Tell me, does adding a corrosion inhibitor prevent lime buildup/scaling?

Or would running the tap water through some sort of filter be the real answer on this one?

Seems to me that we're off on a bit of a tangent here, and confusing polluted water with corrosion. No amount of corrosion inhibitor will fix that your water is full of contaminants. You need to filter/distill the water in that case.

Cathar, I think he was commenting on Al and tap water, not brass. I could be missing somethibng but Koslov never mentioned brass.

Anyway using tap is a bad idea because its filled with dissolved salts and metal, and this has nothing to do with where you live or what pipes are in your house.

So when you said:

You really meant that if your tap water is classified as "soft" ie. less than 17.1 mg/L of calcium carbonate, you have nothing to worry about. Unlike Melbourne, most places ( San Diego, over 200 mg/L, Edmonton, 165 mg/L) do have hard water.

Just watching out for those who might ditch the distilled because you said it was OK to use tap. You have a big name around here, you should be careful what advice you give.

redleader: Hard water has everything to do with where you live.

edit:
http://water.usgs.gov/owq/map1.jpeg

edit2: Sorry, I have completely gone off topic now. Mixed metals, oh yeah...:p

edit3: Let's see if I can save the topic by tieing the two together. Tap water, because it contains chloride and nitrate, can speed up galvanic corrosion:

Okay, I just want to make it clear where I'm coming from.

If all you are using is brass/copper, then you can get by without using corrosion inhibitors provided that your water isn't toxic.

I believe that this is all I said before, yet was picked at for saying it.

As a followup, if you live in a hard water area then it would serve you well to filter your water first before putting it in your system, or just buy some distilled water.

I fail to see how that is misleading people, or taking them onto the wrong path.

As a precaution, feel free to use corrosion inhibitors. I highly recommend using about a 5% mix of car radiator corrosion inhibitor, as this also will stop fungal growth, plus it just allows you to "play it safe" in any event.

All I was trying to say was that if you have an all brass/copper system, then given relatively uncontaminated water (Melbourne,Australia tap water for example is quite soft), then corrosion is not much of an issue to be worried about, as evidenced by my testing of such.

I don't believe that I was out to misinform anyone, just to bring back the level of fear a notch or two when people go around showing unprotected Al/Cu disasters, and then causing panic amongst the Brass/Copper crowd.

Well Said.

I live in the UK, in quite a hardwater area, my shower head ( not in a bong, normal shower ;) ) keeps clogging, and my kettle needs replacing every few months.

Having said that, I've been running with tapwater and antifreeze fine for ages. I use an aluminium heatercore and all copper blocks and fittings, and even when I pull my blocks apart, there isn't much evidence of problems.

There is normally a slight white residue on some areas of the block, but nothing major.

I'd recommend using distilled water and waterwetter, but my setup requires such large amounts of water, its simply not feasible. ( I have a radbox a very long way away from my PC, and I normally need a good 12-15 litres to fill the system. I'm not spending £10 on distilled water every time I need to change or test a block. )

my 2p anyway.

I don't see what the fuss is about: just use distilled, and forget about tap water. Those carbonate maps may or may not indicate your local water plant's ability to filter out the calcium.

Distilled water can be bought here in the US for 58 cents per gallon (3.76 liters). I'm not talking about the pure mountain drinking water, just distilled water, nothing fancy.

Boy this one took a differant turn!

I agree with Koslov on hard water being VERY widespread in this country. And many people living out in the countryside don't have filtration plants to remove any of the mineral content prior to it being in the house. Not far from me (5 miles) is a area with ground water so strong with sulfer it has a strong stench of rotten eggs, & enough taste as well that I don't drink it if in the area. There is also various amounts of salt and other minerals in wells throughout this area. And in home water softeners don't/can't deal with it all. Nasty. I can only imagine what tap water in this area would do, and very fast, if used in a mixed metals system or even in a pure copper one if the system is turned off often. And it is hard on home plumbing as well. (Note; I'm now to the point that I've replaced most of my home's metal plumbing with plastic pipe for this reason, hard water sux.)

On the other hand I can well understand Cathar's not realizing how very differant things are here vs in Austrailia where he lives. He's lived without this high mineral content all his life, what would anyone expect him to relate to. And he did note that for peace of mind you should use corrosion inhibitors and always in mixed metals system.

I think most people have the common sense to realize that if you have problems with home plumbing at times then you shouldn't be running it in a computers closed cooling system for any reason. And what you might read on a computer message board doesn't change that.

Best advice to all is use distilled water + 3-5% corrosion inhibitors.
It costs very little as Ben pointed out, and is sure worth the peace of mind for so little cost. You can even get 3X distilled & deionized water for under $5 per fill up(for system of 1 gal. or less), and compared to what a good computer & water cooling system costs this is a
REALLY, REALLY cheap insurance compared to your total investment.

ALWAYS use distilled water and try to keep the air in your reservior to a minimum AND make sure your reservior is as close to air tight as possible!!!

1. Tap water, regardless of your location WILL have some bacteria still alive in it. This can form alge and fungus in your system, especially if it's using an open air reservior.

2. Tap water (as already mentioned) regardless of your location WILL contain certain amounts of minerals, which will create scale deposits over time.

