Open Loop Cooling Questions

[SirDandyIV]

So, I could look up and compare everything from scratch, or I could just come here and ask this question to save myself half the time.

 

I am going to be setting up an open loop in the very near future, and so I ask thus:

 

Who makes the best open loop parts for liquid cooling? So far I'm thinking it's EKWB.

Who has the lowest failure rate? What is the best coolant/liquid to use? So far I am again thinking EKWB with their Cryofuel.

Is reusing rigid tubing safe? So, if I fail at a bend, can I simply bend the tube again for a different segment.

Is there a way to get coolant out of a loop without it being tedious? I really want to avoid needing to flip my incredibly heavy tower on it's back.

Other questions will probably occur to me. Expect to be questioned.

 

I have the Thermaltake Tower 900 so it'll probably be able to take anything and be fine.
 

Thanks.

[Spuriae]

Depends what part and what you're looking for. If I had to stick with a single brand making the "best" stuff overall, probably Aquacomputer, but their stuff is silly expensive (might get cheaper once Corsair starts selling their stuff under its own name). Barrow/Bitspower is popular for fittings, Alphacool and Aquacomputer make the best CPU block, Hardwarelabs makes the best radiators, Alphacool the best D5 sized pump, etc. I don't think EK makes the absolute best anything other than pump top, but their pricing isn't bad. Lot of it will come down to aesthetics since real performance differences are quite small with most parts. 

 

Nobody knows who has the lowest failure rates; everything is anecdotal. Things from established brands don't fail very often. Everyone has their own ideas of what coolant is best (including the very vocal distilled water only crowd); in practice performance isn't really affected. 

 

Just buy more tubing than you need. Tubing isn't expensive; no need to reuse bad bends. It's cheaper in bulk. You can cut a long unused tube into shorter segments and bend those, if that's what you're asking.

 

Add a T-splitter and valve at the bottom of your loop if you're worried about draining it easily.

 

 

 

 

[FrankV]

23 minutes ago, SirDandyIV said:

 

 

Who makes the best open loop parts for liquid cooling? So far I'm thinking it's EKWB.

Who has the lowest failure rate? What is the best coolant/liquid to use? So far I am again thinking EKWB with their Cryofuel.

Is reusing rigid tubing safe? So, if I fail at a bend, can I simply bend the tube again for a different segment.

Is there a way to get coolant out of a loop without it being tedious? I really want to avoid needing to flip my incredibly heavy tower on it's back.

Other questions will probably occur to me. Expect to be questioned.

 

I have the Thermaltake Tower 900 so it'll probably be able to take anything and be fine.
 

Thanks.

1

I can't answer all your questions but for make, I decided on EKWB. They have a good reputation but I can't say they are the best. I didn't compare as such in my situation. 

 

 

Regarding getting the coolant out, I built a drain system. It's based on JayzTwoCents and you should look up his youtube videos for info on that. The exact implementation is going to depend on the other parts you select. 

 

Regarding rebending tubing, it depends on the exact reason of the fail bend. If the tube collapses, you can't re-use it. If you over bend it, I think you can just reheat and adjust it. But I used soft tubing for my build so I'll let someone else handle this. 

 

I used Cryofuel since I did EKWB and it was good. Again though, I've barely compared other options since I just went full EKWBs. 

[SirDandyIV]

3 hours ago, Nimrodor said:

Depends what part and what you're looking for. If I had to stick with a single brand making the "best" stuff overall, probably Aquacomputer, but their stuff is silly expensive (might get cheaper once Corsair starts selling their stuff under its own name). Barrow/Bitspower is popular for fittings, Alphacool and Aquacomputer make the best CPU block, Hardwarelabs makes the best radiators, Alphacool the best D5 sized pump, etc. I don't think EK makes the absolute best anything other than pump top, but their pricing isn't bad. Lot of it will come down to aesthetics since real performance differences are quite small with most parts. 

 

Nobody knows who has the lowest failure rates; everything is anecdotal. Things from established brands don't fail very often. Everyone has their own ideas of what coolant is best (including the very vocal distilled water only crowd); in practice performance isn't really affected. 

