Koolance Evap Cooling & Filter mod

[Dunno]

I Have been experimenting with sending the mist from a Mist Maker through the radiator.
(At the bottem right of this page is a pic of the exact same one I got)

The mist is extremely fine water droplets made by a Piezo-Electric ceramic disk which turns high frequency Alternating Current into a physical shape change or vibration.
This mist evaporates and gives me a 7 deg C temp drop on my backup/test computer.

More on all this here

After some measuring and CAD I decided to build an enclosure, which incorperates this, into the top of my Koolance case!:

The pic shows the un-bent enclosure that will fit (hopefully) into the top of the koolance case.
On the left is one of the air filters (Fiat Uno), and the hole on the right is for the other. These sides will be bent up and holes cut in the side covers of the case for airflow through the filters. The radiater will be in the top of the enclosure with all 3, std. Koolance fans sucking air out of the top.
The rectangle cut out of the front plate is for a window so that you can see into the enclosure from the front of the case.
The thing that looks like a glass ashtray will hold the Mist Maker and water. It actually goes on the bottem of the plate like so:

It will incorperate a cistern made from the float, needle and seat from a small motorbike's carburator. This will attach direct to the House plumbing with quick connects for getting it to LANS without the house! :

The 'Ashtry' is cast from clear casting resin using a Plaster of Paris mould with the cavity milled out:

Mould Waxed:

Resin poured:

Ashtray!: (After a LOT of sanding and polishing
Looks better in real life with the bubbles in the casting adding an interesting visual effect.

Well hopefully I'll get the plate bent tomorrow and put up pics of it with the 'ashtray' mounted.

I'm thinking of drilling a hole for a LEd in the ashtray; so that the the whole thing glows blue?
Some clear Silicone should transfere the light into the casting quite well?
Also LED lighting for thr interior of the enclosure.

 

[Top Nurse]

Looks like a good start to your project and you do good custom work

 

[Erasmus354]

Looks like it will be a very nice mod. Just make sure you keep all that moisture well and sealed off from the rest of the computer!

I know from your earlier posts in the WCing section that most if not all of the vapor is evaporated in the radiator...but what happens if your computer shuts down thus eliminating the heatsource and your mister still runs, or you still have some mist floating around. Thats why I say to make sure you have it nice and sealed up

 

[Dunno]

Looks like it will be a very nice mod. Just make sure you keep all that moisture well and sealed off from the rest of the computer!

I know from your earlier posts in the WCing section that most if not all of the vapor is evaporated in the radiator...but what happens if your computer shuts down thus eliminating the heatsource and your mister still runs, or you still have some mist floating around. Thats why I say to make sure you have it nice and sealed up

the mister will be switched by a relay and a switch in series; so you will only be able to switch it on when the computer is already on.

The enclosure will only be open to the outside via the fan outlets and the filter inlets. It will be completely air/water tight from the rest of the system.

 

[DarkenReaper57]

I am very impressed. Looks like a lot of work - keep it up!

 

[Dunno]

This is taking ages!
Got a car that I am busy fixing aswell.

Heres an exploded view of the plumbing for getting water to the mist maker and draining it when its LAN time!

 

[Dunno]

The Enclosure has been bent at last!

There we go! On the right you can see the lefthand side air filter.
The 'Ashtray' container for the water, cistern, and mist maker is in place.

The Left Hand Side view gives some idea of what the hole in the side cover will look like.
I cant decide what to for a grill for the side covers. Perhaps mill in vertical slots like those in power supplies, or some cromed wire grills to match the ones on the power supply?

The right hand side view showing just enouggh space for my CD/DVD Combo drive,
and not enough space for the power supply!
The power supply will stick out the pack of the case about a third of the way, with brackets to hold it.

So the big bits are done. Time for fitting, fiddling and testing. Then some galvanising and the Spray Job!

 

[Zecora]

That is really cool.

Can you post a link on the mould, like wher you got it.

 

[Dunno]

THX Zecora.

I made the mould by mixing up some Plaster of Paris in an icecream container.
I then drilled 2 holes to bolt the block of plaster to my milling machine.
Then I milled out the opposite shape to the casting I wanted.
Then some sanding to round the inner corners.
Then wax the mould and pour.
When the resin is set you just give the plaster a wack with a hammer and dig out the inner bit.

Plaster of Paris is wonderfull to machine. You can take huge cuts and get a great finish.

 

[Dunno]

***

With any luck the enclosure will be completely water/air tight; Exept for the entrances, through the filters, and the exits, through the fans on top.

The side covers will have cutouts for the filters. when they are in place the blue rubber part of the filter will be tightly squeezed between the enclosure and side covers.

