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Difficult Case Cooling Project

Date Log; 22, November, 2005

Part One

By way of a prelude I will point out that this project sets out to accomplish two things. Firstly, we are interested in providing some ideas and information about fitting water cooling to difficult computer cases hence the title we have chosen. Secondly, we want to provide a fitting guide which could be considered as specific for our Evolution Two series of kits.

On with the Game

I would imagine the most asked question I get is how do I fit a water cooling kit to my case it hasn't got............. like the others do? Ever had one of those types of cases. Very small external fan mounting points or even non at all make it very likely that these now "spare" cases simply went out of fashion or lost the heat battle with faster and hotter computer components in what is an ever changing electronics market. You can often find these cases hanging derelict around your shed, garage or bedroom. You know the type of case that you scavenged most of the parts out of to fix up the project you were working on at the time. The question is will they ever again see the light of day or have they joined that list of spare cases which belong to the case cooling derelicts.

Here is a classical example of both changing fashion and scavenging. In this case the whole front section has disappeared over time and what we are left with is one very large hole in the case front and no switching mechanism for power on or shut down.

With loose joints and parts missing this case is a perfect subject for our water cooling project. To get started in this project we will start first by finding a place for the largest and most important part the radiator. Lets look at some options.

Radiator Option One

First we trial fit the radiator using our bug legs kit to the existent 80 mm fan hole at the back of the case. You will see that we have decide to use a single pass version of the dual radiator for this trial. You will notice that we have retained the 80 mm fan to assist with any hot case air clearance as it is the only in case fan we intend to fit to extract air. Happy with the fit of the radiator here lets look at some other alternatives.

Radiator Option Two

Next we trial fit a smaller 120 mm radiator to the fan space which can be seen at the bottom front of the case in the picture below.

By adding the alien fan guard on to the front fan mounting holes in the case it hides the bolt holes and tidies up the area.

So far so good, next we have to repair the motherboard mounting points, fit the motherboard and our water block mounting screws before we can continue to investigate potential radiator mounting points.

To prepare for the setting up of tubing the water block is trial fitted and space around the socket checked.

The reason this is done is to check that there is sufficient clearance around the socket for the retaining plate to apply its pressure to the block and CPU.

Handy Hint

It is a very good time at this stage to put the CPU in the socket, add a bit of AS5 and run a test fitting of the water block on the CPU. You might want to visit the AS5 site here for further information. Looking at the impression made on the CPU and block surface will identify any non contact problems which should be fixed before continuing. It is important to note that almost all cases are designed for air cooling so when you water cool you should be prepared to do some modification to make your parts fit. Most manufacturers of water cooling equipment are plagued by motherboard makers who encroach onto to the "no go" areas of the socket. They do this so that the HSF fan will direct coolant air on to caps, mosfets and the like. No harm in that but if you are trying to use a multi plate which will handle fitting to most CPU's and motherboards it is highly likely that the water block mounting plate will not fit on a motherboard with a misplaced or overly close capacitor. In the event that your motherboard is one of the type described above the kit contains a spacer or "adding" ring which can be fitted between the top of the water block and the mounting plate. This raises the mounting plate above the surrounding mosfets and caps by approximately 7 mm. Assembly can be seen below.

The Abit IG-80 motherboard used in this project is one of the offending boards. We gave the adding ring a trial on this board with very good effect.

Handy Hint

When fitting any water block to an upright tower case it is often much easier to lay the case down on its side.

Okay, now we can look at more Radiical radiator options.

Radiator Option Three......over the top. Yes, sure it is overkill but that's what we do.

Option three involves fitting the triple radiator to the top of the case. Simple matter really to bolt the large radiator to the top and feed the coolant downwards to the pump unit. It is easy to see in this picture why we named the standoffs bugs legs.

and of course the options would not be complete without the corresponding bottom radiator placement shot with the barbs now pointing in the right direction. It is clear there are a lot more options available. In our triple radiator placement on top and inside on the bottom of the case it is fairly obvious that a dual radiator could also be placed in the same areas.

