Corsair H115i

[Premsanity]

Hey, I installed a Corsair H115i in my case. While doing so I accidentally scraped off a very very small amount of pre applied thermal paste on the center of the contact point (the plastic feel off without me noticing at first  ) it was barely anything at all so is it still okay to apply this way? Or should I buy some and apply extra?

[Bombastinator]

42 minutes ago, Premsanity said:

Hey, I installed a Corsair H115i in my case. While doing so I accidentally scraped off a very very small amount of pre applied thermal paste on the center of the contact point (the plastic feel off without me noticing at first  ) it was barely anything at all so is it still okay to apply this way? Or should I buy some and apply extra?

The way thermal paste works is it sort of creates a film that fills in submicroscopic air gaps.  It can’t really be touched up.  Possibly just try it.  If the gap is small enough you might get lucky and squishing it down will fill it in again.  If it doesn’t work the cpu will heat up a lot.  If that happens you will need to reapply paste but you need to clean off ALL the paste on both the cold plate and the heat spreader.  Not almost all, all. Like it was never there.  Several goes with alcohol and q tips is common.  When it’s totally clean and dry you apply the new stuff and try again.

[Premsanity]

10 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

The way thermal paste works is it sort of creates a film that fills in submicroscopic air gaps.  It can’t really be touched up.  Possibly just try it.  If the gap is small enough you might get lucky and squishing it down will fill it in again.  If it doesn’t work the cpu will heat up a lot.  If that happens you will need to reapply paste but you need to clean off ALL the paste on both the cold plate and the heat spreader.  Not almost all, all. Like it was never there.  Several goes with alcohol and q tips is common.  When it’s totally clean and dry you apply the new stuff and try again.

So even the smallest little air pocket could cause the entire system not to work? And instead of cooling it even a little bit it will actually make the temperature worse? 

[Bombastinator]

5 hours ago, Premsanity said:

So even the smallest little air pocket could cause the entire system not to work? And instead of cooling it even a little bit it will actually make the temperature worse? 

No, that’s sort of the opposite of what I said.  
 

 “the smallest little air pocket” is unavoidable.  It will make it work less well though.  The bigger it is the less surface area the cold plate will have to transfer heat. 

 

the “instead of cooling will make the temperature worse” thing is particularly messed  up.  I think there’s some fundamental concept that is being missed here but I’m not sure which one.  My best guess is the concept of “cooling” and “heating” being different things (which probably explains that poorly)

 

Let’s try this approach:

 think of a cpu cooler as a heat wick. It helps wick heat from the cpu into the surrounding air.  The point where the spreader meets the cold plate is a barrier to heat movement.  Paste helps make that barrier less severe, but it doesn’t really “connect” the two systems.  It’s not a conductor so much as a flatness enhancer.  It conducts, sure, but that does only a tiny bit of its job.  This is why each application can be used only once.  Every time the the stuff is squished between the plates it forms this film that helps with flatness, and every time it is pulled apart again that film is ripped apart and destroyed so it has to be recreated.  Sort of.

 

If that explanation fails we can try a different one.  There’s something being missed and I don’t know what it is.

[Premsanity]

6 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

No, that’s sort of the opposite of what I said.  
 

 “the smallest little air pocket” is unavoidable.  It will make it work less well though.  The bigger it is the less surface area the cold plate will have to transfer heat. 

 

the “instead of cooling will make the temperature worse” thing is particularly messed  up.  I think there’s some fundamental concept that is being missed here but I’m not sure which one.  My best guess is the concept of “cooling” and “heating” being different things (which probably explains that poorly)

 

Let’s try this approach:

 think of a cpu cooler as a heat wick. It helps wick heat from the cpu into the surrounding air.  The point where the spreader meets the cold plate is a barrier to heat movement.  Paste helps make that barrier less severe, but it doesn’t really “connect” the two systems.  It’s not a conductor so much as a flatness enhancer.  It conducts, sure, but that does only a tiny bit of its job.  This is why each application can be used only once.  Every time the the stuff is squished between the plates it forms this film that helps with flatness, and every time it is pulled apart again that film is ripped apart and destroyed so it has to be recreated.  Sort of.

 

If that explanation fails we can try a different one.  There’s something being missed and I don’t know what it is.

No, I understand now. I just interpreted what you said wrong. Thanks for the answer.