - rises to ~ 95% for 12 tubes.

[Les]

[Cathar]

Originally Posted by Ruiner

Hmmm. So how long until someone markets a rad of thickness/fin density of that honda unit, but in PC sizes (single and double 120, with shrouds and 1/2" barbs)?

Changing the radiator for 12x12cm, as opposed to 16x16cm which is what was being proposed, significantly alters the pressure drop and no longer makes such a radiator as "tuned" for low-speed fans. The Black Ice Pro and Pro-II are already quite close to exactly what you're asking for, in terms of thickness and fin density (20mm thick, 16FPI from my understanding). Problem there though is that even though it's pressure drop is fairly low due to the decreased thickness, so does its efficiency fall away in reference to what was proposed.

Moving from 16x16 to 12x12 almost halves the effective core facial surface area, and as a consequence, almost halves the amount of air-flow you will get through the thing at the same air-pressures.

That's not to say that 12x12cm radiators can't be done well, but it's a MUCH larger challenge than using a 16x16cm radiator. Given that all cases are at least 16cm wide (to cater for 5.25" drives and the like plus mounting) it seemed like a decent size to use.

[Ruiner]

Yeah by 120 I meant 'fit in a PC easily' size, compared to the 30x24cm of that honda you're testing. 160x160 would be perfect....roughly the size of a single heater core that takes a 120mm fan with a shroud.

[Les]

Some simple radiator designs and performance predictions.
For heat transfer, treated each radiator as 12 parallel single tube,240x10x*mm heat-exchangers.
Air flow allowed for 12x2mm thick tubes, ie treated as 240x96mm frontal area

[Tempus]

Has anyone done a recent roundup/comparion/review of the current crop of single 120mm radiators? I'm in the market again and I can't seem to find enough information to point towards the "best" one.

[snowwie]

that's the point isn't it?

no "best" 12x12cm radiator

noise preference comes first, then fan selection, take into account the physical space you have to work with, etc.....problem is that radiator selection seems somewhat slim to begin with.

[Tempus]

I would assume (and here's where I get into trouble) that, at a given CFM, each radiator will have a performance index of noise output, heat dissipated, and other variables I have no clue about.

And there are some static figures for pressure loss/restriction, size, etc.

I just don't know where to find enough facts, figures, and test data to make an educated decision on which is the best for my situation.

[Gungrefjaert]

Nothing new for this thread ?

[Gungrefjaert]

Guess not :-(

[BillA]

kind of continued here http://forums.procooling.com/vbb/sho...8&page=1&pp=25

just working through the HW Labs products

[Gungrefjaert]

Thanx. I'll have a look at it.

[Marci]

Righty then....

Extrapolating from what I'm seeing it tells me that it should be possible to build a purpose built PC cooling radiator that is:

~16x16cm in size for the core
14FPI
1" thick in the core
single pass

Done, built and sat beside me made exactly to those specs (only a few months after the thread has dwindled out!), accompanied by shroud with walls 12.5 degree from vertical... Now it needs testing... You guys have done the maths, I've got the thing fab'd... someone now needs to work out whether what I've had fab'd matches the maths, which I don't have the equipment to test...

[BillA]

Joe Citarella has access to Andrew LeMont's wind tunnel (Millennium Thermal), but the temps are not really controlled (for me anyway)
your worst difficulty will be to correlate different data sets, be sure to also test a 'known' rad
A to B testing will make your point, just not too elegantly
- but hey, what are the alternatives ?

[Marci]

will post up some pix of it in a mo.... indeed, Joe Citarella is looking like the only option for comparative purposes... Safest bet probs to send HE120.2 & PA160.1 (This 160x160) over, but which fans should be used for testing?

The 160x160 was designed for the PAPST as spec'd by Cathar, and his theory was that this 160x160 with PAPST would match the performance of a HE120.2, but with which fans on the 120.2? Panaflo -M or -H are the usual suspects for me...

[Risky]

Alphacool have launched a range of what appear to be BIP style radiators calling them NexXxoS Xtreme. I haven't had sight yet but the pricing is attractive (120.1=EUR30 , 120.2=EUR40 120.3 = EUR50).

Of course the design could turn out to be not so great on futher investigation......

[BillA]

Joe may use his 'calibrated' fan, (with which I TOTALLY disagree)
insist on using yours' in an A to B, the best fan for each unit
- but think hard on max noise, the days of 45db(A) rad fans are over

the Alphacool are dual core, see Joe's test of the CoolWave (another test to shudder about)

[Marci]

Alphacool have launched a range of what appear to be BIP style radiators calling them NexXxoS Xtreme. I haven't had sight yet but the pricing is attractive (120.1=EUR30 , 120.2=EUR40 120.3 = EUR50).

Of course the design could turn out to be not so great on futher investigation......

EDIT: Subst Taiwan for China in this post... see unregistered's post below!

