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Shroud depth?

M

Momo

Gawd
Joined
Mar 3, 2005
Messages
869
Anyone know what the optimal depth of a shroud is to eliminate the 'dead' spots of airflow through radiators?

Having some trouble finding some data on that :(

Background:

I've got a BlackIce Extreme III rad.
I've got an airplex evo 360 grille
I've got 3 x 120mm Panaflo M1A fans.
The fan spacing is off a little on the grille compared to the Rad.

I cannott directly mount the grille to the fans, and the fans to the Rad. I'd like to use a shroud anyhow, so... I'm going to get a shroud made out of U-channl (on the long sides) so i can have the hole spacing for the fans drilled on on the 'top' of the U, and the hole spacing for the Rad on the 'bottom' of the U (the U is sideways) ... i'll simply use sheet steel at the ends.

So to get back to my original question.... how deep (or hwo high, looking at it installed) does the bottom (or the side, when installed) of the U-channel need to be, to allow for optimal airflow through the fins of the rad ?

Thanks.
 
I'd say 3/4" to 1" should be more than sufficient for your needs.
 
I was thinking about 1", to allow for nut / bolt clearance, as they will be quite close in proximity ... but i wasn't sure about the depth in terms of airfow.

Anyone else?
 
I'd go 3/4" to 1" also... from what I've seen that's about the best and what most pre-built aftermarket shrouds use.
 
On the topic of shrouds for rads...

do any of you know of a shroud meant for a BlackIce Extreme III rad by chance?
 
25mm is a minimum the way I understood it, the back spacing should be equal to the diamiter of the center hub on the fan. And most 120mm fans that I've seen have a center hub larger than 1 inch, most are from 1.5 inches to 2 inches wide.

Here's a quote from a thermal engineer at Delphi on the subject.

"The optimal distance for a fan to be from the HX is about 1 diameter of the fan hub, and no less than 1/2 that. Design constraints on the HC200 box size force this to be much closer than optimal. If the box and ducting can be modded such as to add 25mm distance, that would fall right about where it would be optimum."

http://www.houseofhelp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=26549&highlight=shroud
 
While this is true, 25mm being roughly an inch, his rad already has a 10mm setback to the core from the flange the fans mount to so adding 3/4" (roughly 18.25mm) he'll still have well in excess of 25mm between the fans and the rad's core.
 
10mm between that flange and the fins? Seems a little generous from what i remembef of it... perhaps not though :) Not looking at it right now, as it happens.

On another related note.... I read somewhere that dividers between the fans, ie: three seperate 'chambers' for pulling air through the Rad, would provide a more efficient environment to pull that air through the fins.

Can any of you voice your thoughts on that?

The only way I see that happening is that each fan cannot draw air from beside it, as that air would be a lot easier to pull than the air coming through the fins of the Rad ... thus, seperating them into 'chambers' could help. ...

Maybe i'm missing somethin ;)

Anhow, thanks again people.
 
heres a shot of my home-made plexi shroud. (the fans go inside the shroud itself).

radshroudunpainted.JPG
 
BioPort- That's one big shroud...did you seal the edges?

Momo- I'm going by what I read on DD's site but I could be mistaken, I run the Swiftech 80mm version and the setback is about 3/16's on one side and 1/8" on the other but I'm running 1 fan per rad with the fans drawing air through the rads in the 3/16" setback and I get flow all the way across the core...I've got foam filters over my cores and they're always evenly dirty when I clean 'em.
 
I'm using Weapon shrouds on my systems. The current ones have the middle divider and I think it really helps the air floe through the radiator. I've used several versions of the core with and without the divider and the latest with the divider is by far the best yet.

dsc017775sq.jpg
 
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