Aquarium Cooling - I Might Try It

ZeMike said:
Sorry for reviving this thread.

I had a similar idea - to use an aquarium for cooling my PC. I have a 75 gal (300l) tank which is currently heated by a 300W heater.

My idea is to insert an aluminium tube coil in the tank to act as a tank water / PC coolant heat exchanger.

So basically when the PC will be ON, the tank will be heated by the PC (yeah, free heating for my fish!)

Aluminium is a safe material for aquariums. Are there any caveats?
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Mixing copper and aluminum in your cooling loop is asking for flames when it comes to watercooling.
 
Thanks for the warning on AlCu. Are there radiators with copper pipes and long aluminium fins? I don't want copper to contact water in the aquarium.
 
OK, I have moved my PC and aquarium to a new place, where there are really close to each other. The idea of heating the tank by a CPU is closer now :)

I'm thinking of making a heat exchanger with pex-al-pex tubes, coiled and inserted in the corner of the aquarium.
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This way there will be no metal in the aquarium and the water circuit will contain only copper, brass and plastic. Will this work?
 
No. The plastic jacket will inhibit heat transfer.

Just get some aluminum water blocks and call it a day. You're using an aquarium as your heat dump. You're not going to get spectacular temps either way :)
 
miazmaticdotcom said:
I used to keep tropical fish, and I needed a heater to keep it warm.

Now, however, we no longer need that. We can simply use the heat from our overclocked processors to keep our aquarium at balmy, Hawaii-like temperatures.
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Ain't that hard on the fish?

User: Yes, Tech support. I have a problem with your Aquaraium Cooling system. When I play Crysis, my fish start to dance and spin around like crazy.

Tech Support: :rolleyes:
 
Arcygenical said:
No. The plastic jacket will inhibit heat transfer.
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I am not sure, but I have seen solar tanks which use plastic pipes as heat exchangers. Plus I will put the filter outlet in this coil, so it will agitate and move water around the coil.

As to aluminium, maybe use 2-4 of those heat exchangers in parallel?
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Have we thought of just dumping the radiator in the tank, fully sealed? That way the water in the loop is separate to the water cooling the rad. Then you just need to clean out the rad once every two months... I'm sure a 240mm rad would cool down/warm up pretty efficiently...
 
It'll be a shocking experience for the fish but you never know, they may enjoy it..
 
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