car heatercore as a rad

T

trisscross

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Oct 6, 2005
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i have just picked up a car heatercore to use in my new system bulid but it is a dual pass with round tubes and very close fins. i was hopeing for better cooling but more noise i have been reading that round pipes in a rad is a no no.
any thoughs

thanks tris
 
Here is the deal. Most heater cores and rads sold for PC watercooling are flat tube single pass and are fairly restrictive. This is not a problem because most high performance blocks are very restrictive with nozzles that choke down the flow to increase the water veloicity into a high speed stream to stike the bottom of the block directly over the cpu die. With this setup a pump that can produce fairly high pressure with flow rate being secondary is desired. I cannot say for sure but this came about because most WCing rads evolved from auto heater cores and most of them are flat tube, dense fins because, at least in the old days, car heaters were expected to HEAT the car, not like the anemic ones I find on todays. With 300HP turning a water pump you dont worry too much about flow restriction.

There is nothing wrong with a round tube rad and dual pass, it is (compared to flat tube) a much less restrictive to flow design. However to work effectively it needs high flow rates so you need a non-restrictive block, nothing with nozzels, and a high volume pump with pressure being the secondary consideration. Also the fin density is usually not as tight (sounds like it may not apply to your specifc rad, the tighter the fins the more powerful the fan you need, not rpms but able to sustain a good CFM with a high static backpressure, but thats another post) so a lower rpm fan (quieter) can be used. Basically you make up for the reduced fin surface area by circulating the water through the rad/loop faster.

Just two ways of doing the same thing, with properly matched parts there will not be a lot of difference in performance. If you put say a DD TDX waterblock with a nozzel on that rad, then you got trouble. You want low restriction, high flow/volume parts for the rest of the system.

The Tt system on the machine in my sig has round tube rads. It seems to do fair to middling ;) in the OC, temps, and noise departments even after adding an MCW60 gpu block into the loop.
 
i was also considering getting a heater core from the car.

would a laing D5 pump work well with a car heater core? round tubing also

Thanks
 
I would be overkill but would work fine, after rereading my post above I think I should have emphasied that if you stick the the upper end of pumps you are going to have water flying around the loop, they are all way powerfull and pump large amounts of water. Its only when you look at the $30 pumps that a problem might occur. Its the block chocie that is going to be really critical. The Lang will not even break a sweat pushing a LOT of water against a low loop resistance. It in theory at least, actually improve the reliabilty and life of the pump.

Oh and one thing I did not mention, It has mostly been decided in the community (lol but everything is open to debate and constantly is) that in most systems tubing size does not matter very much. However in a high flow system it might matter a little more. So dont be using 1/4inch 6mm ID tubing, the 3/8 ID 9mm ID would be a minimum tubing size and if you have the room 7/16 or 1/2 ID even better. Avoid 90 deg bends/fittings a little extra lenght of hose with a gentle bend and long straight runs is best if you can lay it out that way. But I am getting carried away, unless you fark up something seriously, any good combination of good quality parts, installed with care and common sense, will yeild great results. WC hard core spit all over Tt (I have an old school system with a heater core and have build WCing machines for 15 years) but this go around I was lazy and got a kit most people sneer at. Well fine, but look at my sig and what $150 (and a couple of afternoons) will do. Not too shabby, been runing 17 months now without a hickup. The point is, it is probally more about proper installation, use a good spring mounted block hold down, and good planning than anything else.

http://mysite.verizon.net/ressdxka/id3.html

I recommend you get additonal opinions in the water cooling sub forum, not everyone agrees with me and I have been know to argue with myself. :D
 
nice rig.

I forgot to mention it. I will be using 1/2" ID tubing. EK supreme block or Alphacool block.
 
i was going to re use my Eheim 1048 it is rated at 158 gph and 1/2 inch tubing do you think it will do the job

thanks tris
 
I've got a heatercore (see the sig) and it's great. I run 410*9 24/7 SMP folding with max core temps in the low 50's. I really think heatercores are highly underrated esp since they are so cheap. I guess they aren't the prettiest things to look at, but if you run a shroud or don't have a window (or don't care about looks), you can't go wrong.
 
has anyone tried using an evaporator coil?

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Was wondering this myself. What about a motorcycle radiator, would this have the same effect as well?

To BillParish: That's a veery nice looking rig. Loved the little viking guy on the top of the case, lovely.

Good Day
 
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