IE: With the side covers on I should be able to take the hose, pour water in the top, and have it running down the sides of the case. No water will get inside.
....Hopefully!

Problem is the 3 Koolance fans have to get power, as does the Koolance front PCB. (The one with the temp readout and mode buttons) Power for the 6 blue LEDs that will go into the top fans also need to get power. Also the mist maker.

Gromets will work but I dont want to have to remove all the little plugs every time I want to work on that part of the computer.

My solution:

The wiring for the Front PCB and Fans go to the Koolance Control PCB, (top rear) through the Rear Plate. Plugs and all.

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Here you see the Rear plate with a rectangle and 3 half holes cut out of it.

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Close up.

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From left to right:
The Back Plate
The little plate that will fit in the Back Plate, completing the holes for the gromets.
The plate that will fit over the Little plate and hold everything together.

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Little plate in the Back Plate.

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Plates in place on/in the back plate.

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Wires, and Mist Maker Supply, through the back plate.

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Everything fastened in place. I will have to put a layer or two of heat shrink around the water pipe to get it to fit the gromet.

All the plumbing also needs to exit the enclosure without leaks. To ensure minimum pipe lengths I want to put everything together before deciding where to drill the holes for the plumbing gromets.

O yea: The christmass lights:
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The 6 LEDs that will go into the top 3 fans after they have been sprayed silver.

Sorry this is taking so long; I bought a Mazda 626 200i to fix up and sell. Its pretty beat up but is coming along nicely.
Goes like hell!
Spray painting tomorrow.

 

[Dunno]

Car;'s panel beated & Painted so I've had some time for the Mod.

The Enclosure is too long for it and the PSU; so brackets.

More brackets.

Rad Cleaning

Bling for the fans: Drilled 2 holes/ fan for LEDs They dont shine up in the black So silver.
The wires have to go through the enclosure seal, and I want to be able to see unevaporated mist.

Rad Clean.

All 3 fans will be sucking air: Through 2 car air filters; Cooling due to evaporated mist; Through the rad.

Blue LEDs

Cistern: Made from a Carb Float Needle & Seat. Painted with Etching Primer & 2K.
I also blew some through the Water channel. Galvanic Corrosion, hopefully wont be a problem.

Theres more, but I need to Sleeep.

 

[FadedSpark]

do the fans even work after painting the bearings? 0_0

 

[Fanatik]

do the fans even work after painting the bearings? 0_0

Was about to ask the same thing.

 

[Dunno]

do the fans even work after painting the bearings? 0_0

Yes.

They have been working all weekend while I test the cistern and the best way to mount small fans to get the mist evaporated before going through the radiator.

The bearings are sealed and the thin layer of paint just wipes off the oily surface.
If the paint had been electrically conductive I would have had some trouble!

 

[Dunno]

Some more photos:

The MB & Vid Card: A P4P800E De Lux & Asus 9800 Pro.
the 9800 Pr0 has a R360 core and has been flashed to a 9800 XT.
I will do the Droop & V Dim mod on the MB and a V core & V mem mod on the card later.
I'll also be adding some of the missing caps to the MB.

Its really fiddley to get all the bits into the enclosure; They are all in and the wiring cover is going on.

We have mist! The fans are off here and the cistern is doiung a good job of keeping the water level constant.

With thye fans on you can see that the mist is drawn through the radiator before it has evaporated. Some fans will have to be placed in the enclosure to get most of it to evaporate and cool the air before going through the rad.
I experimented over the weekend and have come up with a good configuration for said fans and some mesh.

The lit fans. They contain 2 LEDs each. I'm thinking of going for 4 each??

 

[revenant]

wow... great idea... evaporation is a fairly powerful endothermic process... the little water droplettes "dampen" your rad fins and they evaporate under the air current pulling more heat from the system. I guess you are not woried about the relative humidity getting too high near you pc? Anyways, very original thinking imo

 

[Ultragamma]

wow, but is there going to be condensation???

 

[Dunno]

THX revenant & Ultragamma

Not worried about the relavant humidity at all revenant: The climate is very dry and windows are always open.

Condensation is not a poblem Ultragamma:
Condensation forms when the air is over-saturated with vapour. Here the air will only cool down while it is still unsaturated. So the water temps in the loop will always be above the point where condensation forms, no matter what the ambiant temp, or humidity level is.
So with evaporative cooling you never have to worry about condensation!

 

[KrakenGuy]

This mod has progressed A LOT lately...

I like what I am seeing =), keep up the excellent work and you may just have yourself a damn fine Overclocking Machine.

 

[Dunno]

THX KrakenGuy

Hoping to get 4Gig from my Presscott 2.4 A.


