Guide How to Create Watercooling Tubing in Sketchup

I figure since we've got more people using Sketchup now because of these awesome design competitions and some people are having trouble making tubing I am making this guide. It took me a while to figure out how to make tubing properly and now that I've got my technique I never have any troubles with it.

This first picture shows a basic setup of components I will connect tubing to. They are not in the correct position necessarily but that is ok.



The first place I will start is at the radiator. What I do is draw a line across the opening on the barb.



Next is to use the Circle tool and draw a circle from the middle point of the line you just drew. Make sure that the circle will be aligned with your line. You may need to hide the radiator so Sketchup's 'Snap to' feature wont try to make your circle at a weird angle. I make my tubing 1/2" ID so I make the radius of the circle 0.25".



Then if you havent already, hide the radiator. It will reduce lag and wont get in the way.



Then use the offset tool to make the wall of the tubing. I always offset my tubing 1/8".



Next, erase the center of the circle as it is not needed.



Now you draw a line from the center of the first line you drew. Make sure it is perpendicular from the first line. None of my components are at odd angles so I can uses the axes as a guide. I always make this line atleast 1".



Next step you do the same thing on the component the other end of the tubing will connect to. In this case it's the water pump/res combo. The only thing is you leave out the step of drawing the circle. All that is needed is the line across the opening of the barb and a 1" perpendicular line.



Next, connect those two lines together.



Then using the curve tool go to the midpoint of one of the line coming out of the barbs. That is where you will start the curve. Always use a midpoint. It just works better.



For the end of the curve set it along the line so it is purple. That is very important.



Then make the size of the so the line once again is purple. Once again, this is important. Dont ask why. It is just is. It will also say Tangent to edge which is also important. This gives you perfect curves.



Do the same at the other barb.



Delete what is not needed from the corners.



At the start of the tubing where you have the circle drawn replace the line that goes across the barb with a single line that goes from the inside of the tubing the the line sticking out. This allows the follow me tool to work proper.



Next, Select the path of the tubing. Do not select the lines that went across the barbs. What I do is select the whole thing and then hold shift and deselect what I dont want selected.



Then click the Follow Me tool and click the tubing wall circle. It automatically follows the path and your tubing is made.



Next change the Face Style to be X-ray.



Select the lines used to make the path and delete them.



Now if you unhide your components you will see the tubing doesnt go all the way onto the barb. Just use the Extrude tool to make the tubing to right to the end of the barbs.




Here is a final picture. The rest of the tubing took me approx 3 - 4 minutes to make. I added extra lines for the one form the radiator to the CPU following the same guide lines.




I have been using this technique for a few months now and have had zero problems. If you follow the same guideline you should be able to make watercooling tubing very fast and easy with no trouble.



Have fun!




Objects are from the SketchUp Component Collection

 

great guide. now we have a good place to direct sketchup n00bs to

 

Purple indicates that the two end points are equal distance from the center point.
-The more you know...

 

Ok, I didn't know that. In my experience that is when it works best. Otherwise you can get glitches in it where it looks like the tubing is sort of kinked or has weird holes in it.

 

-The screenshots told me I'm using an outdated version of SU too. Thanks for that.

You are on the right track, I'm just adding extra info for the kiddies. The 'tangent to edge' is important because the curve is on the same plane as the lines it's connected to.

 

It's not outdated, its RETRO

Good guide (allthou I allready knew this )

 

Well, this here speaker of fluent noobish was greatly helped. Thanks for this.

 

Very useful, thanks!

 

Well written and helpful - thanks

 

Thanks! Plus rep for you and cheaps for the tips!

 

Very cool, + rep

 

Awesome job talladega thanks for getting this up so fast. +rep from me <3

 

Thanks for the comments guys! Hope it works great for you as it does for me.

 

VERY NICE [/borat]

 

WOW.. this is great.. nice job!

 

Link to this guide added to the Modding Guide Sticky http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=140973

 

Thank you for the how to.

I've been farting around with trying to make tubing for a LONG time with minimal success.

It took me 2 minutes to make my first one correctly based off your advice.

Thanks!

 

Guys, how would one make, say, 1mm tubing walls?

I'm planning a non-PC related project, and I wanna know how to begin plotting...

 

Set the model unit settings to metric.
Crank the precision and movement snap down as fine as you can get it.
Make the first circle.
With the offset tool still drawing/active, type a '1' and hit enter. That should give you the 1mm offset.
Delete the center and make a donut.
Don't eat the donut, it's only pixels.
Go to the highest mountain in your parking lot, and-wait. I drifted off there... That should get you started. You might want to skip some of that.


@Talladega - Congratulations on getting sticky.

 

I hate to sound stupid, but i've tried following the watercooling tubing tutorial and i just can't crack it. Would it be allowed if I sent the file to someone who can do the tubing, they do it, and I give them kudos. If not I'm gonna have a watercooled SFF machine design with no tubing connecting it all up.

Cheers,

Joe