Re: Call me silly
 

How is that possible? I always thought the airtrap needed to be the highest point in the system.

nope :p
look @ this article if you arent convinced.

I am planning to shroud the rad. Not sure about the fan thickness as I havn't bought them yet. I was thinking of the delta double fans. They are a little thick, though. I think that mounting the fans between the front of the chassis is a good idea, though, with that shroud. I've got a high speed compressed air powered dremel, so I should be all set, there. :D And yes, I think that I have the same chassis as your case. Different look, though, but everything's in the same place.

Yup, that's about 1.5" of space up there. Kind of annoying for a water cooling system, there's not much I can use that space for. I origionally had the same idea, but my heatercore is exactly 2" thick, and I want to shroud it, so I can't use that space for that. I also just know that if I had an oppening on top of my case, not only would It get covered up with various papers, and stuff, but I'm sure to spill something in there at some point.

Yup, no more hdd tray. I could put the hdd tray back, but whywould I want to? I have my hard drive in one of those hard drive cooler/temp monitors. I only need one hard drive in this system, so it seemed that the rack was just taking up unneeded space where I needed a heatercore to go. The case also used to have a hdd rack right above the psu, but that one has long since been lost.

I'm not sure what the loop being less than 1.25 meters has to do with it, but it should be somewhere about there. I look forward to your upcoming pics.


I think I have decided on a way to go, though. My pump just barely fits under my video card if I turn it around so the exhaust tube fits to the front of the card and it inputs toward the front of the case. I'll run the input tube under the radiator(there's about an inch to spare), and use that elongated res/airtrap idea that I was thinking of putting in the back of my case. Just have it in the front. I was origionaly planning on having two 120mm fans pushing into the rad, and two in back pulling from the rad. But if I forgo the two pulling, and just mount them in my case somewhere, so my case has a negative pressure, wouldn't that cause the same effect without cramping my space near the rad and pump? I'd love to throw you guys together a sketch of myplan, but I'm at a internet cafe in Philly on business for the next week, so I can't even work on my concoction. :(

well, I'm back in town, and this is what I think I've decided on.

Nice, but can you straighten up the pump inlet?

hmm... not very easily, as you can see, I have to get that tube under the heatercore, there. I'd like, even, to be able to pull the heatercore off away from the wall a little more so I can properly shroud my fans coming in the front. The tube going from the resevoir to the pump is 1", which is a little bit bigger than most of my other tubing, which is 3/4 or 5/8 depending on the section. So I was hoping that that bend wouldn't affect the flow too much.. Do you think that's going to be a big problem?

It doesn't actually kink, or anything, I just have the tube cut and coming off of the pump at an angle. it's a pretty clean angle, not quite as steep as the picture makes it out to be.

I suppose I could get some extra room by removing the mounting pad from the bottom of the pump, that should let the pump sit about 3/4" lower. But that's gonna make mounting the pump a little bit of a pain. I'd probably have to screw directly into the plastic which would kill the resale value if I ever upgrade.

While we're on the subject of killing my pump, since this pump is designed to run submerged, it has no ventilation, would cutting air holes in it's case and venting it increase it's life? or create less heat for the water?

I think I might just be going a little paranoid on you, because we talked extensively about the pump inlet, a couple of months back.

If your description is accurate, I think you'll be OK.

As for the pump heat (the heat from the coils, not the heat from the pumping action), yes, venting it would help, but it won't affect the water temp in a measurable way. If I could do that mod, I'd probably jump at the chance to do it, but just make sure that you're not going to accidentally cut a coil wounding, otherwise the pump is toast. I would expect the winding to be pressed against the inside of the pump casing, so using a Dremel is definitely out. I'd highly recomend taking it apart first.

Does anyone know how the Rio is constructed; is it possible to vent?

My Beckett submersible was constructed with the motor coil 'suspended' within a plastic shell by epoxy that was poured in, so there was no way of cooling it--it is a solid, sealed mass.
Would the Rio be similar?

Probably, and the Via's are the same way.
No venting is possible short of just blowing air over it.

would it be possible to mount the res internally above the psu? maybe use a 1" copper elbow on the pump intake...

also, could you use velcro to secure the pump? or maybe straps? like cut some slots on the bottom of the chassis and just strap the pump down. ya know?

yea, I could put the pump over the psu, but the water is still going to have to travel a ways down to the pump, I may as well make the distance the water travels be part of the res.

As for the velcro, with my pump in that position it's sitting right over my motherboard, right under an expensive videocard, and right next to a bunch of other pci cards(read: lot of things nearby to break). I occasionally take my computer to lans, and I would be very nervous of it coming undone and crashing around if I velcroed it down. Even straps have a tendency to losen when jiggled around.

I'm thinking of epoxying four screws to the bottom of the pump so they are sticking out and drilling four little holes in the bottom of the case to match. Then I can just get some nuts and tighten the pump down to the case. That'll put about an 1/8" space(thickness of head of screw) in between the pump and the case for air to flow around the pump too.

Have you considered getting a YY Cube case?

:)

A cuple of posts ago i saw that you had some thin about Negativ Pressure.
You dont want a Vacume (Negative pressure) in your case because it will cause dust to be drawn into the case ann Drives, causing a multitude of problems with dust on the optics of the DVD/ cd drives dust on the Head of floppy drives and your hard drives

Aah, thanks saton, I hadn't thought of that, good thing you got to me. So it looks like the pulling fans have to actually be shrouded right to the radiator.

It seems like everyone and their mothers are getting the yy cube cases these days. If I'm gonna get a new case(which I'd rather save my money for ram or something else.) then I can think of better cases than the yy cube. something a little more compact, I don't really need all the room that the yy has to offer.

im sure you can find a way to stuff all of your gear into your current case :p be creative!

If by "be creative" you mean "use extradiamensional space to fit everything"... Then I'm on it.

throwing another idea in the mix...
 

Looking at the pic of your case... Wouldn't it be possible to move the three drives to the topmost places and use the lower space just over the rad for a square res and air trap?

That would put it at the top of the waterloop and give you enough space for it to actually be a res if you wan't too... It should also make the routing of the tube to the pump inlet a bit easier...