Case Mod - In Progress Arctic Rain - Evaporative Cooling Build

Hey there. I joined back in january this year, and some of you might remember my "Project Rainfall"



Well I went a little crazy and added integrated evaporative coolers, and some other crazy things...







Full log is over on overclock.net

I found my disuse of radiators to work rather well, having a huge thermal capacity, and capable of some really good temperatures. I've since moved on to bigger and better things.





Enter the Azza Genesis 9000. This is my new build, Arctic Rain. It's an all-white evaporative cooler based computer, featuring, well, evaporative cooling and very little color. Right now, It's about 80% finished, mostly just waiting on some parts such as a ASUS Sabertooth Z77 (Going to be repainted in all gloss white) and a EVGA GTX670 Cheesecake. Both my GTX670 and 2600K will be under water.

Sponsors:



As it sits:







EK Waterblocks is now a welcome help to this build, which I must have complete by the end of august in order to have a computer to return to school with. EK is providing me with a FC680 Water block as well as their
EK Supreme CPU Block. These parts should be in over the course of the next week or two.

So here's my progress so far.

Started off with the project before I even had the case, but this motherboard isn't being used in this build anymore:





7/18/2012

Finally got the case in!



It's a very large case. It weighed in at about 40lbs



Quickly threw in some components to see how it looked, and started to plan my craziness.



Should always start at the bare frame before doing anything else. The computer is only as solid as the frame that supports it.



The 9000 is a monster compared to Project Rainfall.









And it's only going to get bigger, and so I start zee frame modifications, as well as painting a few things including the mesh for the front power supply. Majority of which I will never use lol. I removed the 5.25" drive bays completely and also moved the bottom drive tray to the rear of the case. Keep in mind this chassis uses a front mounted PSU.











7/19/2012

Got in my first parts. I love paracord :



And here's what's happening with that. You can also see how the bottom cooler is currently way to big too fit inside the case. I'm going to be performing a lot of modifications to the bottom cooler to incorporate some new machined parts, and also some techniques I've been developing to better cool the falling water. I have a CNC milled plate with a lot of smaller holes packed closely together (Not close enough for the water droplets to connect however).





I'm 84.5% sure that the power supply cables will not be routed though the grommets at all.



This panel is gonna have a lot of work done to it. holes for water line hookups and AMP CPC connectors, as well as being the top of a reservoir. I've got this panel with me right now at work and I'll be punching holes in it after hours. I need to rotate the sliding rails around 180* so I can use the vertical support from the 5.25" drive bays (I still need to cut that part up) to help support the bottom cooler. I have to cut another panel for both sides that will cover the bottom section from the sides. These side panels will also help form that bottom reservoir. These panels are going to be sanded down to nice haze, and then going from the front most part of the case, be painted solid white gradually changing to a perfect clear around where the reservoir will be.





All that blue needs to be sand blasted and then in addition to the cpu waterblock, get painted white.



I finally got the motherboard and it's stand-offs for the motherboard cover set up right. I'm not going to bother cleaning it up as this motherboard is temporary.



I get lots of crazy Ideas when I'm short on sleep..........

7/20/2012

HmmmmMMmm...,..........dremel............shiny............









While paint was drying.....finished crimping all the pins for the industrial CPC connectors. The crimping tool I borrowed from my boss goes for $3000 :kookoo: but it's soooooooooooo nice and works on amp connectors, molex. These things make the task of making wiring harnesses so easy. Still probably going to have to shorten some wires and lengthen others. These connectors in addition to the quick-connect fittings for the water loop going to the motherboard tray, allows me to pull the entire tray and then hook it all back up as a test bench without changing anything connected to the motherboard itself. I have all white connectors, I just don't want to scratch them so I'm using regular black ones for now. I have the shields for he bottom half f the connectors, but I still have to put them on. Basically, the PSU side of the connector will be mounted into the polycarbonate panel that separates the bottom and top sections of the case.



Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm..............painted.....like?



Also, here is 3 140mm fans all sitting in the bottom of the case. You need to have a tiny PSU to do this, but it Is possible. And also goes to show a 360 rad will fit there with a small - mid sized PSU. Someone else asked about a 420mm rad on top, I don't know if there are mounting holes, but it should fit.




