Enthoo Elite Custom Loop Planning

Cavalry Canuck · January 5, 2023

Good Day,

What's out there for Quick Disconnect fittings, and what do I need to look for when shopping around? I'm familiar with their use in hydraulic applications, but I've never worked with them in a water cooling loop before.

My second question is the same, but for Distribution Plates/Blocks/Manifolds. I've been looking into distro plates, but there aren't many options available for the case I'm building the loop in (the Enthoo Elite). I've never used a distro plate before, and don't know how they'd mount to the case, much less how to assess their compatibility.

Thanks for your time,

Matthew B

Edited February 17, 2023 by Cavalry Canuck
Updated title & tags to reflect current planning progress.

fonzz1e · January 5, 2023

QDC usually use together with soft / epdm tubing, they do impact flowrate the more you add to yer loop

usually sold by female & male interconnect side, the other ends is usually female g1/4

koolance qd3 (some has 10/16mm compression fittings)
alphacool HF qdc (i'm using these)
classic qdc from colder cpc
barrow & bykski has them but YMMV

distro plate might look nice & might help u with hard tube routing,
IMO they're a hassle for me

it forces u to use more tubing & fittings (ie back & forth)
if yer using opaque coolant, its a hassle to clean residues stuck on plate o-rings/gasket
can't move to a new case unless they're common fan size (ie EK FLT 240 DDC/D5)
usually don't look good with soft tubing

Cavalry Canuck · February 17, 2023

Thank you for your reply @fonzz1e

I’d like to go over my current plan for evaluation, and then ask some questions. This is a rough diagram of the loop as currently planned:

I’ve drawn the diagram assuming it would be possible to use the EKWB G1 distro plate for the Lian Li 011/011 XL on the Enthoo Elite’s radiator-side panel. The loop will include a front-mounted 560mm radiator and both bottom and top mounted 420mm radiators. Blue and Green indicates hard-tubing runs, closest to the side panel and closest to the rear tray respectively. Red indicates soft tubing runs to CPU/Mobo blocks and GPU blocks.

My intent is to use hard tubing runs between all long-term/permanently-mounted hardware like radiators, pumps, and distro plates/reservoirs. I will use a black soft tubing for runs from the distro plate to swappable components like the CPU/Mobo block and GPU block. Quick disconnect fittings may be used on these soft tubing runs to facilitate ease of maintenance/swapping parts.

I understand this is a lot of hardline tubing. I could, and may yet opt to, use x-flow 420 radiators top and bottom to reduce tubing runs. However, I quite like the look of long parallel hardline runs, and frankly I have a plethora of space to infill. With black soft tubing runs going to the Mobo/CPU and GPU blocks, the more hardline I have elsewhere, the better.

The distro plate I am currently considering, and many like it, are meant to make use of an integrated DDC pump. I have a D5 pump in the loop in my old case. I was looking to reuse said D5 pump, mounting it to one of the integrated pump mounts in the Elite’s PSU chamber.

* Is the EKWB G1 for the 011 easily mountable to radiator/fan mounts other than the side panel mount in the 011?

* Is it possible to put a blank in place of where the DDC pump goes on this (and most other) distro plates?

* Or, are there distro plates with similar port configurations available, but without integrated pumps, that I just haven’t managed to find?

* As planned there will be 1400mm of radiator, 3400mm of hardline, a distro plate, around 1000mm of soft line tubing, potentially up to 4 quick disconnects, and the Mobo/CPU & GPU blocks. If the DDC pump must be mounted to the distro plate, would a second pump in series elsewhere in the loop, as drawn in the diagram, be advisable for this layout?

Thank you for your time.