Nice. I've seen it before, but I was concentrating on the PSU at the time.

He used a 2mm baseplate, where I've got a 3.2mm, but I have more surface area for the water, plus the heat won't have to travel through a solder joint.

I've also thought about using grease between the HDD and this block. If the HDD is painted, I'll have to lap it :D

I like the paint job. I also like the fact that he should have no problem mounting these drives in a standard drive cage.

dont know how, but i keep coming up on all sorts of hd blocks since i've read your post :)

here's another one, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...&category=3673
and only $30!!!!! lol
:D

Thanks MadDog, the propane torch is working out just fine! (as I light a cigarette with it :cool: )

http://www.bernzomatic.com/Images/TS4000KC.jpg

just thought i'd chime in here with my design for my rotor style (plagarism?? where?) hd block, originally the inlet barb was positioned on the top flowing freely into the chamber but my bench drill isn't up to it (size restrictions). Its built out of mammoth 3/4" copper with a 2mm sheet soldered on to top it off, if i had thought harder b4 ordering the copper (ordered it several blocks ago) i prolly woulda gone for 6mm plates instead.. ah well live and learn.

Any comments critisicms welcome, but leave my spelling alone :)

One note: wouldn't you rather have the barbs come out the back, rather than the side? A typical case is only 8 inches wide!

the two barbs at the bottom 'facing' u, join together behind the drives, like the block posted in this thread if thats the ones u mean? the other two i'm either gonna stick an elbow on it, or a straight barb facing down, just depends on where i decide to stick it in the case

i was thinking of something similar, but mine encased the whole hdd, it had 1 channel on the side, and those channels branched off into many more that went across the surface of the HDD (both sides), the many channels would then empty into 1 in which it would then leave the block.

Erm... doesn't most of the heat come off the top/bottom of the drive so the coolers at either side won't do much good.

The only drop you would see in temperatures is placing them with air spaces between them in 5 1/4" bays.

~ Boli

(just a thought)

i figure the added mass of the block would quiet the drive some...

Actually, the sides is probably one of the best places to cool a hard drive from, since it is flat and there is a direct conducting path to the major heat producing components.

The large flat metal "lid" which most people initially thing of watercooling, is actually insulated from the rest of the block by an o-ring.

And cooling the base with the pcb and motor spindle is tough.

The sides is the way to go.

8-ball

Thanks 8-ball - first real post I have found stating sides is better than top.

I plan on doing the tubing-on-plate approach, except without the awful 90o turns. Not enough room for 45o turns, so I've got my 90o sweeps which will have to be good enough.

However, I've stopped for more thinking.

See, seeing as the drive is water cooled, I should think about a nice enclosure to quieten them down. This is where I am at now - what to make it out of, how to "pack" it to deaden drive noise.

Funny thing about being fanless - the drives are SOOO noisy, where as before water cooling, I assumed they were silent coz I never heard them....

*grumbles*

That part is SO true... the worst part about loud drives is it is the high pitched whine that drives you nuts when you try to sleep in the same room as your computer.

I think that was Volenti.

Indeed, and I believe it's linked to, earlier in this thread.

Does anyone know where I can find 3/8 copper street elbows?

Good thread, my thoughts and questions.
 

This is an interesting thread, I just started a different thread on the same subject because I didn't know this one existed... (Hadn't read back far enough) http://forums.procooling.com/vbb/sho...&threadid=6995

The problem I have with most of the designs mentioned so far is that I want to put my drives in the 3.5" internal bays, which means side cooling isn't really an option. I suppose one *could* design a block that attached outside the bay, but I really doubt that it would work well as there would be to many thermal interfaces.

I have been thinking in terms of soldering coper tube to a flat plate, and putting that on the top (cover) side of the drive. I wasn't planning to do anything to the controller side, as I didn't see how to get good thermal contact with the drive.

However I noticed the block that was being sold on e-bay mentioned by lukasz70 (it didn't sell BTW, got one bid of $5 and didn't make reserve) did bolt onto the bottom of the drive, and presumably cleared everything. I may take a closer look once I actually get the drives in hand. Do you think there would be much benefit from putting a cool plate near a drive with some airspace in between? It would at least keep the air next to the drive cool...

I'm not sure about this 8-ball, where do you get your info on the heat sources in hard drives? According to at least one article I've read (I think it was on Storage Review.com, but don't quote me on that) the drive controller components and spindle motor don't make all that much heat. Most of the heat from a fast drive is generated inside the case by air friction of spinning the platters. If that is the case, then cooling the lid might be the optimal approach since that surface is the one with the most contact with the air (and it's a safe bet that there's LOTS of turbulence inside a drive case :dome: )

I do know that I've seen at least a couple of mentions of people just slapping a CPU or GPU WB on the lid and getting lower temperatures on the entire drive.

