Cascade Refurbishment Time

[Lord Nicoll]

Well folks, after playing around with my recent score (Read about it here), it does seem a little low on power and a bit high on temps, to be fair it keeps 5.5GHz @ 1.536v and validated 6GHz (6GHz) at mostly sub zero, rarely over ambient temps, though that's the problem, It should be below zero all the time, so, I'm gonna refurbish this old tiger and put some new claws on it. Currently both stages have the same gas, something the original builder had to do because he couldn't get a better one for the 2nd stage, so R404A on both. I'm in the middle of tracking down either R14 or R1150 for the 2nd stage, that should be under -100°C on cascade, and possibly a new first stage gas too, there are many different supplier over the world who recommend different combinations, and I'm by no means a super good expert on cascade. I could choose to replace the R404A in stage one with R452A, which is a similar but less damaging refrigerant. It's all rather exciting. On top of this I'm considering getting a new evap head, I'd have to wait until the unit is discharged safely after the leak test to investigate, maybe even desolder it and inspect it. Should I document the transformation from cat to tiger?

[porina]

I'd watch with interest. Used to know people who built their own, but it was beyond my motivation to copy them at the time. Any idea what sorta cooling capacity this has? 

[Lord Nicoll]

1 hour ago, porina said:

I'd watch with interest. Used to know people who built their own, but it was beyond my motivation to copy them at the time. Any idea what sorta cooling capacity this has? 

That's a tricky one to guess, but with good correct gases and pressures, and a good evap head probably a around the 500 watt range, currently though probably 200-300 watts, a GeForce 8800 GTS made it cry and the i7 7700K with all cores/threads enabled with a hearty memory speed on 5.6GHz also gave it a run for it's money. They would be between 200 and 300 watts. Currently I suspect the first stage gas is low or noy optimin, and so it struggles, it should be capable of like 600 watts with a strong second stage gas, this first stage condensor is massive.

Edited December 12, 2017 by Lord Nicoll
Correcting mistake