Other How does a radiator work?

Discussion in 'Hardware' started by xMathiasD, 16 Mar 2010.

  1. xMathiasD

    xMathiasD What's a Dremel?

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    Hi guys ^^

    im looking for a guide that illustrates and describes how a radiator works, how the fluids run through the channels and so on ^^ anyone? :D
     
  2. The_Beast

    The_Beast I like wood ಠ_ಠ

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    Did you even try Google?


    Radiators work by moving cool air across fins (the fins increase surface area need to cool the coolant), the fin cool down the coolant, the coolant cools down the CPU (or whatever), the the pump send the warm coolant back to the rad where it's cooled again....repeat....repeat......
     
  3. Cerberus90

    Cerberus90 Car Spannerer

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    Water goes in.
    Flows through lots of squiggly 'cores'.
    These 'cores' have fins attached, these are the bits that you see
    Air flowing past the fins takes the heat away from the water
    Water goes out cooler than it went in.

    Number of cores and pitch/density of fins affects how good the rad is (this is for Car radiators, I would assume its the same for PC WC rads)
    Quality of rad also affects performance. How the fins are attached to cores and materials used.
     
  4. xMathiasD

    xMathiasD What's a Dremel?

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    The_Beast - ye i have :)

    Cerberus90 - aint the small core stopping the flow in the system? ^^
     
  5. Burnout21

    Burnout21 Is the daddy!

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    small cores reduce the flow rate, as the pump generally cant provide enough pressure to maintain the flow rate.

    However by slowing the flow the heat energy held with the fluid can escape into the environment much easier, so its actually a great trade off.

    With in a closed loop such as a cooling loop the slowest point of the loop will set the maximum speed to which the fluid can flow at.

    Now mounting a radiator so its facing up allows convection of warm air to rise though the radiator, except it is important that the user mounts fans with ball bearings rather than sleeves, because a sleeve bearing would not function correctly in this mounting orientation.
     

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