Scratch Build – In Progress The Mineral Oil PC - 3/24/2011 - More leaks :(

congratulations on not finding a bridge to jump off and keeping a cool head when the leak happened dude! looks awesome how the oil flows through the case... you planning on some funky lighting in there?

 

I'll start building my own oil PC soon and I was thinking of making it out of glass. But does aquarium silicone resist oil or will the oil eat it slowly away ?

 

Thanks. I couldn't find a way to remove the audio altogether on Youtube, so I replaced it with the cheesy music.

In other news, it has been about 9 hours since I filled it and no leaks. Hurray!

My room is on the 2nd floor. My nearly empty 5 gallon container of oil was outside basement level. Lol, you should have seen me fly down the stair case.

Thanks, I was thinking either red or white lighting but TBH, there really isn't room for it anywhere. I might be able to stick a few CCFLs on top of the radiators (below the tank). When viewed from the top, the bottom of the tank looks like a mirror so you might not even be able to see the lights, which would be a plus.

I'm not sure. I did a lot of research on what types of plastic were safe for submersion in oil before buying some components. I made sure that my bulkhead fittings that go between the tank and lower compartment were mineral oil resistant. I bought the acrylic with that in mind as well. I also submerged two broken video cards with different types of capacitors for 3 months to make sure they didn't start falling apart. There was a lot of prep work.

I'd be careful with glass too, it doesn't like to bend.

 

Glass doesn't like to have holes cut in it either. Plexi is much more forgiving.

Your power supply fan probably doesn't turn because of it's size combined with the weird way they undervolt them to make them quiet. (Don't you love how tech-non-savy I am. At least I didn't say 'thingamajig' this time.) You could probably get better results with a bunch of 40mm Deltas. It's not like they will make any noise.

Dibs on your old radiator!!! If you don't want it, shoot me a PM.

 

Cheesecake!

 

Looks good, congrats!

 

Thanks!


I recommend watching it in HD. SD kills the eddies, convection currents and swirlies.

 

wow, looks simply awesome.

How about some temp screenshots?

 

Awesome. It has that 'freshly filled aquarium' look, only without the gravel and rocks.

 

I was wondering the same..... What temps are u getting on the cpu and vga cards?? a friend of mine and I are thinking of doing a mineral oil based pc also

 

Heh, I like to stare at the swirling currents. Thanks!

TBH, they're not very good. The lack of a decent TIM kind of kills the temps on the CPU.


Both GPUs and CPU Idle. Note the ridiculous voltage on the CPU.


Both GPUs loaded and CPU @ 100%.

GPU1:
Idle/Load: 46/52

GPU2:
Idle/Load: 52/59

CPU:
Idle/Load: 66/80

The GPU temps are great though.


Full load power usage. You should feel the heat coming out of the side of this thing.

 

Looking good man!

You should know, I'm using some of your research to work on my own case. Your design looks incredibly solid and far better then the flimsy idea I was working with.

http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?p=2031236#post2031236

 

man and u would think the temps would be lower.

 

The G0 Q6600 happily runs at 3ghz with a x9 multiplier, 333fsb and ~1.3v core, how come you are running a 430fsb and such a high v-core dude?
Only wondering unless you are trying to get it ridiculously hot? lol

Awesome build by the way, been following it

 

still an awesome build regardless, I love the case, tbh I doubt I could build a case so clean like that, im still a newbie lol, but I plan on giving it a try. do u know if distilled water will do the same thing?? or would it damage the actual components?

 

Water distilled or not will conduct electricity and it will go pop the second you turn it on, oil on the other hand does not conduct electricity which is why it works

 

Deionized water would work. .... for the 5 minutes it takes for it to pick up free ions from everything and become conductive. Tom's Hardware tried it: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/strip-fans,1203-3.html

Thanks, good to hear my work can be of some use! 1/4" Acrylic is pretty strong stuff. 3/8" is damn near inflexible.

Find me a mineral oil non-soluble TIM and I'd guess they'd be ~15-20C lower. My overclock is essentially the same, so maybe it's a non issue.

Mine doesn't I temporarily have it at a lower multiplier (but not voltage) while I figure out the working temp of my new setup in the oil. With my old water setup, my Q6600 ran happily 24/7 @ 3.5ghz with 1.575V @ 430 /w 8x multiplier. Once I'm happy with the stability at this speed, I'll crank it back up.

Thanks for all the comments guys!

 

Maybe there's a pocket of air stuck between the CPU and heatsink preventing the oil from entering.. you did turn it on after applying the oil as a TIM.. and watch it all leak out.. Maybe a remount with the same procedure?

Vaseline as a thicker version of mineral oil might be worth a go.. but it may melt away at 80C and it'd be a pain in the arse if it decided to all solidify inside a radiator.

Another idea would be something cut with channels on the CPU side mounted in between, giving both the TRUE and oil chance to cool the CPU. Could even have a 40mm fan whacking oil through these channels.

It's great to see the main part of this project has come together nicely!

 

What if you were to go more phase changeish with the CPU. Use some foam or something to seal the actual socket off from the oil and use a normal TIM?

 

It's too late to do that for this hardware, but when I upgrade that's not a bad idea.

I don't think there's air between the two, the heatsink is on there pretty tight. Remounting it would make a mess Everything is covered in oil. I think you're right about the Vaseline dissolving into the oil, plus it's something I'd rather not risk. If my CPU is happy at 80C, then so am I

I'm not sure I understand what you mean about the thing stuck between the CPU and the heatsink. It sounds like you want to put a heatsink between the heatsink and the CPU? But why do that when the heatsink is already doing that?