For anyone that's been wondering why there has been an utter lack of evap cooler goodness, that because I've been trying t design something worthy of the project. Here is the current design, I'm going to be milling the first few parts on the good ol' Bridgeport today. That should give me plenty to do with the coolers this weekend.



It's using some of the old concepts from Project Rainfall, but I still haven't figured out a better method of venting air into the bottom cooler. Wait. Correction, I just thought of one that will work beautifully. Anyways, This cooler uses water channels. You can see the 2" x 1/4" channel going from the plate between the reservoir and bottom cooler, all the way to the top of the top cooler. This channel also connects to a vlave off the top of the bottom cooler, so I can redirect water to just the bottom cooler if I need to.



I'm still working on figuring out what the final water capacity will be, and how I'm going to manage water levels.

7/21/2012

Also, In case anyone is interested, I managed to save Project Rainfall's cooling system. It's panels are all intact (albeit disassembled) and at some point I will rebuild it and use it as a server.

Bottom cooler panels cut, dimensions are within .001" tolerances. Not too shabby if I do say so my self with a table saw meant for wood.



Initial Assembly and test fitting:
















Hmmmmmm... I wonder what these are for...........?



Could they be integrated water supply channels?



I think soooooooo................Anyways, the below photos are all of a test fit. I hadn't gotten around to getting the cooler mounted to the rails yet. With Project Rainfall, I could just stick it in the case and all was fine. IT just sat on the bottom so it was easy to mount. With this bottom cooler on Arctic Rain, IT's going to actually be mounted to the rails with a reservoir hanging down from the middle of that panel.

























7/22/2012

Note: I edited the previous update to include comments. I'm trying to manage sleep and work and this, and sometimes I barely have the energy to upload. Plus recently I've been working with cutting other types of plastics, and I managed to find one that when cut with my table saw, releases fumes, which I eventually started wearing a respirator for, but not before I started to get really dizzy confused. But I'm ok now. I think

I wonder what's going here.............








**Select** **DELETE**......the side panel. Obviously still need to finish dremeling a lot. But the bottom cooler is now officially mounted to the case frame. The only thing left to build for the inside of the case is the bottom reservoir that goes between the drive bay and the power supply. Those water channels I mentioned in my last update allow water to flow from the cooler to the reservoir with very little resistance. I redesigned the cooler to have the fan at the top, and a panel that goes down almost to the bottom of the cooler and separates the fan side from the falling water side of the cooler, where it pushes air out from there.This lets me fill the coolers up SIGNIFICANTLY more than Project Rainfall, achieve a better heat capacity, and with the new flow designs for bot coolers, hopefully an equal if not higher cooling performance in a fraction of the size Project Rainfall's were.












I felt so bad cutting this part out. It was one of my favorite parts of the case.




















7/23/2012

I suppose I might as well just call this all a nightly update type thing. Here's tonight's:



Got the reservoir built today. It's all sealed up and holds water perfectly fine. I have two quick connect fittings on the bottom so it can be filled without any hoses attached.








You can see the water channel going from the cooler to the reservoir here:






Yeah. That's a sick front end. Need to make a bezel that transitions from the white border to the cooler better.



Can see through it.... I made this cooler fit in the are the original 5.25" drive bays took, so that way I can continue to use all the motherboard securing measures.

 

7/24/2012

I'm thinking about using fans in the top like this to help vent some of the case air. I would need to take the top cooler and raise it on stand-offs though, which would make the task of mating the output of the top cooler to the input of the bottom cooler even more difficult.



Started to build the top cooler. I wanted to at least have the side walls and the drainage deck built. I took these parts from Project Rainfall, as those 1/2" polycarbonate panels were expensive.



Yup. That's water in there all right. I got carried away though and had a couple leaks going between the vertical section and the horizontal panel. Anyways, upon seeing these leaks, I over reacted and tried dumping out all the water, most of which made it's way cleanly onto the floor. :doh:



Out of focus photo......



Out of focus photo......



Ok, my lense's AF is fubar. Time to stop being lazy and use manual focus like I should.



