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Distilled water? and Bleeding...

B

bradyapba

Gawd
Joined
Nov 30, 2004
Messages
923
well, im getting closer to my Water cooling system.. went to Home depot yesterday to get the rest of the stuff i need to make my external WC kit.

Im just about to leak test(well in the next few days) the system and i was thinking about the "distilled water" is that just the same kind of Distilled water you can get from a grocery store or drug store?"

Any pitfalls to be aware of?

Lastly... trying to figure out what "bleeding" out the air bubbles means..... is it just filling up everything with water, run it for a bit, add more water, run it for a bit, add more water.. til everything is full? A better explanation of this process would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks.

Chris
 
I am not going to touch the Distilled Water question within a 10 foot pole considering I decided to be a tard and use regular tap water, which results in me having to clean my blocks every 6 months or so. Which also results me in not really giving a shit.

About the bleeding process.

Lemme tell you, i've done it both ways. Through a resevoir, and through a T-Line. The easiest method is through a T-Line for sure. I had a bitch of a time bleeding it through a resevoir.

The only advice I can give though, is that when you use a T-Line, be sure to make the T-Line bigger then your cause so when you tip the case to get rid of some air bubbles, the t-line doesn't spill into your case, cause that really sucks.

The hardest part about getting a system to bleed, is getting the pump to pump the water without being interrupted. I use a DDC 12 Volt, and both times I've had to fill my system, i've had a whore of a time. It needs nothing but PURE water, any air, and you have problems. Also, when you bleed, try to get as much water in the system by tipping your case before you start the pump, cause I did that once and it helped a lot, got the system bled in less then 20 minutes cause I wasn't going from just the pump. I already had water in the blocks and some of the tubes, so that sped things up.
 
Yeah, distilled water from the grocery store is great. Mix that with a little bit of anti-freeze and you're golden. About 5-10% anti-freeze should be good to stop corrosion and keep nasties from growing.

I have also used both a reservoir and a T-Line, and prefer the T-Line. Takes up less spac for one thing, and I found it was easier to get the air out of my radiator and such by tipping my case in different directions, which I couldn't really do with my reservoir easily.

Make sure that your T-Line is directly BEFORE your pump. Like KrakenGuy said, you want to make sure your pump is fed with as much water as possible at all times. Running them dry will break them.

So yes, basically, hook your loop up, pour water in until it starts filling up the t-line or res, then turn the pump on. You could probably just leave it on if you can pour water in fast enough right away - depends on how you're getting it in there. Just want to make sure the pump is always getting water. Bubbles will eventually start to get trapped in the res/t-line, and the water level will decrease in it. Before air starts feeding the pump again, pour some more water in, and keep doig that until the air is all gone from the loop. Like I said before, you may have to tilt your case around a bit to get all of the air out of your blocks and radiator and such. Its a slow process, but not really hard if you do it right.

Hope that helps a bit... :)
 
Distilled water from your local Wal-Mart is all you need........... :D
Bleeding with a res is the easiest thing in the world to do, just start filling the res and the water will drain down to your pump. Keep filling the res till it's full along with the pump, then cycle the pump a few seconds till the res is about empty and then refill. Do this until the system is full and then you can turn the system on for the leak test. During the leak test, monitor the water level in the res and refill as needed as the air is worked out of the system. The bleeding process will go faster if you rotate all the different components in all directions to help get any trapped air out. Then completely top off the res as full as possible................. :eek: Pretty simple really.
 
Bio-Hazard said:
Distilled water from your local Wal-Mart is all you need........... :D
Bleeding with a res is the easiest thing in the world to do, just start filling the res and the water will drain down to your pump. Keep filling the res till it's full along with the pump, then cycle the pump a few seconds till the res is about empty and then refill. Do this until the system is full and then you can turn the system on for the leak test. During the leak test, monitor the water level in the res and refill as needed as the air is worked out of the system. The bleeding process will go faster if you rotate all the different components in all directions to help get any trapped air out. Then completely top off the res as full as possible................. :eek: Pretty simple really.
Click to expand...


Yeah walmart water is great, and cheap I got it on sale here for 20cents a gal. :cool:


I'm currently bleeding my system and its a pain in the ass.
 
Maybe I find it so easy because i sometimes do it a few times a week............. :eek: Depending on what I have in house at the time..................:)
 
Bio-Hazard said:
Maybe I find it so easy because i sometimes do it a few times a week............. :eek: Depending on what I have in house at the time..................:)
Click to expand...


Nah, I think its just cause I'm lazy and this is the second time I've done it. lol :p
 
I love it when Bio answers me :)

But seriously that helps a lot guys. I think i get it. Makes sense. I wont be using a t-line, as i already bought this ressie

ex-res-56.jpg


it will feed my pump directly though, though it will take a bit of play from me, becuase of the external box.... but i get it now.. it was exactly what i was thinking i needed to do, but becuase i never really saw it explained, i was just double checking, becuase sometimes what you think you know, you really dont!

hopefully i will have some more pics up this week!

and a little note about that res.. under its description, it says..."natively fits in a 120 fan hole"

that would NOT be true.. almost all the 120mm holes i have seen are about 4.5 inches, this is 5 inches...
 