3. The water you use in your system (REGARDLESS OF WHAT TYPE) will create a small amount of current and become acidic over time. This is what happens to water when cycled through metal passages. Especially metal passages that are electrically separated from each other (can you say WBs and RADs). If you think I'm lying, put in fresh distilled water, and flush your system. Then refill again and take a ph test. Then after a week, test the ph again. The water WILL be more acidic.

4. Always pay attention to your aluminum components. I have yet to use a wetter (lazy) and have seen a steady buildup of aluminum oxide in my reservior over the 4 years I have run the system. It's about time to change out my trans cooler I expect. 8-D

Everyone chime in and rip these apart if you feel I am incorrect.

*** FLAME ON! ***:D

I didn't mention hard water, but I'll reiterate my point anyway. Do not use tap becuase it has dissolved salts in it.

News flash:
Hardwater is due to calcium carbonate, dissolved in tap water.
Calcium Carbonate is a.... SALT!

It would only seem natural that since lots of people were talking about the specific salt calcium carbonate that that was also the salt you were referring to.

News flash:

A salt is the product of any two ions reacting. Since most things that will dissovle naturally in tap water are ions . . . get ready for it . . . theres more then one salt involved.

Specifically there are salts of carbonate, sodium, chorine, calcium, copper, iron, sulfer, florine, iodine, lead, bromine, etc. Did I mention nitrates, phosphates and sulfates? Do a google search, you'll find a few dozen more things. Basically if its solable at all, exists in nature and is stable in water, theres some of it in tap water.

It's the aluminium rad that will suffer, have you peaked inside it lately?, through the barbs...

it seems fine, although I havn't looked in it for a while I admit.

I suppose I could cut my old alu rad in half and see what happened to that after running on tapwater for a year or more.

If I do, i'll post some piccies.

Keepalive.
 

Bump.

pHaestus , how did things work out?

thats really quite scary...I'll make sure to use a corrosion inhibiter next time I refill!

Anyway, at www.ipkonfig.com there is an article suggesting a pure water source is aquafina bottled water...I was wondering if anyone agreed with this?

http://www.ipkonfig.com/Articles/CleanWater/ is the article

That is complete BS. Aquafina is spring water (aka MINERAL water) which may have even higher levels of ions than your tap water depending upon location. Here is a chemical analysis:

http://www.pmgeiser.ch/cgi-bin/mineral?disp=Aquafina

edit: derogatory comment about se7en and co. removed until I can track down whether there are 2 aquafinas or not...

Hrm perhaps there is more than one aquafina? Pepsi says:

"Enjoy the crisp, refreshing taste of Aquafina – 100% pure, non-carbonated, purified drinking water. The consistent purity and great taste of Aquafina are guaranteed by means of a state-of-the-art purification process that includes reverse osmosis and carbon filtration. Since its debut in 1995, Aquafina has won over consumers with its great taste and purity. Aquafina is currently America's #1 selling bottled water brand in measured retail channels.

Aquafina is the official bottled water of Major League Soccer and the PGA of America. Aquafina is distributed nationwide and can be enjoyed in 16.9-ounce, 20-ounce, 24-ounce, 1-liter and 1.5-liter bottles. Aquafina. Purity Guaranteed.

Contains: Purified water


Calories 0
Total Fats (g) 0
Sodium (mg) 0
Potassium (mg) 0
Total Carbohydrates (g) 0
Sugars (g) 0
Protein (g) 0
Caffeine (mg) 0 "

Also to clarify:

Pretty much all of the distilled water at grocery stores is going to be either produced by reverse osmosis or of similar quality. So even if Pepsi's Aquafina is "pure RO/carbon filtered water" and not spring water, there is nothing special about Aquafina compared to other RO distilled other than it costs the same for a 22oz bottle as the generic stuff does for a gallon.

Pretty much all labs have 16MOhm RO water coming out of the "DI" tap at the sink. If you are a student just take a jug and grab some :)

... and sold in a really elegant bottle full of air. ;)

I'll grab some of the stuff from the bio lab on Monday then
Hope the Biology lecturer doesn't catch me lol

White tap: DI Water

Will be reverse osmosis for sure.

Most of the 'distilled' water is produce using steam distillation. Just to clarify. Reverse osmosis is a different process altogether.

Is it all sold as "Purified" water then? I am certain that the water I used to get at local Acme was RO (said so in small letters on label) but wasn't labeled specifically as RO water.

Any idea on relative conductivity of distilled vs. RO?

From what i understand, 'purified' water (as in water meant for consumption) is in no way, shape or form devoid of minerals. Water that we drink, has TONS of minerals in it, the minerals are good for us but bad for watercooling. The arrowhead water i am drinking right now is 'purified' but still has plenty of minerals. True distilled water (I usually buy arrowhead) is devoid of ALL mineral content. Here is a quote from "THIS article : "distilled water is like a vacuum without any minerals". RO is a process that does remove most of the mineral content of water but I believe that distillation results in water that is 'more pure'. As far as the conductivity of distilled vs. RO water, it really makes no difference. As soon as the water comes into contact with ANYTHING, including the air, it becomes technicaly unpure.