 

Just buy more tubing than you need. Tubing isn't expensive; no need to reuse bad bends. It's cheaper in bulk. You can cut a long unused tube into shorter segments and bend those, if that's what you're asking.

 

Add a T-splitter and valve at the bottom of your loop if you're worried about draining it easily.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for the info.

 

So, I want something with very low failure rates because I keep my PC online pretty much forever since I host servers and bots from it. The very last thing I want to happen is fluid to land on my Maximus VIII Formula and have it die and take all my other components with it.
But.
There is the other solution of having coolant with zero electrical conductivity. Or, well, close enough to zero that it really doesn't matter at all. EKWB's Cryofuel is apparently good for that, but I don't know if there is better. Distilled Water does have low conductivity, but then I need to deal with the problem of buildup in my loop, and so on. Something which can be avoided outright with some coolants.

I was thinking that if I get a tachometer for my water flow and have it set up to turn the system off after it gets low enough, any spill in the loop wouldn't kill the PC if the electrical conductivity is low enough, and the PC would get turned off before it died. Maybe.

I am not one to take chances.

[Limecat86]

1 hour ago, SirDandyIV said:

Thanks for the info.

 

So, I want something with very low failure rates because I keep my PC online pretty much forever since I host servers and bots from it. The very last thing I want to happen is fluid to land on my Maximus VIII Formula and have it die and take all my other components with it.
But.
There is the other solution of having coolant with zero electrical conductivity. Or, well, close enough to zero that it really doesn't matter at all. EKWB's Cryofuel is apparently good for that, but I don't know if there is better. Distilled Water does have low conductivity, but then I need to deal with the problem of buildup in my loop, and so on. Something which can be avoided outright with some coolants.

I was thinking that if I get a tachometer for my water flow and have it set up to turn the system off after it gets low enough, any spill in the loop wouldn't kill the PC if the electrical conductivity is low enough, and the PC would get turned off before it died. Maybe.

I am not one to take chances.

Fluid will become conductive in a short time as it picks up ions from your waterblocks and fittings. Unless you plan to replace your coolant every few weeks there isn't much you can do about it. Also, how can you have buildup with distilled water? I'm running distilled water with Mayhems X1 Clear + Mayhems dye for a good year now and haven't ran into any issues yet. I do renew my fluid each 3 month or so but that's just me. I like to play around with different colors...

[Spuriae]

1 hour ago, SirDandyIV said:

Thanks for the info.

 

So, I want something with very low failure rates because I keep my PC online pretty much forever since I host servers and bots from it. The very last thing I want to happen is fluid to land on my Maximus VIII Formula and have it die and take all my other components with it.
But.
There is the other solution of having coolant with zero electrical conductivity. Or, well, close enough to zero that it really doesn't matter at all. EKWB's Cryofuel is apparently good for that, but I don't know if there is better. Distilled Water does have low conductivity, but then I need to deal with the problem of buildup in my loop, and so on. Something which can be avoided outright with some coolants.

I was thinking that if I get a tachometer for my water flow and have it set up to turn the system off after it gets low enough, any spill in the loop wouldn't kill the PC if the electrical conductivity is low enough, and the PC would get turned off before it died. Maybe.

I am not one to take chances.

Other way around with coolant; the purer your water, the less you have to worry about buildup. That said, you shouldn't have issues with most coolants. Don't trust electrical conductivity to stay low; the entire reason not mixing metals in a custom loop is such a big issue is because the coolant will carry ions whether you want it to or not; any fluid inside a cooling system should be assumed to be electrically conductive.

 

There's no way of telling what brands are more reliable than others; some specific parts from virtually every manufacturer have had issues at some point or another but those are pretty easy to point out. Blindly buying from a single high-profile brand isn't going to help in that regard.

 

If you want an automated loop you'll want to look at Aquacomputer; just don't be surprised when your cooling ends up costing as much as the rest of your components. I doubt that you'll be very lucky with your leak sensing idea, though; you'd have had to have already leaked most of your fluid for that idea to work. Leak detectors exist, but they're very much DIY projects only trip after directly contacting water; you'd have to place sensors all over the place and deal with the associated wiring (and programming) to make it work. Definitely a possibility, but simple leak testing will take care of almost all leak issues.