My first water project. *Work in progress - Lots of pics warning*

[finbarqs]

how often do you have to do maintenance? Like flush the fluids out and stuff...

 

[Interitus]

Since I'm new to WC, aigo would probably better answer that question than I would.

I would say it depends mostly on your loop and what you put in it. Since I'm just running distilled and silver, I'll probably drain it in a month or two and inspect everything just to be on the safe side. After that if all's clear and well, I'll probably only tear it down around the 6 month mark for a good cleaning and inspection.

Different coolants and additives change that though. Mostly what I'll be looking for after a few months time is possible plasticizer build up from the tubing and any other gunk that might have collected from the new parts, even though I did make sure to flush them with distilled. If I were using dyes or other additives I'd probably clean it out more often than that.

The way I see it, I usually rebuild at least yearly if not sooner than that, so it's not much more maintenance than I'd normally be doing anyways.

I also plan on adding more goodies to the loop as money allows, so I'll probably inspect or clean when I do that too.

 

[Interitus]

And away we go!

Needs moar towels!!

Leak testing went great. Not a drop anywhere I could find after 45 minutes and multiple stop/starts of the pumps.

Bleeding went pretty fast at first, the DDC's quieted down within about 15 minutes. My GPU block still sounds like firecrackers blowing up inside of it though so after a few tips/shakes/taps and whatnot, I'll let it run for a few hours to see if it blows some of the air out of the block. Pretty smooth so far.

Aigo, here's a question for you:

I have both pumps running right now while it bleeds. When I filled I just ran the first pump so not to overpower the process. Should I leave both pumps running while it bleeds or should I just run the first?

These DDC's are water hungry monsters, lol. Just one sucked a full res dry in about 1.5 secs.

 

[WoodButcher]

If you bleed with one it should bleed out faster provided there is enough flow to force the air from the high spots. Every loop is different so you will be the first to know which is better.

 

[Interitus]

Well I passed out yesterday evening and woke up just in time for work this morning so it's been bleeding for almost 20hrs with both pumps on, lol.

There's no air bubbles that I can see, even the res is clear until above the water line. The noise in the GPU block went away too, although sometimes if I shut off the pumps for more than say 5 minutes, when I turn them back on the GPU block gargles for a min or two then it goes away again.

Any concern with that or is it just air that will eventually work its way out? I did do the dougie around the table a few times tilting, tapping, and whatever flailing motion you'd like to call it

 

[Infrnl]

Great job on the build; looks awesome; especially for your first time. Some great photos in here as well !!!

 

[Interitus]

Great job on the build; looks awesome; especially for your first time. Some great photos in here as well !!!

Thanks!

I decided to play with the lighting module for the reservoir a bit last night. It looks pretty good, not overbearing or too dim either. I plan on taking the plug and spray painting the top black so that no light emits from the top of the reservoir or the plug. That way only the inside of the reservoir shows light. I have tons of stop plugs with 5mm LED holes (found em for 49 cents at Microcenter, lol ) so if I don't like the way the spray painting comes out I can always just use a standard one instead. Might have to put a little electrical tape around the LED itself as it protrudes a bit from the plug and I don't really want to paint the LED. I figure the tape would be small enough not to look bad or even be noticeable if I take my time and do it nicely.

Anybody think it would look better with the light shining from the plug?

Note in the pics that there's some funny refraction going on from my killcoil floating in the bottom of the res.

Here it is before I attempt to paint a plug:

 

[finbarqs]

awesome! Can't wait to see what temps you're getting!

 

[GprophetB]

Whoa, awesome build thanks for sharing - I'm not huge into the WC scene but i hope it works out for you!

 

[Interitus]

Thanks guys

Unfortunately today was a full steam ahead on the fail boat.

The ModMyToys PCB's are utter s**t. Really don't understand how you can screw up a breadboard with 4 fan plugs on it but they managed to do it. $15 down the toilet there.

