Maintenance for a water cooling setup

Changing out coolant/tubing every 6 months or so, I check mine once a week or so to monitor the coolant levels and whatnot, but there's very little maintenance if you get it set up right.
 
If you clean everything the first time and run something pretty close to distilled, you can pretty much avoid maintenance except for topping it off every once in a while (stuff leaks).
 
I think it's unecessary to change out your tubing every 6 months..

I recommend using straight distilled water and putting silver in your loops. Some of us on another website have made our own silver coils to insert into our tubing to kill any "critters" that might think about growing in the loop.

One thing I like to do is disassemble all components and clean them with a mild soap and rinse with distilled water. I also run my loop for 2-3 days with a Pentek installed. It filters out any cobtaminates that might be in the loop.:)
 
Depending on the fittings/clamps you use, the ends of the tubing runs could be pretty mauled and cut up when you switch them out. Plus tubing is generally cheap, so that's why I was saying to change it out. Plus basically all tubing (unless you get the crazy expensive plasticizer free tubing) clouds up and that just looks ugly.
 
IMO if you dont put crap in you dont have to take it out. Top off the water level in the res every now and then is all I have to do after making sure everything (rads in particular) were clean when I first installed.

Biggest pain is dust in the rads .
 
I just use distilled water and check the system. No issues. Just don't put any crazy stuff in there. Maybe get some PT Nuke and drop some in here and there.
 
I thought it was basically maintenance free. I set up my last PC and didn't do anything to it for almost 3 years, until I decided to upgrade the parts, except add a little fluid once and awhile.

still haven't found out where the water vanishes to?
absorbed by the tubing?
 
Yep, the tubing is a tiny bit porous and the water permeates through the tube and evaporates into the air.

Least thats my best guess based on specs for tubing and the fact that the other parts are copper or much denser plastic. I noticed that a really good spec sheet will give a value for the porosity of the tubing..
 
I have tygon tubing, ran it for 2 years straight, nothing evaporated, never had to add water, water level might have dropped but I never seen the differences. Mastercleer, on the other hand, is cheap for a reason, every couple of weeks it lose an ounce or 2 of water...
 
I've run for years at a time without topping off, or..actually without doing anything. Never see anything grow or mold or anything like that. I just blow out the rads every 6 months or so and go along my merry way.

I used distilled water with a few ounces of BlueIce coolant. Worked flawlessly for years now.
 
I have tygon tubing, ran it for 2 years straight, nothing evaporated, never had to add water, water level might have dropped but I never seen the differences. Mastercleer, on the other hand, is cheap for a reason, every couple of weeks it lose an ounce or 2 of water...

Huh, I've never had an issue with either. Any other reports of this?
 
Yep, the tubing is a tiny bit porous and the water permeates through the tube and evaporates into the air.

Least thats my best guess based on specs for tubing and the fact that the other parts are copper or much denser plastic. I noticed that a really good spec sheet will give a value for the porosity of the tubing..

How does this differ between different types of tubing? Are some better than others?
 
just go with whatever is at your local hardware store, or whatever is cheapeston petras or whatever site. unless of course you wanted uv or colored or whatever. as far as evaporating water, replacing a few teaspoons of $1/gallon water every few months isnt gonna kill you.
 
Use distilled and a silver killcoil from petra's or some PT-nuke and you'll be fine.
 
How does this differ between different types of tubing? Are some better than others?

Yes. There are many grades of 'hose' that vary in the amount that air and liquid can pass. I use some CO2-proof hose on my reef aquarium... without it my calcium reactor (which runs off a bottle of CO2 that slowly gets bubbled into a column of media) wouldnt work as over 1/2 the CO2 would blow right through the hose. Imagine that... regular silicone or clear hose... bleeds CO2 like a siv. Anyways, I would imagine some of that CO2 proof stuff would for sure be water proof. I wonder if silicone might be worth looking into as well since Im pretty sure it resists water very well.

But even acrylic absorbs and passes water (as well as PVC). Thats why 'welding' or 'bonding' acrylic panels together to make an aquarium or other water holding device (rez), is so dangerous. Acrylic can absorb about 60% of its weight in water... which means it expands as well... enough to tear apart seams and break glass. I learned the hard way by siliconing an acrylic wall across two opposite panels in a glass aquarium. 6 months later the acrylic expanded enough to shear one glass panel right off of the base of the tank... ripped the silicone like nothing, and then crack the other panel top to bottom... 3/8" plate glass! All due the plastics taking in water. Even the rubber o-rings in our pumps and blocks are vulnerable. If you ever take a block or pump off-line for more than a month, be sure to coat the o-rings in some plumbers silicone grease to keep the rubber from shrinking, getting brittle, etc. Otherwise, you might hook up the block again and the rubber will be so dried out that it will leak all over. I have had this happen with many a silicone rubber o-ring.
 
I use masterklear and i dont recall having to ever add water to the loops. But then again i tend to drain it and screw around with something every month or 2 because i'm constantly tinkering with it.
 
I use masterklear and i dont recall having to ever add water to the loops. But then again i tend to drain it and screw around with something every month or 2 because i'm constantly tinkering with it.

hey VW-freak... so do you use G11 or G12 in your setup? Lol. :p
 
Heh, i assume you refer to my car, i use whatever the dealership puts in it :p My 64 runs on air though :)
 
Huh, I've never had an issue with either. Any other reports of this?

My first setup used 1/2" ID Tygon and I didn't have any issues. I tried Masterkleer 7/16" ID tubing on my next setup and had to fill my res all the time (a few times a year). I liked the 7/16 ID tubing, but I switched to Tygon 7/16" ID tubing for my new i7 setup. I can't be sure it was the tubing, but I'm not sure what else it could have been either...
 
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