Help with custom water loop

[rinikulous]

Hey guys,

I'm about to put together my first build in over 10 years and I know I want to build a custom water loop. The question I'm about to ask is probably extra stupid and mundane so please excuse my idiocy.

The machine will feature: 8700K, Maximus X Hero, TridentZ RGB (3000/CL15), Supernova 750 and EVGA 1080 FTW ACX 3.0 - all inside a Define R6. When it comes to water cooling: EK 360 Slim, EK 240 Slim, EK block/backplate, EK PWM 120 Vardars, EK D5 PWM, hard tubing...

 

My question is this: Considering I'll be doing a 360 and a 240 (5 fans total), what is the best way to connect all those fans to the motherboard - fan hub/controller? 

 

Thank you in advance. Any piece of advice would be appreciated. And again, please excuse my inadequacy in this matter.

[Dissitesuxba11s]

Something like this should work, which will then be connected to the motherboard. It doesn't have to be that one specifically, there are better/cheaper options.

 

Also, welcome to the forum!

[rinikulous]

Appreciate it, Dissitesuxba11s.  I was thinking of a hub like the one you suggested - either Thermaltake or Corsair...

[For Science!]

1 hour ago, rinikulous said:

Appreciate it, Dissitesuxba11s.  I was thinking of a hub like the one you suggested - either Thermaltake or Corsair...

Since you have a nice motherboard with 2-pin temperature sensor headers. I would also recommend investing in a 2-pin temperature sensor into you loop so that you can base your fan speeds on fluid temperatures. Otherwise any fan hub with supplemental power that can transfer the PWM signal would be fine.

 

Just watch out since there are many fan hubs that take a PWM input but output voltage control which is not what you want. 

[rinikulous]

1 hour ago, For Science! said:

Since you have a nice motherboard with 2-pin temperature sensor headers. I would also recommend investing in a 2-pin temperature sensor into you loop so that you can base your fan speeds on fluid temperatures. Otherwise any fan hub with supplemental power that can transfer the PWM signal would be fine.

 

Just watch out since there are many fan hubs that take a PWM input but output voltage control which is not what you want. 

Thanks, bud! That's a good suggestion. I know two rads for the config is a bit of an overkill but im trying to future proof it a bit. I'll def look into temp sensors. 

I just hope the Vardar fans will play nice with the commander pro hub - if not, i may go with ML120s. 

[Kalm_Traveler]

2 hours ago, rinikulous said:

Hey guys,

I'm about to put together my first build in over 10 years and I know I want to build a custom water loop. The question I'm about to ask is probably extra stupid and mundane so please excuse my idiocy.

The machine will feature: 8700K, Maximus X Hero, TridentZ RGB (3000/CL15), Supernova 750 and EVGA 1080 FTW ACX 3.0 - all inside a Define R6. When it comes to water cooling: EK 360 Slim, EK 240 Slim, EK block/backplate, EK PWM 120 Vardars, EK D5 PWM, hard tubing...

 

My question is this: Considering I'll be doing a 360 and a 240 (5 fans total), what is the best way to connect all those fans to the motherboard - fan hub/controller? 

 

Thank you in advance. Any piece of advice would be appreciated. And again, please excuse my inadequacy in this matter.

I just finished up a sort of similar build in the Define R6 with a Maximus X Formula

Top radiator 360mm with 3 120mm fans plugged into the PWM side of the built-in fan hub behind the MB tray - that plugged into the upper right H-AMP fan header
front 140mm x2 fans connected with a PWM Y-splitter to the front lower chassis fan header

bottom 140mm x2 fans connected with a PWM Y-splitter to the bottom middle-ish fan header
rear 140mm fan on radiator connected to the mid left side chassis fan header

One tip I would suggest since I am new to water cooling and just learned this last month, I would add a water temp sensor and have your radiator fans run off that rather than plugging them into a CPU fan header since they will ramp up and down often for no reason due to CPU temp spikes that don't quickly affect water temp.

[rinikulous]

Cheers, dude...I'll definitely get some temp sensors. Appreciate the fan setup writeup - helps a lot.

 

Keep Kalm and Carry On

[Mick Naughty]

I use something similar for one of my rigs. 

 

My boards have 3 fan headers, a cpu and cpu opt header and 3 opt headers and 3 temp sensors. So I can normally get them all wired up without issues. 

No issues with hubs or powered splitters. Just depends on what you feel like doing.

[Dschijn]

EK SE rads are not the best rads... If it has to be EK, get the PE ones.

[bling]

The build in my signature is pretty much the same as yours but in a different case.

I used the phobya pwm splitter and some of the fan header on the maximus hero, but I'm running 9 fans.

 

The temperature sensor is very useful but you cannot use it for the pump header, it uses the cpu temperature and it's pretty annoying.