Mmmmmmmm Top cooler.......



Top fans.........



I need to figure out a way to fill in the gap between the plastic and the metal panel and the cooler.









reservoir. It's just hangin out. See what I mean about those fittings?!







Bottom cooler and divider panel supports:



Water channel that failed me, and managed to leak. I did only quickly moun these parts together, and everything still needs to be taken apart and polished before the final assembly so everything is crystal clear. The horizontal divider panel however will be painted gloss white, which is why it's sanded down.



Oh, and I suppose I DO have some surprises coming.









I'm on a business trip next week, so I'll be working on this till friday, but next week no updates as far as I know.


7/26/2012

Today's progress, and most likely the last work I'm going to be doing for a week.



Oh man. Look at that smexy white plastic. The panel I had, 15x12'' weighed like 2lbs. Very dense and strong. Cuts like butter.









The cooler looks like a scratched mess right? Fortunately
it's just covered on the inside with dried silicone from assembly.



















This is really starting to look like the computer in my mind's eye.





NO LEAKS!!!!!!!!!!!!







7/27/2012

So I turned it on and one of the water lines coming from the pump wasn't properly secured. Water was then pumped straight into the vent of the power supply, and blew the house's breaker for this room. I think the motherboard and GPU went too, as neither works with any other power supply I have..............






























































































Just kidding. It works



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osGWvFs5HeM

Now obviously all these water lines are going to be inside the case, and the water pump tucked away, and the top cooler actually containing water....... but his is kinda the gist of what I'm going for with this build. I plan on replacing all those blue glowing bars with crystal white versions, with white led's, as I'm really trying to make this entire case monochrome colors. I have silver tubing that will be sleeved in dark grey sleeving, and the asus sabertooth z77 will be all white. Also still have to machine a plate for the side of the bottom section, with a window for the reservoir.











7/31/2012

I think this certainly goes with the theme........



Selenite crystal with holes drilled for individual LED's.... This is either going inside the case somewhere or inside the bottom cooler.

8/1/2012

Just bought:





and a lot of white heat shrink tubing in all the sizes.


So at this point, using the Aquaero 5 XT as my main controller should work out great. I'm going to try and get the idea I have down on paper so I don't forget it later (unlikely though). Using the AE5 (Aquaero 5) to control the DD-CPX PRO allows me to control the water flow going to the top cooler. The water flow sensor will be inline directly before the water flows into the top cooler, giving me feedback on how much water is actually entering the coolers. A temperature sensor mounted directly in front of where the water flows into the top cooler will give me a base temperature to compare other temps in the loop later on. A temp sensor at the input of the bottom cooler (aka output of the top cooler) allows me to compare the water temp in and out of the top cooler and thus the efficiency of the top cooler in terms of temperature. Another temp sensor at the output of the bottom cooler allows me to get the efficiency of the bottom cooler as well. The amount of thermal energy being lost in the coolers in conjunction with the flow sensor, allows me to see how much energy is being removed from the loop each hour.

Then using a temp sensor on the inlet and outlets of the CPU and GPU blocks, I can see how much the CPU and GPU are heating up the water. For now I only have one flow sensor, but eventually I will get a second that will allow me to get the amount of energy being added to the cooling system by the CPU and GPU.

I'm using the aqua computer tubemeter to track water level in the reservoir in order to control a solenoid via the AE5's relay that will add water in from an outside source when ever water levels get low. This also allows me to set it up so incase water levels drop too low, the AE5 will stop sending a dummy RPM signal to the motherboard, which will then forcibly shut down the computer.

I plan on having the AE5 run off the 5V standby voltage the PSU generates. This way, the AE5 will be able to monitor temps in the different sections of the computer after shutdown and will allow me to monitor heat dissipation with the computer fully off, as well as kee the clock on the AE5 properly set.

The AE5 allows me to setup different ways to control these coolers. For instance, It will only turn on the evaporative cooling system when the water temp in the CPU loop goes above a certain temp. So with low power things such as web browsing etc, the AE5 will turn off the evaporative cooling loop completely. The fans that control the intake and output of the coolers will be completely shut off, allowing a near dead-silent operation. One of the characteristics of my evaporative cooling on Project Rainfall was that even at full load, it took a while for the temps in the CPU water loop to rise due to the sheer volume of water in the system.

