Cooling better mounting for tower cooler?

Hi all.

I just purchased a Thermaltake Tower 112 cpu cooler (on clearance no less, paid $16 for it!) My plan so far for mounting it is to actually run longer bolts, all the way through the motherboard mounting tray, including plastic spacers between the MB and the tray on the bolts, so that the load of this massive chunk of copper isn't being carried by the motherboard.

My only problem, I don't like the idea of needing to simply tighten down the nuts to hold the cooler down, relying on my sense of "how tight is too tight."

Any thoughts on putting some springs, with washers, between the nuts and the H bracket on the cooler, let the springs keep it down? Or would this give the cooler enough play to stay slightly loose from the CPU, reducing or removing the cooling entirely?

I'm also planning on replacing the second set of nuts, which are presumably used to keep the first set from working loose, with locknuts (the type with the nylon washer built in)

Thanks all.

 

Pretty much all waterblocks use springs to keep them down so I dont see why using them here would be a problem. Just make sure they are tight springs and not loose.

 

Blimey, never heard of mounting a cooler like that, make sure the spacers between the mobo and mobo tray are exact else you'll end up bending the board as you tighten.

 

Yeah, that's actually why I'm looking to mount it that way. Read a review, seems this brute in a tower case, flexed the MB. Guy believes, but admittedly couldn't prove, that the flex was enough to bust something on the motherboard, as a couple weeks (2 I think) after he put it in, the system died, due to a dead mobo.

I've been checking and measuring, both the standoffs currently under the mobo, and the "H" bracket (including foam insulation and mylar film to separate the H bracket and foam), to make sure the spacers are just right. Probably order them a smidge big, and file them down to fit, rather than going with my measured size (~3mm tall)

Problem now is finding longer bolts for the mounting, thing uses 3mm bolts, existing ones are about 35mm long, figure I want to get at least another 15-20mm in length, just to have some extra in case (can always trim the bolts down, too)

Problem is, the new mounting isn't going to be cheap. The springs alone, for ones that aren't going to require massive washers to keep flat, are $8 for 3 (why not 4? wish I knew) Grand total, if I order all my parts from McMaster, I'm looking at ~$40-42 plus shipping.

Tempted to look at getting just some threaded rod, and trimming off what I need, and using nuts to keep everything in place. Very tempting, threaded rod, 3mm diameter, 1m length, is only $3.50, compared to $7.50 for a 50 pack of 3mm x 50mm machine screws.

 

I don't know how you've been going about measuring the needed length for the spacers between the board and case, but if you're unsure of your measurements you might use a motherboard mounting standoff as a reference, since those are exactly the right size.

 

I think he's measuring the gap between the HSF backplate and the motherboard tray hence the ~3mm measurement. I'm not a mechanical man but currently the backplate helps to distribute the load of the HSF across the plate, get this wrong and you'll actually end up putting the entire weight of the HSF on the mobo so be careful is all I can say.

 

Why are you wasting your time with M3 parts?

Buy 4x 2" 6-32 Machine Screws, 4x 6-32 Lock Nuts (to lock to the bracket on the cooler), and 4x 6-32 Nuts. Lock the bolts to the front of your bracket with the lock nuts, install the cooler, and thread through the four holes you're going to make in the motherboard tray. Then either with springs or normal bolts, just tighten down until you're about finger tight (it's always good), and you're good to go.

 

Umm, because I'm stubborn, and am trying to stay with the same part sizes that came with the cooler?


Yeah, I'll take a look and see if I can find the long US sized machine screws, probably be able to pick those up a Lowes / Home Depot.

Thanks, sometimes I get way caught up in keeping things the same....

 

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=117054 - this thread should help you a fair bit. It's for a different cooler but the principle is the same and theres a lot of helpful info there.

 

Seen that guide before but it mounts the HSF without a backplate so the mobo mounts take the full brunt of the load of the HSF, might be OK for a case where the HSF would be vertical but I personally wouldn't use that method exact in a tower case. The entire idea behind the backplate is to take the pressure load off the mobo.

 

Well, for a start, there are people mounting 900g HSF's that way without a backplate and it's been fine for them. More over though, you can pretty much use any 755 mounting plate to brace the mobo a bit. I'm shortly going to be doing that mod and I just tonight bought the Thermalright 775 RM. It's just a fairly standard backing plate but it should work fine for a pressure mount, and take enough pressure of the mobo that I can breath easy when going to lans.

 

I never doubted that it wouldn't work, I was just saying that I personally wouldn't go with that guide without a backplate.