Same rads as marketed in the UK under the brand name of XSPC, made in Taiwan under cheap labour... direct clones of Innovatek's range... with the addition of the 120x3 model, which Innovatek don't produce and doubt ever will... clone and expand appears to be the way of things at the mo in Taiwan... same company that produces the rads also produces a load of DangerDen clone waterblocks, LRWW clones, as well as clones of Innovatek's reservoirs... see this page: http://www.colorstone.com.tw/product...&productid=482

DD Clones are labelled as "NAZI" blocks
LRWW Clones labelled as "462 block"
RE1 range is a duplicate of Innovatek's plugon Tank-O-Matic but expanded to support a wider range of pumps.
MWD120 is the rad clone.

So, XSPC, Coolwave, AlphaCool, MWD... all the same product with a different badge on the box so to speak. The pricing on them is all down to everything being cheaper in Taiwan, and looks set to demolish the European Manufacturers, ThermoChill (O-CuK / www.over-clock.com) and BI (HWLabs) included should they take off well...

That's just the main outlet for em all... they're made by someone else, and the link is already up on here somewhere... but can't remember where offhand.

[BillA]

not Taiwan, too expensive
China
the times they are a changing, adapt or die
yes, we too are concerned - but we are not waiting either

[Marci]

Ta fer the correction - keep forgetting that! Added EDIT: line in me post to cover the confusion...

Tis definitely a case of no rest for the wicked n' all that jazz ;P

Hence the reservoirs yesterday (see Araldite 2022 thread), and...:



As you can see, shrouded at 12.5 degrees from vertical results in it being rather on the large side... 12.5 degrees from Horizontal resulted in a shroud that wasn't worth bothering with as was ridiculously small... and it's single row, single pass.





^^ 14FPI... tis more see-thru than it appears in the photo... wasn't particularly well squared on the radiator...



^^ Beside a PC60 for scale...



^^ Hanging from an old MountainMods wrapper (old as they no longer use the U wrapper, they use 3x separate panels)



^^ And mounted in the MountainMods...

So, does it LOOK as expected?? Is that shroud seriously correct??? Really want Cathar's input on this seeing as it's the spec he came up with... IMO, 160x160 is still a tad large tho in terms of ability to mount in a case. Width wise it fits, but lengthwise (barb to barb) it's a bit on the long side.. 160x120 on the core, + end chambers would be more accomodatable in terms of yer average case...

Next plan is to get the ThermoChill Waterblocks sorted for use with A64 and LGA775... iirc testing ages ago showed them to perform quite peachy at low to moderate flow, so figure coupled with the rad above, the res and the DDC or CSP-Mag should make a peachy l'il kit... we shall see...! Only thing we're missing is a British-Manufactured pump now... we've done the rest...

SIDENOTE: Are there any other British Manufacturers around anymore that anyone's aware of?? Or is ThermoChill the only one left now? (Bearing in mind XSPC buy their bits in from China so don't really count as a British Manufacturer...)

[Risky]

Thanks, for the info. These are 30mm thick as opposed to the 45mm XSPCs so I guess they've expanded their range (or a similar outfit has a varient).

[BillA]

30mm means single core ?

[bobkoure]

Originally Posted by Marci

IMO, 160x160 is still a tad large tho in terms of ability to mount in a case. Width wise it fits, but lengthwise (barb to barb) it's a bit on the long side..

I'd have expected this set up so that the tanks were top and bottom (PC towers tend to have a bit more room vertically than horizontally). I'd also have expected the barbs to face the side the fan was on, which should reduce the total size a bit.
I'm not at all convinced that you need quite this much plenum on the pull side to get somewhat-even flow between all the fins, although I'm prepared to be convinced - and many cases do have room for this if the rad is positioned in the lower front of the case.
Finally - I want one!

SIDENOTE: Are there any other British Manufacturers around anymore that anyone's aware of??

I lived through the "decline and fall" of brit motorcycle manufacturers. Would love to chat about "what went wrong" sometime. Maybe the Italians, with their protectionism, were entirely right. At least Guzzi and Ducati are still around...

[HAL-9000]

Originally Posted by Marci

SIDENOTE: Are there any other British Manufacturers around anymore that anyone's aware of?? Or is ThermoChill the only one left now? (Bearing in mind XSPC buy their bits in from China so don't really count as a British Manufacturer...)

I think Wet and Chilly Chips still makes their own waterblocks at least. They also have a dual pass radiator for sale on their site that everyone else isn't selling, though I doubt its origin is British.

They do however sell a kind of integrated res/rad that is similiar in concept to a Zalman Resorator. You can get it in different lengths up to one meter, and unlike Thermaltake's outright ripoff of the Zalman unit, this one doesn't look like some phallic symbol either. God save the Queen.

[pauldenton]

Originally Posted by Marci

As you can see, shrouded at 12.5 degrees from vertical results in it being rather on the large side... 12.5 degrees from Horizontal resulted in a shroud that wasn't worth bothering with as was ridiculously small... and it's single row, single pass.

hmm - wouldn't the best way to reduce it's depth be to use a larger-than-120mm fan?