So let's say I start folding, and my CPU temp is at ~55c max. It will take about 15 minutes for the water temp in the reservoir to rise 10c. So when the water temp in the CPU water loop rises maybe 5c above idle temps, the AE5 will engage the evaporative coolers, and attempt to bring the water temp back down to a certain temp and then maintain that temperature for the duration of the raised CPU temps.

I think this is definitely a build that will let the aqua computer product prove themselves. I certainly don't think a regular fan controller could do this.

8/5/2012

FRESH UPDATE!!! First one in a while. I meant to update last night, but I hadn't taken any photos and things were going very smoothly so I didn't want to mess up my mojo. lol

So anyways, I realized I haven't really shared that much about how I make all these parts. So I'm going to try and give a glimpse of how I'm building this thing. Here is the basement where I for the most part build everything. The "workshop" is also down there so it makes taking dimensions, drilling etc. a lot easier.



The "Workshop" It's freakin' tiny. Not to mention right now here in massachusetts, it's been in the high 80's - low 90's and humid. That furnace hasn't got a clue what it's doing and thinks it's winter, so it's pretty bad in there. I have never sweat so much, but I deal with it cuz ya gotta get work done.



Today's plastic shavings so far:







This is where I machine my parts. Like I said, I try to spend as little time in here as possible. I was working on the top cooler when I took this photo.



My lovely Delta drill press. This thing has taken anything I've thrown at it and none of the stuff I've made for this project nor Project Rainfall would have been possible without it. I also occasionally use it as a router.



And the other tool that makes all this possible, my craftsman table saw. It's old, but I recently rebuilt the spindle for the saw blade using precision ball bearings and I get much cleaner and more precise cuts now.





I learned with Project Rainfall that having all the parts screw together means there is a significantly lower chance of anything leaking later on. For this build, I've mostly used M5 screws (which I need to get more of tomorrow as I have barely enough to fit all the parts together) and they hold everything together very securely. I tap all the holes by hand too which can really suck at times.



Top cooler getting built:



I did a semi-final assembly of the bottom cooler, mid-plate, and reservoir last night. Had a small leak, but got it fixed and it holds water fine now. You can also see how I changed the fan setup from the way it was with Project Rainfall. The fan is now up higher with a simple plate to channel air to the bottom of the cooler. IT's more efficient, simpler, and I don't have to worry about water overflowing anymore.



Here is the almost finished top cooler. I still need to finish machining the parts that will connect the top cooler to the top of the bottom cooler.



You can see the water channel that delivers water from the bottom of the mid-plate.





And here is what the cooler will look like finished. Obviously this is all going to be inside the case, but I figured I have it all out now, might as well give an example of what it would look like minus the case. Once everyhting is fitted and leak tested, I'm going to tear it all apart again, polish all the parts so they are all scratch-free and reassemble it all meticulously with silicone.



Well everything for the top cooler is cut, drilled and tapped. Going to do a leak test tomorrow once I get more screws and hardware.



Stainless steel wool is on order for the swamp cooling system in the top cooler, but I'm going to wait until final assembly before I cut it and put in the cooler.



One step closer. I still need to finish the part of the bottom cooler that makes it rain. Once that is done, and everything else sealed up, I'll give the whole loop a test run.



Couple side things.

1) I need a GTX670. Preferably the GTX680 reference design board. I dunno if that exists, but I think the EVGA Cheesecake GTX 670 is what I'm looking for.

2) I need a compatible full face water blocks for that GTX670 - If someone could hel me out with this and #1 above it would be greatly appreciated as I'm not that great with graphics cards.

3) I forget

4) I got the Aqua Computer Flow meter and Tubemeter in on friday. I have to figure out where the heck I'm going to put the tubemeter, but the flow meter was an easy install.

5) I just ordered another 100 feet of white paracord, and 5 meters of 120 LED/meter LED stripping in bright white.



Calling it a day, off to bed and the off to work in the AM

 

8/7/2012

Update to the coolers.

