Applying liquid metal

[mako0411]

Hi,

 

I have a question regarding applying liquid metal on my I7 8700k. I want to delid my CPU and put liquid metal between the die and the ihs. It is possible to apply lm between the ihs and my Corsair 150i AIO? Thank you for your help.

 

Best

[Fuzzleworth1]

7 minutes ago, mako0411 said:

Hi,

 

I have a question regarding applying liquid metal on my I7 8700k. I want to delid my CPU and put liquid metal between the die and the ihs. It is possible to apply lm between the ihs and my Corsair 150i AIO? Thank you for your help.

 

Best

Putting it between the ihs is not advised because Galistan (liquid metal) is corrosive and will break down your copper or whatever cooler you have

[NelizMastr]

Possible, yes. Effective, no.

 

Only apply it between the IHS and the die and then just use high quality thermal paste between IHS and the cooler. 

[mako0411]

Ok, thank you very much for your help.

[Falkentyne]

12 hours ago, mako0411 said:

Hi,

 

I have a question regarding applying liquid metal on my I7 8700k. I want to delid my CPU and put liquid metal between the die and the ihs. It is possible to apply lm between the ihs and my Corsair 150i AIO? Thank you for your help.

 

Best

If your heatplate is aluminum, absolutely NO, it will destroy it.

If your heatplate is nickel plated copper, then you CAN do it, but you need to take utmost precautions to stop any chance of runoff of any conductive balls of doom getting anywhere.  That means, foam dams (stuff usually for packing fragile equipment, some hardware stores may have it, or some crafting stores) to act as a barrier.  It's usually easier to apply foam dam barriers on laptops than it is on desktops, but again it's a LOT of work and usually not worth the effort unless every last C temp drop matters to you.

if your heatplate is copper, it won't destroy it, but you need to insulate it as much as possible against air, and have firm, decent static downward pressure.  Gallium will be partially absorbed into copper, leaving the tin and indium to harden as the gallium won't be there to keep the mixture liquid anymore.  Direct exposure to air GREATLY accelerates this effect immensely--a thick layer of liquid metal exposed directly to air (not mounted in a computer) on a copper surface will completely harden in about 2 weeks.

If the heatsink is fully insulted and has good static pressure, this effect can be migitated to where only some absorption of the gallium will happen, leaving a stain and some liquid left behind.  This will take months, and if this happens, what you can do is remove the heatsink, clean off the partially hardened LM off the heatsink using 3000 grit sandpaper, until the surface is fully smooth BUT leave the silver stain there!  Just wipe the heatsink until it is smooth, but do NOT wipe enough to expose the copper color!  What this does is leave the gallium battery differential there, so that when you reapply new liquid metal, there will be a lot less absorption this time than before.  if the surface is fully sealed and pressure is good, you should not have to worry about replacing the LM in over a year.

 

HIDevolution uses a proper sealed method for their gaming laptops and copper heatsinks, and they never have customers complaining about temps degrading, because they insulate the heatsinks against air.

 

The two big things that accelerate gallium absorption into copper are:

1) exposure to air (oxidation)

2) high temps (increases battery effect)

 

2+1 is a killer.

Overall it's really not worth it to use liquid metal except on direct die cooling, as that is where the heat needs to be transferred the most and quickest.