Gooserider

think you'll find that the HD manufacturers design the drives these days to sink the heat to the sides, use the case as a heatsink if they can. _i think_!

how many cases u seen that have a plate on the top or bottom of a 3.5" hd?

Where do all the watts go?
 

This is an interesting question, I might try giving Seagate tech support a call on it and see what the experts have to say...

My take on it is that the sides don't seem all that great as a heat dissipator. The drive manufacturer doesn't know what the mounting conditions for the drive will be. Best case, the drive is screwed to a steel cage, with no thermal interface material. Not a great heat sink at best. But I've seen cases plastic with plastic cages, and / or plastic drive rails which would be even worse! There is more and more of a move to getting rid of rails, and screwing the drive to a steel cage, but my understanding is that this is driven more by manufacturing costs and a desire to improve chassis electrical grounding than to solve heat problems.

I haven't seen many cases of ANY kind of liquid cooling on drives, but I would say I've seen about equal numbers of side coolers and top/bottom coolers. The air cooling solutions I've seen appear to me like they are trying to do more top/bottom cooling than side cooling.

Aside from the question of hot components on the controller board, the two biggest heat sources I see in a hard drive are the spindle motor and air friction heating done by the spinning drive platters Both of those sources are inside the drive, and can't be cooled directly. The sides are relatively thick, and thus slow to transfer heat, they are also fairly small in surface area. The top is thin, thus will transfer heat quickly, and has a lot of surface area. My understanding of the conditions inside the running drive is that there is more than enough air circulation to ensure that if any part of the drive shows a temperature gradient, the air will rapidly convey any heat from the hotter areas to the coolest one. The lack of a clear metal thermal path shouldn't make much difference as I see it.

I also mention yet again that I want to put the drives in my 3.5" internal bays. Edge coolers prevent that, but it should be quite easy with top/bottom coolers.

Gooserider

Re: Where do all the watts go?
 

You might consider applying Volenti's solution, and weld copper tubes to the sides of that drive cage.

Instead of soldering the entire pipe to the plate so the contact surface is minimal. Wouldn't it be better to rip the pipe in half and then solder it on. So there is a more direct path for the heat to take.

Secondly. After about a month of planning and prepping I silenced my PC. The first night with the "silent" comp I almost went nuts because of the HD noise. My solution was hooking up a ramdisk and running SETI and AIM of it. It didn't solve the problem 100% but it sure did cut down on the number of times when the HD had to spin up.

Does anyone have any numbers on how quiet you can get a HD if you water cool it surround it in foam?

It's my plan to do just this. I have an LRR, so one outlet will go to GPU and the other outlet to NB. Then both loops will proceed to either side of the drive cage for a little loop. They will only be combined when back at the reservoir for a submerged pump. Pump goes to radiator, and then to CPU and off we go again.

I figure I can balance the flows in each side as some runs and bits will be longer and more curvey then others, so I will need to mix and match until its balanced.

The plan is to take to copper piping with the angle grinder, but I am yet to start....

Doing the half pipe & sides vs. tops
 

Got another opinion in the top vs.side cooling debate. See 3rotor's response to me here:
http://forums.procooling.com/vbb/sho...&threadid=7010

While he expressed preference for top cooling, he didn't seem to feel it made a big difference either way. I'm thinking it is probably a case of which approach is easier for the setup you are using. :cool:

Probably would be better in theory to do a split pipe, but I don't think the hassles would be worth the gains.

1. Drives don't generate THAT much heat (Seagate Cheetah 15K U160 SCSI's are only rated for 18 watts max) I doubt the efficiency difference would amount to a significant difference, possibly not even a measurable one.

2. Soldering on a split pipe means LONG seams, and lots of fussy surface prep and very exact fitting of the pipe to avoid the many chances for leaks. Soldering on an intact tube will be leak free if you don't burn a hole in it (difficult) and it's no big deal if you miss a few spots.:rolleyes:

3. An intact tube means an easy hookup for tubing, just leave an end sticking out and slide the tube over it. No barbs, no fuss. You'll need do some fancy transition to go from a split tube to a round fitting, and you can't put a tube on a semi-circle very well.

4. Unless you use a much bigger diameter tube, you will end up with alot more flow restriction than you get with an intact tube.

5. As a minor cost issue, soldering an intact tube to a plate is very material efficient. I don't see a way to do a split tube without wasting alot of material...