Having looked at most of the readily available radiator mounting options it is now onto tubing setup. For this project we have decided to limit the tubing setup to be discussed to the rear mounted dual radiator and the front mounted single radiator these being the two Evolution Two kit options currently available. Before we do this it is necessary to clear up some misunderstanding regarding the method of connecting compression fittings to the tubing used in this kit.

Compression Fittings

Compression fittings are just starting to emerge onto the Australian water cooling market. In Europe this form of tubing connection and the use of push on fittings have been used for some time. It is only now with the move away from bulky 1/2" tubing that compression fittings have been made available in commercial kits. Compression fittings are in my mind the most useful and safest method of attaching tubing. The principle is that the tubing is compressed against the fitting making for an almost foolproof/leak proof fitting.

Please Note;

For the benefit of explanation the compression fitting has been removed from the block to explain its use. Normally the fitting would remain screwed into the block to fit tubing as illustrated here.

Lets have a look at the parts.

Compression fittings feature an 'o' ring seal in the base and a threaded portion with a top which screws down onto the tubing being used. The following pictures will explain the process.

The tubing is pushed through the circular retaining collar.

Then onto the tube holder of the fitting as illustrated here.

And the collar is tightened onto the fitting. When completed the fitting will be firmly held in position.

Next we should look at pump placement.

Pump Placement

I prefer to mount the pump under the block to reduce tubing clutter and provide space for tubing turns. Given that the flow route we've chosen is for the single pass variants of our radiators it also makes tubing rollout easier without any loss in performance. It is intended to fit a GPU block to the video card in a future part of this project so placing the pump here will also greatly assist in any future re tubing of the system.

We will look at setting up the tubing on the single front mounted radiator first.

Having placed the pump in position the next task is to attach tubing from the pump to the block. you will note that the outlet for this pump is on the right hand side of the pump. I have taken out the filler plug so that the outlet orientation is clear.

So, with the pump in position, tube one goes to any side of the block you favor. I prefer to keep the tubing as straight as possible hence why I have used the right side of the block as the inlet to the water block. I have done this for clarity.

Tube two is now added and you can see that it comes from the left side of the water block and goes to the bottom of the radiator which now becomes the radiator inlet. (see the handy hint below for the reason)

Handy Hint;

Single pass radiators like their dual pass brothers have the unique ability to cool equally well no matter which of the barbs on the radiator are used as inlet and which are used as outlet. It is simply not an issue. Whichever barb you use the radiator will work equally as well. Single pass radiators do however have one major advantage over dual pass radiators in they can be configured to self bleed air. Simply use the bottom barb/ compression fitting in this case as the inlet and the top fitting as the outlet and the trapped air will be dispelled automatically.

The third tube comes from the top of the radiator and returns back to the inlet of the pump. At this point the cooling loop is completed.

Dual radiator tube roll out.

Having set the flow route of tube placement for an internally mounted radiator it is now necessary to look at an externally mounted dual radiator tubing placement. The principle is the same for each element with the exception that we will be using a PCI tubing pass through for the bottom tubing placement. The completed PCI pass through is shown below.

As an alternative and if you are into case cutting and drilling holes a simple way to enter tubes is to use the PCI pass through for the bottom tubing and drill a hole in the case back for the top tubing.

The other alternative so that both top and bottom tubing enter through the PCI pass through plate is to use a ninety degree fitting on the top radiator barb hole.

This is best viewed in the "through the case shot" below.

Here you can see the top ninety degree barb facing downward at an angle towards the PCI pass through plate holes. The tubing has been attached to the barb and the tubing has been fed through the PCI pass through plate to the pump inlet compression fitting.

Okay, so we have our tubing rolled out and its now onto fitting out the rest of the case and filling our cooling system for use.

Next.........fitting out.