Watercooling Guide
What this is
Demystifying the art of watercooling: exploring procedure, compatibility and components. The guide will show you how to build a watercooling system based on your budget, cooling requirements and chassis limitations.
What this isn’t
A detailed review/database of all available components. The guide will be updated to reflect new parts, but given the sheer number of possible hardware permutations, there has to be a degree of generalization.
1.0 Planning
1.1 Cooling requirements
1.2 Choosing parts for your chassis
2.0 Components
2.1 CPU waterblocks
2.2 Motherboard waterblocks
2.3 RAM waterblocks
2.4 Graphics card waterblocks
2.5 Radiators
2.6 Fans
2.7 Pumps and reservoirs
2.8 Fittings
2.9 Tubing
3.0 Coolants and additives
3.1 Cooling fluid
3.2 Dyes and biocides
4.0 Preparing loop components
4.1 Radiator flushing
4.2 Dry fitting
5.0 Assembly
5.1 Maintenance schedule
6.0 Chassis and radiator compatibility
1.0 PLANNING
1.1 Cooling requirements for your components.
First, you have to estimate the amount of heat you need to remove from the system. In general, power usage equals heat output. To estimate how much heat you need to dissipate, I would suggest using one (or more) online power usage calculators. It's better to overestimate voltage and wattage requirements -- you'll be incorporating a margin for error.
When using the PSU calculator, you need to isolate wattage for the component(s) you will be cooling, so subtract any baseline power consumption not pertaining to the components you intend to watercool. Remember to deduct the 34w "minimum PSU wattage" figure from your total if using the calculator provided in the link.
A basic rule of thumb is to allow 200-250 watts of cooling per 120 or 140mm radiator increment. You can generally use the same overall size spread across multiple radiators to achieve the equivalent cooling (I.e. a 480mm quad radiator equals 2 x 240mm radiators or 1 x 120mm plus 1 x 360mm).
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The lower wattage range requires average flow rate, radiator(s) of good ability and fans of good static pressure, whereas the upper wattage range needs a high flow rate (1.5 U.S. GPM+/ 1.25 Imperial GPM/ 5.5 litres per minute), very good radiator cooling efficiency with fans matched for static pressure.
Both figures are highly dependent on flow rate/restriction (number of waterblocks and how restrictive they are) as well as pump, fan and radiator efficiency. High-speed fans with excellent static pressure are usually required to reach the upper values. Exceeding the heat dispersal wattage for a given radiator area will raise coolant temperature. A 10ºC difference (delta) between coolant and ambient air temperature is considered an average to work toward. Anything exceeding 15ºC means the loop is becoming overwhelmed, while a 5ºC delta (or less) is very efficient.
CPU-only watercooling: Low restriction loop. Tubing diameter, pump (flow rate/head pressure) and radiator performance not hugely important. Little difference in temps between 240/280mm and 360/420mm radiator.
CPU + 1-2 graphics/chipset/RAM blocks: Moderately restrictive loop. Temperature accumulation rises as flow rate is impacted by more inertia/restriction from waterblocks
CPU + 3-7 graphics/chipset/RAM/MOSFET's/mobo blocks: Very restrictive loop. Pump quality (flow/head pressure) paramount*. Temperature accumulation rises as pressure drops across waterblocks, greatly decreasing waterblock efficiency due to rising coolant temperature. Consider separate watercooling loops with the aim of keeping the coolant-to-ambient air temperature delta under 10ºC. Alternatively, you can add a second pump (two in series within the loop). However, realize that the second pump will also add its heat dump to the coolant.
*Remember that a pump dumps a lot of the heat it generates into the fluid it's circulating. Running a pump at its highest setting to overcome loop resistance adds to the pumps wattage and thus, heat.
Good pre-planning is essential to building a watercooled project on a budget. One of the biggest obstacles is having an idea of what you want and then adding more pieces to an existing budget as problems or options arise. It doesn't take long for the budget to balloon beyond the original estimate, leaving you with an empty wallet and boxes of discarded components we euphemistically call "spare parts."
1.2 Choosing parts for your chassis
By determining the heat dissipation you require, you now know the basic parameters of the cooling needed. A typical loop encompasses radiator(s), fans, a pump, a reservoir and tubing that you'll need to house.
Radiator placement: Most chassis have a rear exhaust fan (or top fan for 90º rotation chassis like the FT02, Raven etc). This provides an option to mount a radiator of the same size as the existing fan in that position, or to use an adapter for an external mount of most standard sized radiators. Other placem