Finally got the drain plate for the bottom cooler. I figured I would try and get the water to drip down as close as possible tot he edges of plate, so that way it is the closest to the air flowing past.







The drain assembly slides into the rails on the top cooler. My table saw developed issues on the fourth cut, which fortunately, was the last cut I needed to make for the coolers. So there might be some delays with aesthetics part of the computer, but everything should be done by my target date.





I DID however, find my rotozip, which is an awesome tool. So I've been using that to do cuts while my table saw is out of order (It developed a tick at one point in the blade's rotation. I took the belt off and it's no the motor, and sounds like it's coming from the back section of the axle the disk is mounted to. And if you have any experience with table saws, you know that having a 10lb serrated metal disk traveling at extremely high speeds, with the parts that hold that disk down possibly failing, is a very dangerous thing).



I forgot to notch the bottom plate on the top cooler. Once that's notched, that top panel of the Azza case will pop right in.







Ewww. Gotta clean all that up. I'm thinking painting it all one color. Maybe all white perhaps?





I still think this is a great looking case. Very high quality too. I've been hacking away at this thing for about three weeks now, and its been very resilient. I keep forgetting to mention this, but all the case's dimensions are extremely simple. It's like Azza's engineers said "Everything a modder might need to mod, make sure the length is in multiples of a 1/4" so that way measurements are easy". I have no idea if this is intentional, but essentially things like the distance between the two rails, 16 1/4" on the dot. Height of the lip of the rails, 1/4" on the dot. Distance between the two rails, 6 1/2" and so on, it just makes mods like mine where there is a ton of custom parts being made, much easier to deal with. When I built Project Rainfall, dimensions were anyone's guess. That caused a lot of issues with parts being slightly off and made gaps her and there that needed a lot of post-machining. With the Azza Genesis 9000, I've had to do very little of that. It's been a great case to work with. Gotta hand it you guys at Azza.









So you can get an idea of how the drain for the bottom cooler works:



The drain plate is sealed on the sides with the two parts seen in the first three photos. It's also sealed front and back by the bottom cooler itself. With it like this, I don't need to silicone the front and back edges of the drain plate, which means I can simply pull off the top cooler without having to re-silicone that whole assembly.









OH GOD THE SPIDER WEBS!!!!!!!!!! ? Yeah I need to polish those out











I ran out of silicone, so I couldn't do the leak test like I wanted to. But tonight, there shall be. I hope.





See how on the sides of the drain plate, there are the two air channels? That's how the water vapor from the bottom cooler is channeled into the top cooler and out the back.









Hope you all enjoy the build so far






8/8/2012

Got me LED strips and stainless steel wool in today:



SOMETHING IS BEING DONE ABOUT THAT PLASTIC. DO NOT WORRY. lol





Scrap silicone so far. I'm removing and cleaning all the plastic in this build. Tomorrow, when I get in the polycarbonate polishing kit, I will make everything crystal clear.



I figured out a way to prevent light from shining though the plastic. It was super easy. I simply spray painted the backside black.





8/10/2012

[quote name="dmanstasiu" url="/t/1281076/build-log-arctic-rain-azza-genesis-9000-evaporative-cooler-build-case-review/200#post_17904752"]
Would they actually confiscate a 6ft bong tower? :lachen:
I'd love explaining that to a floor supervisor XD[/quote]

Our RD (resident director) would probably ask if computers can do drugs, pick her nose, then call the campus police (Actual state troopers because this is a state campus, and they have already arrested me once before, so I'm not too fond of them).

I managed to pull off 14 hours of work on this thing last night and today. I am beat, and wide awake (ADD = methamphetamine salts) and I managed to finish the coolers. They need a couple tweaks here and there, but they work. Video is uploading now.

I gotta go and change out some mounts on a fixture, but when I get back I'm going to caption all the photos. Keep in mind, this is still not done. I have a LOT of work still to go.








I didn't take too many photos during the work last night. In fact, most of these photos I took around 4:30am. Here's the bottom cooler partially rebuilt. I was able to get out scratches on some parts, but apparently I built my liquid cooling system out of industrial robotics grade polycarbonate, which can take the impact of a large (600lbs +) robotic arm and is also corrosion resistant. IE I have to break every thing down, sand it all, and send it out to be vapor polished. No idea how much that costs nor how long, but I have a couple leads on it. I decided just clean everything very well, and assemble it.