I have to order some 1 to 3 or 1 to 4 Y-adapters now, so it'll be a few days before I can get wiring going. I knew things were going too good, lol.

Also the motherboard block is not gonna let me use my RAM cooler unless I do a little cutting. Gonna have to bust out the dremel and trim the mounting plates where the board block interferes.

Thanks again ModMyToys. Not only did I throw out $15 on your s**t heap PCB's, but I hacked up a bunch of my fan extensions to make Female->Female cables to plug them in. Raaaaage.

 

[aigomorla]

lolol.... yeah i was very disappointed in the mod my toys also...

Its not just you, but everyone whose gotten one is reporting that on some of the headers, the voltage is getting resistored, and sometimes u wont get full current to all the ports.

 

[Interitus]

That wasn't the only problem I had with them either. I tried all 4 of mine, only one of them gave more than 5'ish volts per ANY channel, and the one that did I would guess spit 7'ish volts. Some of my Yates wouldn't even start.

Then, the 3-pin input on one of them snapped completely off when I was trying to put the cable in it. And it wasn't me pushing too hard, I barely even got started.

Also one of them arrived without a velcro pad of any sort.

Just total fail all around.

 

[Interitus]

Aigo..

I made a little discovery.

I was playing with the pcb's with my multimeter and trying some odds and ends to see if I could figure out what the hell was going on with them and I stumbled across something..

If you DO NOT use the end plug, the one mounted 90 degrees to the board, everything works perfectly. I can't explain why this happens, I don't understand it at all.

All 4 of my boards, even the one with the end connector broken off, if I plug the power IN to one of the headers facing straight up, fans work at 100%.

Another oddity is that if you use the end plug, you won't get an RPM signal to your controller. If you use any of the other plugs, you get an RPM signal.

Maybe this is something someone else can nail down as I have limited knowledge about this kind of thing, but all I know is that using any other plug for the power IN but the end plug, the board works fine.

 

[Interitus]

Well I decided to fire it up and make sure everything worked while I wait for my cables.

Everything's running fine. Temps appear reasonable.

Running Prime95 on all 8 cores with 80*F ambients:

GPU (idle only) - 37*C
GPU VDDC - 35*C

CPU Cores - 50-48-48-49
NB - 35*C
VREG - 48*C

-edit-

This is with the 920 running at stock.

I just pulled some air idle temps from an old thread...

VREG - 58*C
CPU Cores - 40/36/40/35 *C

that was with 77*F ambient.

I'd say it's pretty impressive that my VREG dropped 10 degrees, and cores were about 5*C off. And that's comparing load on water to idle on air

Looks pretty good to me. Anybody see anything wrong with that?

 

[Interitus]

When it rains it pours.

Sitting on a total of $125 worth of useless defective parts, $40 of which retailers have refused to exchange.

PPC's has just lost my business for good. I had planned on just trashing the fan PCB's as they were only like $20. It would cost at least half that to ship them back to replace them with the same garbage that probably wouldn't work again anyway. Until today, when my replacement red bulgin switch doesn't light up at all. I figured I might as well ask about the PCB's since I would have to send the switch back. Spent $400 from my build at that place, and apparently it's too much to ask for 1/10th of that in exchanges. Not to mention I was made out to be a dumb a** in their reply. Middle finger salute to you guys, I'll spend my $400 elsewhere next time.

Blah, sorry for the rant, really aggravated.

 

[aigomorla]

oh man.. u didnt talk to hank directly?

:T

i think he's getting massive headaches on those mod my toys tho.


Coolant change.. typically every 3-6months if ur on straight distilled.

Premixes can go up to 1 yr without maintaince.. however,,, most likely u'll pull it sooner from clogging of jets.

H5O H7O are good for up to 2-3yrs because of neoprene tubing.
however that stuff is NASTY... if it ever leaks.. ur so screwed cuz its worse then spilling cola, in how it becomes sticky, and nasty.

 

[Interitus]

I deleted the email response because honestly the more I read it the more angry I became.

Basically they told me that it was obviously something on my end, because it was just impossible that all 4 PCB's could be bad. They'd also sold "hundreds" of the PCB's with no complaints supposedly (I call bulls**t on that). I even tinkered with one of them trying to figure out what exactly was going on, and I stated that in my RMA request. Said I would only try to exchange 3 of 4 since I had experimented with the last one.

As far as the switch went, their "disclaimer" on the switch basically screws you no matter what. They say that they test them in-house so they should be guaranteed correctly working when you get them. Well obviously mine wasn't. The contacts haven't been touched since arrival until yesterday.

Obviously it had been awhile since I ordered, and I wouldn't have argued or been upset if they had simply stated that fact. But it was stated in rude fashion. Honestly I've never been responded to by a retailer with anything even close to as rude as that email was. I was extremely polite in my requests, there was no need to attack me like I was some kind of scam artist.

Whatever though. I'll protest with my wallet instead of bashing their name in public for months on end. I have RMA going through with Lamptron right now for the switch. They haven't approved it yet but they're about 200% nicer than PPC's was about it.

 

[Interitus]

Decided to start in on the OC while I wait for the power splitters.

I seem to have lost my saved sheet of OC profiles somewhere, so starting from scratch. I do remember that 3.8 was cake at stock settings so I'm starting there and priming just in case.

Prime has been going for 1hr as I post this.

Settings:

Vcore - 1.25 bios (1.285 CPU-Z, pretty sure I remembered lowering this later for 3.8)
Multi - 20
BClk - 191
Vdimm - 1.65

VTT, IOH, etc all at stock.

Temps:

CPU Cores: 54-53-54-55
VREG: 54
NB: 35 (odd it didn't increase at all)

Pretty happy with this. I do remember 3.8-4.0 loads in the 80's for the cores and the VREG's were insanely hot in the 90's on air.

Shooting for 4.0-4.2, but if it stays happy with little fuss I'll keep pushing

 

[Interitus]

I was digging through some old stuff on a hard drive I had migrated out of my system and I managed to find some data from when the system was air cooled. I figured this might be of interest to those watching the thread that were wondering about temps and how much an improvement the water cooling has made. Well these numbers should give you a good idea of how things have changed I'll leave a few notes at the end of the post as well.

Initial setup notes:

CPU load is tested with Prime95 small FFT loads. GPU load data is taken running Furmark.

Air cooled idle (stock frequency & voltage):

Ambient: 77*F (est 25*C)
CPU Cores - 40/36/40/35 *C
VREG - 58*C
GPU - 52*C
GPU VDDC - 55*C

Air cooled load (stock frequency & voltage):

Ambient: 77*F (est 25*C)
CPU Cores - 64/62/64/62
GPU - 75*C
GPU VDDC - 77*C

Air cooled load (4.0ghz overclocked):

Ambient - 77*F (est 25*C)
CPU Cores - 79/77/79/76
VREG - 88*C (!!!!)
GPU - 79*C
GPU VDDC - 83*C

Water cooled idle (stock frequency & voltage):

Ambient - 80*F (est 27*C)
CPU Cores - 34/30/33/30
VREG - 48*C
NB - 35*C
GPU - 37*C
GPU VDDC - 35*C

Water cooled load (stock frequency & voltage):

Ambient - 80*F (est 27*C)
CPU Cores - 50/48/48/49
VREG - 51*C
NB - 35*C
GPU - 51*C
GPU VDDC - 53*C

Water cooled load (3.8ghz overlocked):

Ambient - 81*F (est 27*C)
CPU Cores - 54/53/54/55
VREG - 54*C
NB - 35*C
GPU - 53*C
GPU VDDC - 56*C

--------------------------------------------------------------

I have to admit I'm pretty satisfied. I did expect a little bit better temps on the CPU, but part of that might be from mounting the block sideways. This d0 has always been odd. It seems to idle very hot but still wind up at the same load temps as other 920's I've seen. It's a bit odd that the NB doesn't change at all from idle to load. Maybe a bunk sensor or something.

The load temp for 3.8ghz has gone up a bit since my last post, coming in now at 58/54/57/55. Probably cause this thing is toasting my office, lol. Cores also have a tendency to give strange numbers for the first and last. Occasionally I see numbers like 58/53/56/49. Again I'm guessing this is because of the odd placement of the block. One core might be getting a good blast of water while one is left on the outskirts. When I tear down the loop for maintenance I'm gonna do what I talked about earlier and place another 45 on the CPU block so I can mount it the correct way to see if that helps with closer core temps.

I plugged in the bitspower water temp sensor and placed a probe at each of the rad air intakes to try to obtain my delta as well. Both of the rads read the same for air intake (case is open right now). Delta at idle came out to 5*C and load was around 7*C. Seems like reasonable numbers to me. I expected my delta to be pretty good since I have a bit of overkill on rad space for the parts I'm cooling.

 

[finbarqs]

nice! I did WC once, but didn't do maintenance on it, and it didn't go to well... So now, I'm on a closed loop... ever thought about phase cooling?

 

[Interitus]

Phase always seemed a little too extreme to me, but then again, so did water, so who knows lol.

Quick update,

Priming at 4ghz (21x191), stock settings besides bclk, just turbo enabled this time

-edit 2:16pm-

Prime BSOD'd with 0x1E at 1.22 Vcore in BIOS. Since I have "Without Vdroop" set on the EVGA board, reading was close to 1.25 actual at load.

Bumped Vcore to 1.23 in BIOS. Priming again. Temps are good, 57/55/56/55.

 

[Interitus]

Well it didn't play nice, lol. Had to armwrestle this D0 for 4ghz a bit.

Sitting at 1.2375 in BIOS, although CPU-Z shows 1.247 idle / 1.270 load with LLC/anti-Vdroop.

It is prime stable for 20 hours at that Vcore.

I do have a newer D0, so it's probably just one of the ones that needs almost 1.3 for 4ghz. Anything past 4ghz and it goes all to hell and frankly I'm happy with 4.0 so it'll probably stay there. I am happy to report that idle temps for 4.0 on water are EXACTLY the same as idle for 2.6 on air

Highest load recorded was 61/59/60/59. It did get pretty hot in here though. The cheapie thermostat in one of my fancy room fans reported 88*F so I imagine most of the time the full load temps would be under 60 and real world loads would probably be around 55-57.

Again this is not a good chip by any stretch. It idles hot even on stock and is super fussy past 4.0ghz. It's also got an extremely picky IMC.

 

[finbarqs]

I have a i7-930, and I can't get it to prime stable @ 4GHz for the life of me... lol I'm was already at 1.3!

 

[Interitus]

Rig is about 99% complete.

Still need to do the following minor details:

1) Replace the blue power switch with the red one when I receive it from Lamptron RMA.
2) Seal up some minor light holes in the front panel on the MB side.
3) RAM cooler still needs hacked up to fit correctly. Not 100% sure if this will work, but gonna try.

CPU-Z 4ghz validation:

http://valid.canardpc.com/show_oc.php?id=1888819

Lamptron controller set up as follows:

F1: Left side case fans
F2: Right side case fans
F3: Left side radiator fans
F4: Right side radiator fans

T1: case intake air temp (probe behind right side bottom intake)
T2: rad intake temp (measured right side rad farthest fan from intakes)
T3: rad exhaust temp (measured underneath case top grill right side)
T4: water temp (measured w/ bitspower temp probe in reservoir)

Idle delta: 3*C
Load delta: 4.5*C

Delta taken with case fans at 1050RPM and the GT's on the rads at 1200RPM. Nice n quiet.

And some "almost done" pics. Sorry about the lighting.

 

[finbarqs]

nice nice nice! Time to upgrade to Sandy Bridge CPU's (or Ivy Bridge)