Hey Guys I live in South Africa and water cooling bits here are really expensive to import and the like and my budget is like nonexistent. So I gave myself a challenge with a couple of goals. 1: Build a water cooling system as cheap as possible. 2: Using only local bought parts 3: Recycle old parts where ever possible 4: Make it using a hard piping system 5: Steam punk style Okay then let’s get this ball rolling shall we. In the First pic we have my plexiglass which cost me a total of £4.18 Then there is the Copper tubing 2m Length and all the other bits and piece which was £7.9 In the Other Pic there is the water pump which pumps 700L a hour up to a height of 1.2m that cost £13.93 I will be using my old Cooler master 690 case which needs some work. The res will be 14cm x 12cm x 20cm. I have currently two designs for the water block The block is 50mmx50mmx20mm Please le me know which one you think will work the best, I do not have access to flow software to work that kinda stuff out. I had a 3rd design which seems to have gone missing I will see if I can redo it. I have a block of solid copper that is 10cm long at its widest point about 4cm thick, I will be making the cpu block out of that. When I am finshed the layout in sketchup I will post it on here. The biggest problem I am having is finding a rad.
Home made block? Love it! What sort of equipment do you have access to for making your block? Will it be all hand tooled, light tools (drills, jigsaws etc), or do you have access to some proper bench tools (mill, bandsaw, etc) as design complexity will vary with equipment available. As a general rule you want to try and maximise the surface area and water turbulence directly over the core(s) of the CPU - so in your first design, the decreased number of pins to the centre is a bad thing, also more, smaller pins would be better. You have got the right idea with the input to the centre but have you considered the idea of a mid-plate for flow shaping. As I can see it my advice for your block design is... Step1: Find out the position, size and orientation of your CPU's core(s) and having a little look around at others would be no bad thing either. This just to figure out where the concentrations of heat will be - it isn't uniform over the whole IHS - this will determine where you should concentrate your efforts, and any orientation to a midplate - should you choose to use one. Step2: have a serious look at the internals of currently available blocks, the designs vary from company to company, and model to model so be sure to cover a decent amount of ground. Step3: Categorise the tools that are available to you and what there uses could be for block construction (this includes torches etc.) this includes anything you can beg, borrow or whatever from mates. Step4: Start designing, I know you have already, and I don't want to sound rude - but complete the above then start again. Radiators? Go to your local breakers yard, find a car who's front end is still in good condition (no front end shunts or major impacts with trees or bollards) buy the heatercore / intercooler braze on a G1/4 female thread (or whatever thread you need to match the rest of your design) and you're done. A body to focus airflow and mount fans would be good to, you could bend one up out of aluminium, or (at desperation's end) cardboard. Copper or brass would be favourite for ease of eliminating galvanic corrosion so have a good trawl around, but if there's nothing but aluminium then that'll have to do, corrosion inhibitors are pretty good at doing what they do.
I have a mate that might have access to a CNC machine. Also I have a Intel 2500k that I will be cooling. I have looked at a lot of other custom water blocks and quite a few of them use the Tiny Pin design but I will also look at the other retail blocks as well. The copper tubing I am using has a I/D of 15mm which should me enough for a pump that can pump 185 gl/h. I have a dremel and various other hand tools, I also have a table saw as well. I am really hoping that I can get access to the CNC machine.
Even if you don't get access to the CNC (mill?), a dremel with the right cutting disc and easily be turned into a slit cutter to make a micro-fin base, but for that you'd want more like 2.5-3mm sheet rather than a big chunk of stock like you've got... This newest design is reminiscent of little river waterbocks; hollow pins in essence, they then had smaller pins inside to increase turbulence. The sandybridge cores run top to bottom.