I could go on, but I think you'll agree that overall the benefit doesn't look worth it.

Gooserider

I'm just about finished with my plans for a block and have 1 remaining question. Since the heat we're talking about here is very little, aproximately 20watts is it necessary to have a pair of side blocks or could one get away with having only a single sideblock.

The block would be a strip of Cu same profile as the HD, the thickness is still under consideration. I'll either do a rotor style block or a cross drilled style.

The chassis of a HD is a chunk of aluminum which is a rather good cunductor of heat. So if I lap the side of the drive merely to remove the paint and insure its true then apply the copper block, the drive should stay cool. Since the drive doesn't put out that much heat there shouldn't be a huge variance across the drive.

Does this sound doable or does the drive really need a pair of coolers?

If you look at it from a perspective of thermal resistance, you would have a higher resistance with a single block.

Is it relevant?

Well, most drives will work well without water cooling, which brings up the question: why watercool it at all?

It's not necessary, and just like the rest of our watercooling ventures, it's not worth the money (not cost efficient).

So if you only want to cool only one side, go for it.;)

Well I've got a pair of 7.2k rpm drives. I could always put a fan on them but that would involve putting a fan on them and virtually doubling the fans in my system. I stacked them once and they got rediculously hot in no time at all. I'd like to save room by stacking them in this case so watercooling would be the best way to keep em cold without adding fans or spacing them a good distance apart.

Then stick to my design: I'm making a block (2 blocks) for two drives, with a large enough gap between them so that I can put a ramsink on any components that wouldn't sink any heat to the sides. Any little fan should do the trick.

It's too bad that it has to be this way, but I'm not putting another waterblock, to cool the rest of the drive.

I always intended to mount the drives to the HDD block using a copper plate on the sides too but never got around to it. I was also going to isolate them in a double glazed box to totally soundproof them as they can still be heard if listened to close up, but the Seagate IV's in single platter are so quiet it really isn't a requirement. They are truly the only item that makes a sound in my PC when not using DVD/ Printer etc, (unless you include the slight component buzz of the NF7-S).

From my experience cooling two drives via the top plate works just fine, we are not talking CPU point heat levels, (at least not with 7200rpm drives), and heat will always migrate to a cooler surface as long as there is some type of transfer medium. My opinion is don't complicate it or over engineer, just make a block that works well in your system. I choose a slim flat block simply because I could cool two drives with one block. Oh and one other tip, do not hard mount your drives as doing this with mine makes them 10 times more noisy, (especially in seek). If the seek noise is annoying try just sitting the drive on some foam for a test if you currently have the drives hard mounted, and see if it makes a difference in your system.

I'm going to make a new HDD block soon to complete the migration to 8mm festo for all the blocks. Not important but a slight correction in that my current HDD block has 6mm festo push fits and is constructed using two 2mm plates for the top and bottom and the main part is 6mm (not 10mm), making it 10mm thick overall. :)

Bah, I dream of that level of quiet. Not got the money, time, but most importantly, the dedication to do anything close to what you've done. That adn I seem to be moving house every 3-6 months for the past 2 years :(

BladeRunner is my new personal Hero. Since I've soften you up what different diameter tubing do you have in your system right now?

I'm not going to fill this topic up with my images, so go HERE to see some current images of the PC. I will have some build details on the current blocks when I get around to it but my work has been mad again lately :(

The Tube sizes are Tygon R-3603 for inflow & outflow, (12.5mm ID), via reamed out 5/8 barbs (13mm ID). To get the Tygon on the barbs requires about 15secs immersion in boiling water and a fair bit of force, once on though ugly hose clamps are not required as there is no way it will pull off. The inflow enters directly in the centre of the new splitter block that has four 8mm festo push fits for outflow built in. The polyurethane tube for these is 8mm OD, 6mm ID and the for separate outputs supply the 7 other blocks in my system, (the lesser ones doubled up). There is an extra splitter that can be seen dangling and this is the temporary splitter required at the moment for the current HDD and R9700 ram blocks as they are 6mm festo, (4.5mm ID). When the R9800 pro cooler i'm working on is finished, and a new HDD block made this extra splitter won't be required.

Output from the 8mm festo blocks are all collected into another low restriction splitter, (the fixed one on the far right in the images), that takes the flow out via the 5/8 outflow barb.

The silence is great but I don't even think about it much anymore. It's only really bought home to me when I get a new graphics card and test it out before making a cooler for it. It's amazing just how noisy they sound when they are the only major sound source :eek:

Or when you load a cd. That's very anoying with current fast drives and a silent system..:shrug: