Whole Room Water Cooling (Build Complete)

[ninbura]

I'm un-ironically attempting a "full room watercooling"-esque type thing like Linus did in the good old days.

My room gets unbelievably hot, even in the winter with the window open all the way, and obviously worse in the summer. Could get an expensive AC but that will just ramp the power bill, so I think this may be a good option. I have 2 PC's with multiple high power graphics cards and high end CPU's. I plan on keeping the loops separate for each build but not like a two separate loops for GPU and CPU PC (preferably), each build would be using 2 480mm radiators mounted on the wall outside. 

I have two worries: 

1) If the power goes out will the water in the radiators freeze in the winter?

 

2) With an extra 5-10 feet of tubing / radiators (basically extra travel) will 2 regular PC pumps (per PC) like the Swiftech MCP655 suffice?

A quick search of anti-freeze as a coolant brings up some confusing results, some say it's to viscus, others saying you need to dilute it, wont it separate? Some people talking about corrosion, bottom line it didn't seem like it was the most safe thing to do.   

[stealth80]

On 1/31/2018 at 1:04 PM, Cimmerian said:

I'm un-ironically attempting a "full room watercooling"-esque type thing like Linus did in the good old days.

My room gets unbelievably hot, even in the winter with the window open all the way, and obviously worse in the summer. Could get an expensive AC but that will just ramp the power bill, so I think this may be a good option. I have 2 PC's with multiple high power graphics cards and high end CPU's. I plan on keeping the loops separate for each build but not like a two separate loops for GPU and CPU PC (preferably), each build would be using 2 480mm radiators mounted on the wall outside. 

I have two worries: 

1) If the power goes out will the water in the radiators freeze in the winter?

 

2) With an extra 5-10 feet of tubing / radiators (basically extra travel) will 2 regular PC pumps (per PC) like the Swiftech MCP655 suffice?

A quick search of anti-freeze as a coolant brings up some confusing results, some say it's to viscus, others saying you need to dilute it, wont it separate? Some people talking about corrosion, bottom line it didn't seem like it was the most safe thing to do.   

if its cold enough to freeze in the winter how can it be too hot with your windows open? just turn the heating off in your room lol 

 

as long as your winters don't exceed -8C mayhems should be fine

 

https://www.mayhems.net/collections/pastel-pre-mix-1ltr/products/pastel-uv-white-1ltr

[tomoki]

I don't have much input into this other than to probably not use anti-freeze. Remember in Linus' video from whole room water cooling that there were microbes or what we'd see as "guck" in the tubes? It clogged up the water block and increased the temperatures overall. 

 

 

[ninbura]

On 1/31/2018 at 1:09 PM, stealth80 said:

if its cold enough to freeze in the winter how can it be too hot with your windows open? just turn the heating off in your room lol 

I would assume it has something to do with my 9 monitors and 4 GPU's lol

It gets below freezing outside where I live and even with the window all the way open when I'm mining or something my room is still uncomfortably hot, I'm worried that if the power goes out the water in the radiator outside will freeze over.

 

On 1/31/2018 at 1:16 PM, tomoki said:

I don't have much input into this other than to probably not use anti-freeze. Remember in Linus' video from whole room water cooling that there were microbes or what we'd see as "guck" in the tubes? It clogged up the water block and increased the temperatures overall. 

I forgot he used anti-freeze, guess I should go re-watch those.

 

On 1/31/2018 at 1:15 PM, stealth80 said:

as long as your winters don't exceed -8C mayhems should be fine

 

https://www.mayhems.net/collections/pastel-pre-mix-1ltr/products/pastel-uv-white-1ltr

On occasion in the winter temps get to -10 degrees at night in Utah. Albeit pretty rare, would suck to wake up to a cracked radiator due to expanding.

Conditions pretty unlikely though, power going out and temperature that low.

[stealth80]

4 minutes ago, Cimmerian said:

I would assume it has something to do with my 9 monitors and 4 GPU's lol

It gets below freezing outside where I live and even with the window all the way open when I'm mining or something my room is still uncomfortably hot, I'm worried that if the power goes out the water in the radiator outside will freeze over.

I guess you have a small room then haha, I have a 27" monitor on my PC (only 1x 1080GTX) a 55" TV on the wall, AV amp, stereo amp, SKY box, 3 vivariums on 15 hours a day and it gets pretty cold in here when I leave a window open 

[ninbura]

4 minutes ago, stealth80 said:

I guess you have a small room then haha, I have a 27" monitor on my PC (only 1x 1080GTX) a 55" TV on the wall, AV amp, stereo amp, SKY box, 3 vivariums on 15 hours a day and it gets pretty cold in here when I leave a window open 

Yeah unfortunately I have a really small room, can barely walk in there with all the stuff. 6 monitors 24-35 inches, a 65in TV (so 7 monitors not 9 MB), yamaha studio monitors & sub, several external audio interfaces, and two PC's with multiple high end graphics cards and CPU's.

I'd just rather not blow $500+ on an AC that will cost me power in the long run, tried a $200ish AC last year and it wasn't enough.

[danejesse1]

I think Antvenom did something similar, but with one computer. I forget if he kept the setup or deemed it too much of a hassle. I'ts probably worth watching his videos on it (I've never watched them but I heard about them somewhere).

 

Edit: It looks like he made a post about it on here. 

 

[MaratM]

You can use anti-freeze as long as you do not use petg tubing, petg is not comparible with antifreeze. Probably a dual d5 pump will help to compensate for increase in tube length

The other way is to use a heat exchanger so the water (premix fluid) in the loop does not mix with the loop of the radiator

the way it can be done is

res->pump->waterblocks->heat exchanger (any fluid of your likings) on the other side heat exchanger -> rad -> res -> pump.

this way you can use antifreeze in the outside loop and any coolant you want in you rig.

[ninbura]

On 1/31/2018 at 1:38 PM, danejesse1 said:

I think Antvenom did something similar, but with one computer. I forget if he kept the setup or deemed it too much of a hassle. I'ts probably worth watching his videos on it (I've never watched them but I heard about them somewhere).

 

Edit: It looks like he made a post about it on here. 

Thank you for this, I'll use the pump he is using, and check out the other stuff.

 

On 1/31/2018 at 2:02 PM, MaratM said:

You can use anti-freeze as long as you do not use petg tubing, petg is not comparible with antifreeze. Probably a dual d5 pump will help to compensate for increase in tube length

The other way is to use a heat exchanger so the water (premix fluid) in the loop does not mix with the loop of the radiator

the way it can be done is

res->pump->waterblocks->heat exchanger (any fluid of your likings) on the other side heat exchanger -> rad -> res -> pump.

this way you can use antifreeze in the outside loop and any coolant you want in you rig.

This is actually super interesting, I have never heard of anything like this. I would go for this immediately if it wasn't advertised with a 20 degree delta.

Seems a bit much.

 

After looking into things for longer this is actually quite enticing, I could have a pump on each side of the heat exchanger with pure antifreeze on one side and Primochill vue on the other.

I'm still worried about the delta though, I have a 7900x, a gtx1080, and a gtx  1050ti that would be all in the same loop with 2x480mm rads. Would this be enough after a possible 10-20c delta from the exchanger? Thoughts?

Thanks for the help guys.

[aezakmi]

what about a heat extractor? technically it's just a couple fans and a flexible duct

[ninbura]

12 minutes ago, aezakmi said:

what about a heat extractor? technically it's just a couple fans and a flexible duct

Not a bad idea, but I should mention that one big factor for me wanting to do this is reduction of noise, I do a lot of music production and the 2 PC's together are quite loud, running a water loop outside should get rid of most of the noise.

[danejesse1]

2 hours ago, Cimmerian said:

one big factor for me wanting to do this is reduction of noise

You could do something like what Linus did for his computers at home. He ran a thunderbolt cable from his computer (in a different room) to a thunderbolt dock so he could connect his monitor / kb / mouse. If there's a place in the house that you are fine dumping heat into that could be an option. The only problem is that a TB cable long enough might be expensive.

 

 

 

[Canada EH]

I would enclose the computer(s) in a wooden box, do some copper lines around the wood, air intake fans blowing air over the lines, and exhaust fans

[MaratM]

8 hours ago, Cimmerian said:

I'm still worried about the delta though, I have a 7900x, a gtx1080, and a gtx  1050ti that would be all in the same loop with 2x480mm rads. Would this be enough after a possible 10-20c delta from the exchanger? Thoughts?

Thanks for the help guys.

7900x - 140W TDP if overclocked it can produce up to double of heat + VRM = around 350W max

1080 - 200W TDP

1050ti can be expelled from the loop (try to find a waterblock for it) even if your find it it is max of 50W TDP

All together it will produce 600W TDP

The heat exchanger is capable of transfering heat with deltaT 10C at the rate of 860W in the worst case scenario

Average d5 pump at half of its power (one is used inside the rig, to keep it as quiet as possible) is capable to pump fluid at 1GPM - arounf 4 LPM 

The outside loop pump can be run at 100% all the time

All of the above bring us to a nice number of 2000W at delta T of 10C and 4000W at delta T of 20C

If the the rads are outside there is no limits to their size I would of use some huge rads like MO-RA3 from Watercool with something like industrial grade noctua fans.

As for outside loop coolant either anti-freeze of winter windshield fluid (methanol or isopropyl based do not freeze till -30C) can be used

During winter where will be no problems with heat transfer (the only problem is if the inside loop gets too cold it can cause condensation on the tubes) however during summer it is getting a bit different due to the fact that ambient tems can probably get as high as 30+C and to get deltaT of 10C it brings us to the temp of inside loop as high as 40+C (which is also fine)

there is also a problems with control of the pumps speed and fans RPM but I think aquaero can get it all under control

This project is not going to be a cheap one at the end

The choice is yours

 

[ninbura]

20 hours ago, MaratM said:

7900x - 140W TDP if overclocked it can produce up to double of heat + VRM = around 350W max

1080 - 200W TDP

1050ti can be expelled from the loop (try to find a waterblock for it) even if your find it it is max of 50W TDP

All together it will produce 600W TDP

The heat exchanger is capable of transfering heat with deltaT 10C at the rate of 860W in the worst case scenario

Average d5 pump at half of its power (one is used inside the rig, to keep it as quiet as possible) is capable to pump fluid at 1GPM - arounf 4 LPM 

The outside loop pump can be run at 100% all the time

All of the above bring us to a nice number of 2000W at delta T of 10C and 4000W at delta T of 20C

 

If the the rads are outside there is no limits to their size I would of use some huge rads like MO-RA3 from Watercool with something like industrial grade noctua fans.

As for outside loop coolant either anti-freeze of winter windshield fluid (methanol or isopropyl based do not freeze till -30C) can be used

During winter where will be no problems with heat transfer (the only problem is if the inside loop gets too cold it can cause condensation on the tubes) however during summer it is getting a bit different due to the fact that ambient tems can probably get as high as 30+C and to get deltaT of 10C it brings us to the temp of inside loop as high as 40+C (which is also fine)

there is also a problems with control of the pumps speed and fans RPM but I think aquaero can get it all under control

This project is not going to be a cheap one at the end

The choice is yours

 

Thank you for explaining this, I took a look at the above chart on their website and I couldn't make sense of it and I think I understand now. 

I had a similar thought like you, why not use some industrial radiator from like a car or something and an intense fan if it's going to be outside? But I quickly realized I was out of my territory and began to think I should just use conventional parts.

I was going to buy 3x480 rads and already have a 240 rad, 2x480's for my main PC with the Core i9 and 1x480 + 1x240 for my second PC. Keep them on separate loops utilizing the 2 heat exchangers with standard pumps on either side of the pump / reservoir combo's I'm looking at are advertised to do 1000LHR with up to 15ft head. Load the rads with SP120 fans, and call it good. But now that I can see that 1 exchanger could handle both PC's and you introduce me to huge rads I didn't know existed, it would make more sense to combine the loops with one larger pump / one larger rad outside and two separate smaller pumps in the pc's. The reason I would still do two pumps inside is so I can fill and bleed the systems separately and then use quick disconnects to eventually hook them together and then to the heat exchanger. 

What fans would you recommend?

And on the subject of condensation, would this really be a problem for the tubes inside the house even during winter? It doesn't seem like the water could get that cold but I guess if it's -10C outside with a huge rad it could, even with both PC's bringing the heat on the other side of the exchanger?

And like you said on the other hand if it were 37C in mid summer it seems like that would be a problem... I've never truly sat and thought about radiators and how they work exactly, can a radiator only cool the liquid it contains down to ambient temperature? I've also never thought about the temperature of the water really just the temperature of the components, if the previous point is true is 47c water cool enough to keep the components from getting to hot?    

I was thinking just use PSU fan adapters and just run fans and pumps at full speeds with an extra PSU I have lying around.

I mean is any of this even really possible? lol I'm beginning to second guess myself. My original idea / components was going to run around $2k, would be less if I used a single large radiator and combined the loops it seems, I'm ready to spend that much if this is actually feasible.

Thanks for the help I appreciate it.

 

On 1/31/2018 at 8:15 PM, danejesse1 said:

You could do something like what Linus did for his computers at home. He ran a thunderbolt cable from his computer (in a different room) to a thunderbolt dock so he could connect his monitor / kb / mouse. If there's a place in the house that you are fine dumping heat into that could be an option. The only problem is that a TB cable long enough might be expensive.

I've pondered this idea but there are other inconveniences involved, also I have audio interfaces that hook directly to PCIE cards via ADAT, longer digital cables will increase latency.

Also I like the look of my PC in my setup 

 

On 1/31/2018 at 8:44 PM, Canada EH said:

I would enclose the computer(s) in a wooden box, do some copper lines around the wood, air intake fans blowing air over the lines, and exhaust fans

Would be a bit loud and wouldn't look as nice, unless I did some window or something I guess. My PC sits on a table I build and is a pretty important part of the atheistic, I appreciate the suggestion though. 

 

The more I Look into this the more I realize how little I know, it almost seems like something like this would only work in a region that has very steady temperature year round. But then again Linus did this in Canada and in the last video they made on it he said they had been running it for a year, wouldn't he have had a condensation problem? I don't remember him mentioning one.

I'd rather not put my build in some air tight chamber to prevent condensation, maybe I need to look into just putting the radiators in a different room not outside. Problem is, there really isn't a good room to put it in / will have to run way more tubing involving a more industrial pump.

[MaratM]

3 hours ago, Cimmerian said:

The more I Look into this the more I realize how little I know, it almost seems like something like this would only work in a region that has very steady temperature year round. But then again Linus did this in Canada and in the last video they made on it he said they had been running it for a year, wouldn't he have had a condensation problem?

They are based in Vancouver! Vancouver has +5C average in january, of cause they did not have problems with condensation. Even if they did they used cupper piping, so the liquid was warm enough by the time it was entering PC’s.

To solve the problem with condensation you will have to controll the pumps based on the deltaT between inside and outside loop. The greater the delta the lower the pump speed on the outside loop

you can also use a rad after the heat exchenger so you can warm up the fluid to your room temp)))

The other solution is to make some kind of heat extractor, place rads inside your room and figure out how to dump hot air from the rads outside

 

[ninbura]

5 hours ago, MaratM said:

They are based in Vancouver! Vancouver has +5C average in january, of cause they did not have problems with condensation. Even if they did they used cupper piping, so the liquid was warm enough by the time it was entering PC’s.

To solve the problem with condensation you will have to controll the pumps based on the deltaT between inside and outside loop. The greater the delta the lower the pump speed on the outside loop

you can also use a rad after the heat exchenger so you can warm up the fluid to your room temp)))

The other solution is to make some kind of heat extractor, place rads inside your room and figure out how to dump hot air from the rads outside

 

Yeah I was thinking Pump speed or multiple exchanges chained together, but then I really have to focus on what time of year it is and plan accordingly. Sounds like it would be consistently annoying and extremely prone to error.

I think I will just do what the other guy did, less fun but oh well, just route pipes to my laundry room. I'll post back when I'm all done with results, I don't see any reason why this won't work + it's cheaper than figuring out exhangers.

[MaratM]

4 hours ago, Cimmerian said:

Yeah I was thinking Pump speed or multiple exchanges chained together, but then I really have to focus on what time of year it is and plan accordingly. Sounds like it would be consistently annoying and extremely prone to error.

I think I will just do what the other guy did, less fun but oh well, just route pipes to my laundry room. I'll post back when I'm all done with results, I don't see any reason why this won't work + it's cheaper than figuring out exhangers.

Just make sure you do not cheap out on pumps, or place some kind of industrial pump in the laundry room.

[AnonymousGuy]

I'm one of very few people who are running a whole-room type setup.

 

My advice is to a) use heat exchangers b) don't use stuff from traditional "watercooling" companies.  Generic industrial stuff is far cheaper.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/22x22-Water-to-Air-Heat-Exchanger/301580116440?hash=item46379361d8:g:PmIAAOSwQJhUi06C

 

with a box fan and variac to control the box fan's speed. that thing is equivalent to something like 5x480 rads.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-30-Plate-Water-to-Water-Brazed-Plate-Heat-Exchanger-1-FPT-Ports-W-Brackets/282264076190?hash=item41b83fff9e:g:GfgAAOSwWMhaYjnm

 

so then I can use regular tap water with anti-algae, UV, and garden hose on one side and mayhem x1 on the other side.  tap water is cheaper than coolant when you need to do a long run across your house.

[AT0MAC]

38 minutes ago, AnonymousGuy said:

I'm one of very few people who are running a whole-room type setup.

 

My advice is to a) use heat exchangers b) don't use stuff from traditional "watercooling" companies.  Generic industrial stuff is far cheaper.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/22x22-Water-to-Air-Heat-Exchanger/301580116440?hash=item46379361d8:g:PmIAAOSwQJhUi06C

 

with a box fan and variac to control the box fan's speed. that thing is equivalent to something like 5x480 rads.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-30-Plate-Water-to-Water-Brazed-Plate-Heat-Exchanger-1-FPT-Ports-W-Brackets/282264076190?hash=item41b83fff9e:g:GfgAAOSwWMhaYjnm

 

so then I can use regular tap water with anti-algae, UV, and garden hose on one side and mayhem x1 on the other side.  tap water is cheaper than coolant when you need to do a long run across your house.

wow that looks real interesting actually!

I see these things use standard 1" connections like in plumbing, can you point to adapters you use to get it down to normal water cooling size for the indoor loop then?

[AnonymousGuy]

28 minutes ago, AT0MAC said:

wow that looks real interesting actually!

I see these things use standard 1" connections like in plumbing, can you point to adapters you use to get it down to normal water cooling size for the indoor loop then?

You probably have an equivalent store to McMaster (industrial supply), but it's not too much of a problem to adapt 1" NPT to 5/8" barb (for garden hose) or 1/2" or /3/8" for the watercooling side. 

 

When dealing with 1" NPT stuff (male or female), you generally have to get creative to be able to adapt it down to a 1/2 or 3/8 barb because it's hard to find a direct fitting.  So you might have to do 1" -> 3/4 NPT reducer and then you can find 3/4 NPT -> barb, or you can do 1" NPT -> copper sweat -> 3/4" NPT -> barb.   For the air-to-water heat exchanger I did 1" copper sweat -> 3/4" copper sweat reducer -> 3/4" sweat to female NPT and then I screwed in a plastic 3/4" NPT -> 5/8" barb, for example.

[AT0MAC]

4 minutes ago, AnonymousGuy said:

You probably have an equivalent store to McMaster (industrial supply), but it's not too much of a problem to adapt 1" NPT to 5/8" barb (for garden hose) or 1/2" or /3/8" for the watercooling side. 

 

When dealing with 1" NPT stuff (male or female), you generally have to get creative to be able to adapt it down to a 1/2 or 3/8 barb because it's hard to find a direct fitting.  So you might have to do 1" -> 3/4 NPT reducer and then you can find 3/4 NPT -> barb, or you can do 1" NPT -> copper sweat -> 3/4" NPT -> barb. 

now when i think about it, those posts on the heat exchanger is most likely just soldered on, could work with on the indoor site unsolder them and solder on a direct water cooling fitting instead. I know the diameter would not fit but should not be difficult making a small piece of cobber with a hole in to use as a spacer

[ninbura]

After doing everything wrong and choosing needlessly expensive parts I have it working (for now), I had a few questions though if anyone could answer them.

Firstly, I have a reservoir downstairs hooked up to the pumps, but additionally I have a reservoir in each PC. The reason for this is I wanted to bleed each computer separately before introducing them to the main loop. This would reduce my 8000 points of potential error when I went to test everything, so I just put two quick disconnect fittings on an extra pump I had and did just that. After introducing them to the main system I noticed that the water level in the reservoirs were slowly but surely rising, they were already almost full before but does this mean air is being compressed within them? Do I need to make sure that these reservoirs are completely filled? Will having these additional reservoirs somehow create issues down the line?

Secondly the reservoir down stairs has a pretty significant level decrease / increase when I turn the system on / off, is this something I should be worried about?

Thirdly I used a few PMP-500's by Koolance as pumps, after looking at different things online and friction loss calculators I thought I would need multiple in series but alas I'm pretty sure I was over thinking it and only needed one. However I have read that running several pumps can be nice just for redundancy so I think I'll just leave them in (or maybe just put quick disconnect fittings on them too and have the others ready to go if one dies?), but the flow is extremely fast. From what I understand you need some sort of controller between the molex connection and the pump to change the speed but I can't seem to find a "molex pump speed controller" or anything that allows me to adjust molex power output. Any ideas?

EDIT: I found a controller for pumps on their website, seems I couldn't find one before my bad.

Thanks for any help.

[Shadow_Storm56]

On 1/31/2018 at 3:09 PM, stealth80 said:

if its cold enough to freeze in the winter how can it be too hot with your windows open? just turn the heating off in your room lol 

 

as long as your winters don't exceed -8C mayhems should be fine

 

https://www.mayhems.net/collections/pastel-pre-mix-1ltr/products/pastel-uv-white-1ltr

Unless he has fans blowing in the room or doors open it is very easy for air to just sit.... and it to be cool only by the windows 

[Shadow_Storm56]

11 hours ago, Cimmerian said:

After doing everything wrong and choosing needlessly expensive parts I have it working (for now), I had a few questions though if anyone could answer them.

Firstly, I have a reservoir downstairs hooked up to the pumps, but additionally I have a reservoir in each PC. The reason for this is I wanted to bleed each computer separately before introducing them to the main loop. This would reduce my 8000 points of potential error when I went to test everything, so I just put two quick disconnect fittings on an extra pump I had and did just that. After introducing them to the main system I noticed that the water level in the reservoirs were slowly but surely rising, they were already almost full before but does this mean air is being compressed within them? Do I need to make sure that these reservoirs are completely filled? Will having these additional reservoirs somehow create issues down the line?

Secondly the reservoir down stairs has a pretty significant level decrease / increase when I turn the system on / off, is this something I should be worried about?

Thirdly I used a few PMP-500's by Koolance as pumps, after looking at different things online and friction loss calculators I thought I would need multiple in series but alas I'm pretty sure I was over thinking it and only needed one. However I have read that running several pumps can be nice just for redundancy so I think I'll just leave them in (or maybe just put quick disconnect fittings on them too and have the others ready to go if one dies?), but the flow is extremely fast. From what I understand you need some sort of controller between the molex connection and the pump to change the speed but I can't seem to find a "molex pump speed controller" or anything that allows me to adjust molex power output. Any ideas?

EDIT: I found a controller for pumps on their website, seems I couldn't find one before my bad.

Thanks for any help.

The res will decrese in level simply from pressure, pushing fluid through a large system of tubes and rad will take pressure and pressure causes tubes to slightly expand and air spaces to compress thus lower levels appear, no worries. oh wait you said rising, also not an issue unless the res is open at the top or something, a little pressure won't hurt and likley the air is bleeding out or moving to another system point. Nothing wrong with mutiple pumps... we need to chat I have done the whole room water cooling with great success