Water Cooling Loop Maintenance Question

[Simple Jack]

 

Hello Everyone,

 

I have a custom water cooling loop that I've been running for over a year now, and I recently disassembled it for some maintenance. I’m hoping to do a thorough cleaning and wanted to get some advice on running a cleaning solution through the loop, aside from just distilled water. I reached out to ChatGPT for some guidance, and it suggested using a 5% cleaning vinegar solution.

 

I picked up HDX Cleaning Vinegar from my local Home Depot and plan to mix 50 milliliters of it with 950 milliliters of distilled water in a 1-liter Erlenmeyer flask. I’ll add a magnetic stir bar and let it mix on a magnetic stir plate to ensure the solution is well combined. Once it's fully mixed, I’ll pour the solution into my reservoir/pump combo and run the pump for several hours, with only the pump/reservoir combo powered on. ChatGPT mentioned that I can safely run the pump for up to eight hours with little to no risk of damaging the components.

 

Afterward, I plan to do several rinses with distilled water to make sure I remove as much of the cleaning vinegar as possible.

 

My question for all of this is, how bad of an idea is this?

 

If anyone has any advice or suggestions, I would be most grateful for it.

 

Thank you very much in advance.

[jaslion]

Euhh if you are using a coolant with the appropriate biocide and anti corrosion stuff in it you dont need to do any of this unless theres an issue. Just top it up or flush it out With distilled water and call it good.

 

unless you used an opaque coolant which leaves a huge mess no need for any of this really

[Doctor Briola]

There really isn't any need to do that to your loop, unless like jaslion said above if you're using a coolant that can leave a mess. If you're using straight up distilled water in your loop, you will need to add some corrosion inhibitors and may need to change the water out occasionally.

 

My personal build has EK Cryofuel in it, I've had it going for well over a year now with no issues and no need for any maintenance. My roommate has his build that he's going on five years now with absolutely no maintenance - at this point his is a test case to see how long it will work without doing anything to it. He's had absolutely no issues, and the only thing he would need to do is add more coolant probably sometime next year.

[Blai5e]

I use EK Cryofuel Clear in 3 rigs and choose to do a full flush about every 12~15 months with distilled water.

[jaslion]

56 minutes ago, Blai5e said:

I use EK Cryofuel Clear in 3 rigs and choose to do a full flush about every 12~15 months with distilled water.

And thats the important thing. You choose to do so! Think op maaay have read some overly attentive advice

[Simple Jack]

Thank you everyone for your responses. 

 

I have a, at the time that it was built, pretty expensive build. I want to make it last for several years and I plan to make general maintenance a regular and important thing.

[Lurking]

Don't put acid in your metal components....

 

And if you ever need to mix vinegar for other reasons... you don't need fancy Erlenmeyer. 5% or 6% wouldn't matter. And the vinegar you buy isn't 200% to begin with. And an acid is polar like water. So they mix readily without a magnetic spinner.