My Aqua Computer tubemeter is in a cathode light tube. lol. I drilled a small pilot hole through the top and bottom of the water channel while the plates were bolted together during pre-assembly. Took off the white panel which I hadn't siliconed down yet, Tapped a G1/8 hole in the bottom plate, and found a bit that matched the diameter of the cathode's tube. Funny story about this tube. Hold on, let me finish my thought. I put two notches in the bottom of the tube, siliconed the white plate on, put a bit of silicone around the tube and put it in. The notches allow the water level in the cooler to equalize out with the water level in the tube. and since the base of the tube meter is at the exact same level as the base of the cooler, I get a perfect measurement. I chose to go with this method for two reasons, one being If I installed it in the cooler itself, all the splashing water would give a very inaccurate reading compared to being in a small space with no water movement other than the level changing. Second, There wasn't enough clearance with the PSU below the cooler. I still need to make a top stabilizer for the tube so it sits perfectly straight. So anyways, I had this UV cathode tube, and one of the wires came out on the end of the tube. I took it apart, soldered it, and placed the bare tube on my chair so when I came back to my desk after trying to find the end cap, I would see it sitting there, and to be careful with it. So I dig around my room for the cap for 15 minutes, and finally found it, walk back to my desk, sit down, and ***crinkle**.... Well Then I had a fancy clear acrylic tube. The end.



In the process of rebuilding the top cooler with the new stainless steel wool installed. That stuff was so easy to install, but was like working with house insulation. And I didn;t have gloves. :doh: yeah that sucked. Showered and threw my clothes in the wash. So far I have pulled out 12 metal splinters from my hands.





And these are the photos from 4:30am. Everything mounted up and the tubemeter happily blinking away.



It atleast looks beter than the towels and mesh in Project Rainfall.....





Reservoir....I need to make a panel that goes up to that rail, and frames the reservoir. I'm hiding the PSU altogether. Give everything a much cleaner look.



Some temporary fittings during my testing and trying to see what the best way to route the tubing will be.



Pump is off, so water levels are all equal.



Zee tubemeter in zee tube. It's off at a slight angle, and I need to use a stabilizer on the top to get that dead on.



Hard to tell, but the air pump is on while the water pump is off, so it sits there and gurgles. Or it blows air through my water pump. Which is great. Just need to put the air pump on a relay control through the Aquaero and then I will set it so the air pump will never be on while the water levels are equalizing (IE when I turn the water pump off, the force of the water coming back down from the top cooler causes the air pump to start pumping air though the water pump, and we all know what that's like.... ) :





Both pumps on:







The horizontal water channel gets enough flow going that it shoots the water over the ledge like a REAL LIVE waterfall :wheee:











Zee buublees















Inside the top cooler. I love this shot.



Two random shots of the back plate:





The Aquaero is NOT going there permanently. I need to get the table saw fixed so I can make my parts for it's mounting.



It's a mess right now. The PSU cables got wet and we all know what happens in wet t-shirt contests.....The wires are showing through......



I'm thinking about making another window only in this section of the back side panel.





Gonna try and have a running computer tonight!

 

8/12/2012

My Iphone kicked the bucket this weekend as well, so I bought a Galaxy S III with my upgrade. $280 so I'm going to hold off on the GTX670 till next week, and buy the Z77 Sabertooth in one shot off newegg.

Update from the last two days.

It still needs a lot of work, but I think I will be able to hit my deadline of having it finished by the end of the month (When I return to school). I will now need a dolly to get it in from the parking lot to my apartment, as there is no way I can carry this that far. It's pretty damn heavy even when it's drained.







Here is where the two coolers are joined, which is why there is only two fans. This part looks like it has sealed off the top and bottom coolers, but there is a gap between that horizontal panel and the rest of the cooler that allows the air to flow past with little restrictions.



It's very easy to hook something up incorrectly...



