Hunting info for Enermax PSU - watercooling issues

[logosmani]

Well, since my Q-Tec 550 decided to give up the ghost (low 12v line, overloaded it without noticing) i've had to start redesigning and rethinking about PSU cooling. Fortunately the block i have from the Q-Tec was designed with reuse in mind if need be, it basically replaces the poisition of the 80mm (or 92) bottom fan in a cpu. But i would like to ask for any information anyone has that could be helpful.

I'm not looking for the obvious howto for doing a watercool, that can be found with some time on google. What i'd like to hear about is if anybody has had any experiences in what does + doesn't need cooled in a 550 enermax. (blade maybe u can help here?)

The current plan is to provide a cooled solution via a path to water to anything mounted on Heatsinks, the transformer and the one coil which bladerunner felt the need to cool.

Suggestions, pointers, information on where to look for more information, anything would be helpful

[BladeRunner]

If you haven't yet check out the PSU Update on my site. Its worth noting that my psu is working fine and not even warm now, BUT it is not being loaded much at all in my system. I would not recommend running any Tecs or items that suck lots of amps from it however.

My cooling solution for the Enermax works, and is a multitude of things that I have done over time to solve all the hot parts I could find. Even since that update article on my site, (when recently modding the block for 8mm fetso from the previous 6mm), I noticed that the large white ceramic resistor near the transformer was obviously getting hot by discolouration of the base of the copper block. I have since thermal epoxied the resistor to a copper plate that is connected to the block in a similar fashion to the coil cooling bracket.

[logosmani]

thanks blade, i had thought about the resistor maybe needing cooled, used to run rc cars and used a resistor just about that size to discharge the batts after a run and it got HOT so it was deffo something i was considering.

Another idea i'm considering atm is to cool the bottom of the PCB board, with some of this stuff as an interface with a copper plate. Although i'm not yet sure if this would be at all beneficial (prolly not), still need to look into this further anyway.

[BladeRunner]

Good link, not heard of that stuff so added to my favourites in the Material Supplies folder

Funny you should mention cooling the PCB as I'd considered this, I was going to resin coat the underside so it was flat and all conductive traces & pins were insulated then use a full size thin copper waterblock in contact with it. The resin wouldn't have been a good transfer medium but with my cooler coolant the block would lower the temp of the resin a PCB a fair amount helping to cool the components. Like so many things I never got around to it, and to be honest I don't think the Enermax needs it as it's fine heatwise with the way I have it now.


I may do it in the next PSU mod, (if I do another). Was thinking that I could raise the PCB so it was about half way up the case, then transfer the mosfets to the back of the PCB. This would keep their pin trace length the same and allow them to be mounted easily to one block under the PCB. The only issue with that is the transformer wont be cooled, but if it were done with a form of PCB cooling it may work ok?

[logosmani]

blame bigben2k for that link, he posted it up elsewhere . I have found stuff like that before, unfortunately when i asked for prices etc the minimum order was £100 and it had a lead time of 6weeks. Can't remember precisely what company i contacted atm tho (thought it was in my favourites, it isn't :\). Anyway, that put me off a bit and i didn't bother placing an order at that time.

To further how i was going to go about dealing with the PCB board, i was going to build a completely new enclosure which corresponded to the ATX specs (in dimension at least) out of Perforated Steel sheeting (RS 447-5284), i've already used this stuff to replace the cover on the PSU (would give u a pic but no cam :|). Then i was going to move the PCB about halfway up in the case, put a copper plate on the bottom of it, bring the Mosfet etc wires round from the top to the bottom of the waterblock. This however has left me without a clue on how to deal with the Transformers etc, but it sounds like it could be easy enough to relocate them as well, possible on their sides to contact the waterblock.

Anyway, i'm typing half thought thru thoughts here, sounds just like your idea now that i'm typing it lol