Hey Guys Here is another update for you. My lastest and most expensive purchase to date £19. 7x90º elbow 1x Straight Piece 1x T-Piece 5 different Jig Saw Blades 1x 5mm tap 2x 20mm drain 20x4mmx12mm Bolts We dont seem stock M4 bolts in SA. The case I am sanding is a Cooler Master 690 and I am still busy with it but I have taken a lot of the paint off and the under coat as well. So out of the current water blocks which one should work the best ? The box is all the bits I had taken off the case. I will be under coating it with red under coat spary paint and then I will be painting it Brass/Copper colours. I have to build a custom Facia for the case as the plastic one broke but I have a awesome idea in mind and I will be be making it out of wood.
Okay time for a big update been quite busy and since it is the first time I am working with perspex and a few other things, its been taking a little longer than I thought. This Picture I have cut the perspex for the res, although Its a bit smaller now as I made a mistake or two and had to correct it. . This is the Behr Rad and the white board marker is to show the sizing of it and its about 40mm thick. This is the wood I am going to be using for one part of the feet, the wood is american ash. This is some more wood I am going to be using it is rhodsian teak, very very hard wood. Some clamping taking place. Test fit of the feet Top view of the thickness of the wood. Wood been glued and clamped My Current plan is to have the Rad sit in the bottom of the case and then it goes to the Res tank/pump and then its pumped to the CPU block. The res tank will be a water fall style tank. Testing how level the feet are. I have a idea for the base to rest the radatior on and I dont wat to use solid wood, as it will be a waste of wood as no one will ever see it and makes air flow a problem so I have a few things to work out but should be fine.
Well I have just spoken to a company about doing the CNC Milling for me and a very rough quote at this time is R 1000 or £ 83. So thats going to have to wait until the end of the month for the CPU water block, beyond my budget this month. That would be to do the drawing in solid works and then Milling the copper block for me as well. It might be worth just buying a ready made CPU block if I cant find a cheaper way to do it. What do you guys think ?
Hey Guys I have another update for you guys. Made some good progress today and I think you will like whats comming next. The pump with all its fittings Excess metal that I cut out off the case. Bottom view of the case, with the holes for the rad pipes, I know its really rough the cuts but I do have a plan for it. Slot cut into the case for the PSU wires. Red Oxide under coat Different view on the case. Front view of the case, paint is still wet. Another view of the case Pump and res connected, I did a quick test as it was there and the pump will empty that res out in about 3 seconds. I later found out that config will not work in the case and I have to change it. 3 of the support braces for the rad. I did a dry test of the feet and works well only to find out I have under estimated the size of a psu, so I will have to fit it in at 90°, which changes my cable running scheme a bit but nothing to hetic. The case as it stands currently, I am pretty happy with this layout and nothing should get in the way of any very long gfx cards, I am busy saving for the Nvidia 680 GTX or what ever it might be called but I still have a very long way to go as I would like to go SLI.
Here's a very clever method of producing a home made waterblock for minimal cost - if you preferred a micro-pin to micro-fin base then all that's needed is to make a second set of passes at 90degrees to the first.
Okay I might have a small problem with galvanic corrosion, since that rad is Alu and the rest of the system if brass/copper. How ever they will not be touching each other serperated buy plastic and I am thinking of using this Zalman G200 Coolant as the cooling fluid ? Would the Zalman G200 Coolant atleast help slow down the problem ?
Yea something like that; or any commercial corrosion inhibitor should do too. By preference you want something that has the same or lower viscosity than water to avoid straining your pump.
Thx Nexxo for moving the topic the project logs. Okay cool I will get the G200 since I can get it locally. I made some more progress over the weekend not a huge ammount but some. I have started with the bracket for the rad and 140mm fans and its about half complete, need to get some longer bolts to complete it but its coming along nicely. It will have 2x140mm fan push and 2x140mm pull. I really need to get paid soon, so I can buy the rest of the fittings I need but I think my pump may be a bit of overkill since it does 11.7L per minute. I did a quick leak test on what I have made so far and its powerfull enough that is made a vortex in the res tank....
Rather than have to worry about corrosion, which may still be an issue even with fluid, why dont you look for a copper heater matrix rad from a car? loads of cars have copper/brass rads for the heater matrix.
I will ask the guys where I bought this rad from, they should have something. but its going to have to wait for pay day