I tried a res something like that a while ago (a little smaller from Mountain Mods) and where i had it installed didn't work out to well, it ended up inducing a lot of air back into the system. I think if you were to mount it on the top of your box you should be OK.
 
i am putting it in the top of the computer case, not the external case, think that will be ok Bio? it will still be the highest point in the system, and right in front of the pump, filling it 1st.

I thought about putting it in the top of the external case too.. but i think it looks cooler in the top of the Computer Case.

Chris
 
My problem was that where I tried to mount it was low and on the side.......... :eek: I figured I miht have a problem, but i wanted to try it anyway. You should be fine with it on the top I think.
 
cool, thats what i like to hear...

i am still tempted to put it in the external case.. and not try to hack through my nice new AL case... but then again.. i think it would look so much prettier there...

decisions, decisions...
 
which of course is the external case.. which isn't as cool. i want to be one of the cool kids on the block (ok, cool adults, with the cool kid toys, i am 34 for petes sake)

:)

If i do put it on the external case though... lot less of an issue of messing up the pretty case.... so i am now thinking about putting it on top of the external case!! Bio, you always have me thinking!

Chris
 
You know, the only differance between men and boys (kids) is the price of their toys............. :D
And it's better that you do the thinking...........it makes my brain hurt......... :eek:
 
Bio-Hazard said:
The bleeding process will go faster if you rotate all the different components in all directions to help get any trapped air out.
Click to expand...

Ok, novice question time...here's something I've not understood just yet, I guess...

So, you want to test your setup for 24hrs. prior to actually turning your computer on, right?...well, just how do you "rotate all the different components in all directions" with things already installed in place?...

Perhaps I'm just getting some stuff out of order here...heh....
 
Back in the old days, when the t-rex was still around, most wc setups were completely internal. So it was much easier to dry fit everything in place,cut the tubes, connect it all together then slide everything out. Put your loop in the bath-tub or kitchen table with some newspaper, and let er go for a day.

Nowadays, with these young kids and their dual & triple 120mm rads being cut into the top of the case or hung off the back, external leak testing isn't as simple. Rotating everything, means "tilt and spin your case around as much as you can." :D
 
KrakenGuy said:
The only advice I can give though, is that when you use a T-Line, be sure to make the T-Line bigger then your cause so when you tip the case to get rid of some air bubbles, the t-line doesn't spill into your case, cause that really sucks.
Click to expand...

Not to threadjack, but what do you mean by this?
 
SpoogeMonkey said:
Back in the old days, when the t-rex was still around, most wc setups were completely internal. So it was much easier to dry fit everything in place,cut the tubes, connect it all together then slide everything out. Put your loop in the bath-tub or kitchen table with some newspaper, and let er go for a day.

Nowadays, with these young kids and their dual & triple 120mm rads being cut into the top of the case or hung off the back, external leak testing isn't as simple. Rotating everything, means "tilt and spin your case around as much as you can." :D
Click to expand...

And if your case weighs a billion pounds?... ;)


BTW, how important is it to have the res. be the highest point in the loop?
 
Well, since air rises, and the res is where you fill up and would like all the air to go....it should be the highest point.
 
The res doesn't need to be at the highest point in the loop, but it makes it easire for filling and bleeding the loop. But with a radiator mounted in the top of a case, it makes it kind of hard to mount a res higher that it................. :D
 
Not to thread high-jack or anything, but I'm going to try to make the rest the highest point in my loop -- if it's really that important. I was thinking of using a dual 3.5" bay res, but that would put it at around the same height as the CPU water block -- maybe a centimeter or two higher or lower, not sure yet. Instead, I can get a 5.25" single bay res (a double seems a bit...excessive, maybe?), and slide that in definitely higher than the CPU block.

I'm still trying to figure out my res + whole location situation...heh...I'll probably make a separate thread about it soon...

To get more back to this thread though, I'm *still* unsure, however, how to bleed the system with the components already in place.... ;)
 
The res does not HAVE to be at the highest point, as I stated before, it just makes filling and bleeding the system easier, mainly for the pump so it gets water first so it won't run dry. My res is at the lowest point in the system and it works just fine and also fills and bleeds without a problem.

dsc020046jk.jpg
 
Bio-Hazard said:
The res does not HAVE to be at the highest point, as I stated before, it just makes filling and bleeding the system easier, mainly for the pump so it gets water first so it won't run dry. My res is at the lowest point in the system and it works just fine and also fills and bleeds without a problem.
Click to expand...

So you don't have any problems with air getting trapped higher up in the water blocks or such? Basically the bubbles just move along the circuit eventually to the res where they are taken care of?....
 
Back to the distilled water part of the Q:

Buy the sodium free non-potable (NOT FOR DRINKING) stuff from walmart or something. 38 cents last I went.

That and some green antifreeze (about 60% water 40% AF/additive) to keep stuff from growing and lube the pump a bit and you're good to go.

Or if you're really lazy the premixed PEAK antifreeze will work great too.
 
That's a extremely high percentage of anti freeze you want to run and serves no purpose when running a copper based system with no aluminum in the loop. Even the old HydroCool with a aluminum radiator used only a 30% mix. That high of a mixture will also hurt system flow and thermal transfer as anti-freeze doesn't transfer as well as water.
 
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