I'm busy with a centrafuge fan thingy idea to get more of the mist evaporated.
If droplets stick to the radiator and evaporate there, thats OK, but I dont want to cool the room rather than the radiator.

This will cause a scale buildup, on the radiator, over time, so its best to get it evapd first, then through the rad.

 

[KrakenGuy]

Is this going to be a closed system? Or will the mist evaporate into the air in the room?

 

[Dunno]

Definatly open KrakenGuy, otherwise the air will become saturated and not cool anymore. Will even begine to warm up!

Even the windows in the room will have to be open so that the air in the room does not become saturated.

Testing today with the thermal probe thats part of the Koolance (usually attached to the water block) gives betw 8 & 10 deg C below ambiant!
Depends where you measure.

 

[Dunno]

Testing caused the enclosure to rust quite a bit.
So I sanded down all the steel plate bits and had them galvanised:

All nice and shiny! Seems a pity to paint them but I want to keep wet metal down to a minimum.

This is my centrafuge/fan/evaporator thingy:

A fan, without the frame, attaches to the centre bit with the blade's tips inside the slotted tubing.
The idea is that larger droplets will be thrown from the centre outward, into the tubing, by centrafugal force.
Her the circular shape of the tupe, along with the wing tip vortices, will cause the mist to keep being cycled through the fan until it has evaporated.
Once the mist is evaporated it no longer weighs 'anything' and cool air is blown out closer to the centre.
Seems to work quite well in testing.
Remember you saw it here first!

I have spray painted all the galvanised bits with etching primer.
They will be sprayed metalic black.

Just some RAMSinks I'm making while waiting for paint to dry:

Made from 2 Celeron HSs.

 

[SpangeMonkee]

how are you gonna keep this full of water. How much water is lost over a 24 hour period?

 

[v3rt1g0]

This is one of the most interesting mods I've seen in a while.

 

[Dunno]

how are you gonna keep this full of water. How much water is lost over a 24 hour period?

I'm using a mini cistern, cut out of a small carburator, connected to the plumbing.
If you look back at the pics you'll see it.

 

[Dunno]

Finally had some time to work on this project again:

This is a bad photo of the enclosure and its components:
Top left is the a rectangular mesh screen for catching most of the droplets that would normally end up on the radiator and air filters. Effectivly blocking airflow.
Left is the front cover with LED lighting mounted. No window yet.
Bottem centre is the fan/centrafuge thingy for evaporating the water mist before it is blown through the rad. This way you cool the air before the rad rather than the room!

Everything assembled.
The fan/centrafuge is just above the centre water pipe. It blows cool air and some mist towards the front fans.
The air filter will go in the rectangular hole where you can see the mesh.
The cistern is keeping the water level constant beautifully!

Ambiant temp.
You can see the thermal probe that is normally attached to the CPU block, in my hand.

Here the probe is just below the radiator, so should be giving a good indication of the air temp of the air that is sucked through it.

Thats a 14 C temp drop in air temps!!!
When the probe is attached to the CPU waterblock, in its normal possition, it reads 17C after around an hour.
Thats 8C below ambiant!

This seemed to indicate that a lot of the cool air is going through the radiator without cooling it down much. A nice cool room would be nice, but I'd rather have the CPU block at 11C.
I think that once there is a load on the cooling loop the efficiency of the system will increase.?


O Yeah:
It makes very little difference weather the fans are on high or low. Perhaps slowing them down a little more, some how, will give the mist more time to evaporate?
How??

 

[Pherret]

From what I remember the old evaporative cooling tower designs worked on very low airflow. They even performed well fanless. Slapping a screamer on it would not realy net better temps, only a nice fountain out the top of the tower.

Not that you were considering this but...Your design probably won't work well fanless because the filters would hold back any ambient airflow.

Lowering the speed may not help temps, but you may not see a loss in cooling either.

I believe the Imprezza WRX STI uses a mister to spray water on the turbo intercooler for cooler air and more horse power. It is a theory that has proven well for many rally racers, where they are constantly at very high rpms but because of a windey dirt stage may not get over 40mph. They must spray water on the radiator so the engine doesn't overheat from lack of airflow!

Congrats on puting that somewhat internally. This idea probably even makes WCers and phase change ppl squeemish.

 

[Dunno]

THX Pherret
If I do something similar again I'll defenatly build the mister and rad into the bottem of the case.
Or an enclosure attached to the bottem.

Eye catching plumbing...
This is the water supply to the cistern.

Quick Connect Fittings

P4p800E dlx. In.

9800Pro (360 core) XT flash
HSs made from 2 Celeron HSs.

Caps, Pots, 28K, LEDs, Hss.
For later....