You can see my reflow gun for soldering smd in the lower right. Set to 200c and it's prefect for heat shrinking without messing the heat shrink up at all. the other nice thing about it, is the heating element is in the handle, and it uses a diaphragm pump instead of a fan so it's dead silent compared to most heat guns.









Top cooler output/Bottom cooler input sensor



Bottom cooler output sensor



This is the drain port I installed in the front behind the PSU panel.











Running :sonic:



This is the total cooler's heat dissipation.This was during a 4.683Ghz OC that resulted in a max temp on core 2 of 63c. I'd say ~120W is about right?











These photo's are true color. Meaning, this is how the color looks. I love it.







I also realized I still have a significant amount of space to hide things on this case too. The bottom panel comes off, and I can hide all my harddrives, and new pumps under there, and cut a few small holes in the metal grating under the reservoir and psu etc.

8/13/2012

So I have a predicament. I just found some really nice unmarked 20 gauge white wire, and cut off 50 2 ft strands. I already crimped molex pins on one end of each, and I will resolder all the wires on my PSU with these. The question is, whether or not to paracord them this time.



Also found this random pic. These are all the screws for JUST the bottom cooler assembly. That does not include the mid plate nor the reservoir. Note, the black rusty ones have all been replaced with stainless steel versions.



This is now a sponsored build. EK-KIT H3O 360 LTX and EK-FC680 GTX are supposedly on their way.





Thanks EK This really helps especially since I had to unexpectantly buy a new phone.

I have decided on my cabling. White paracord sleeving, white heat shrink (all evenly matched of course, I'm going to buy a LOT) and groups of three wires into braids. I am in love with this. I need to get paracord and heat shrink on order ASAP.













Even if I decide I don't like the braids, I can just take them out later on

And that's it for now.

 

Reserved 4

 

Reserved 5

 

*speechless*
*gone after physics schoolbook*

 

Would anyone mind explaining how the water is plumbed in and how this kind of cooling works?

 

Ok lol. Basically when water gets heated up, it evaporates. I based my cooling system off that concept. The cpu and gpu add heat into a water loop that connects to the main reservoir in the bottom of the case. So that loop is constantly heating the water, just like your normal liquid cooling setup, except there is no radiator in the loop. The second loop, the cooling loop, takes water from the main reservoir and sends it to the top cooler, via that water channel that runs from the mid-plate all the way tot he top of the case. This water then saturates the stainless steel wool which also acts as a large radiator. Once the water has dripped off the stainless steel wool, it travels to the bottom cooler, where it drains through, creating that rain effect. The entire time though, air is passing over the water droplets (with the help of the intake and exhaust fans). As the cool, dry air passes over the falling water droplets, it collects water vapor, and in turn removes heat from the water droplet, which then returns to the collective water supply. So this all gives me a huge cooling capacity, without a single radiator.

 

Nope. Stainless* Steel Wool

 

It's 434 stainless, and it shouldn't rust for a couple years, well beyond how long I will use this computer.

 

Yeah I'm not too worried about it. Around December I'm probably going to pick up another case and work on integrating a water chiller into a case, so I expect to have this computer running maybe a year at most.

I also drain and refill the system monthly in order to try and get rid of anything that shouldn't be in the system.

 

well evaporating cooling is not new in common industry but for PC it's the only 2nd time i see it. i have only 2 Qs
how often one had to add wster in a loop due to evaporating?
how often one had to run to WC due to constant water falling sound ?

 

I get asked that a lot haha

It fills itself up automatically. The Aquaero uses a profile I made to watch the tubemeter for water level and flick on a relay that engages an external pump or solenoid to flow more water in. As for second question, never. That's a reflex that very quickly goes away. I've never had an issue with any water sounds.

 

Wow! it's great to see a new idea executed so well. It's one thing doing something this ingenious but it looks utterly awesome at the same time!

If the warm water vapour leaves the case, is there a chance you are going to end up with a room like a jungle after a heavy gaming session?

It might make games like Crysis scarily realistic!

 

Very interesting mod and very skilled work. I only just heard about evaporative cooling a few weeks ago while looking for an AC unit, never ever heard of it being used in a PC ! Completely awesome work dude.

 

Thanks! I actually have no issues with humidity. Just keep a window open and a fan on and you're all set.