Water Chilling Disaster

K

kingsack

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 13, 2003
Messages
155
This weekend I had a problem with a water chilling project.
The system is the one in my SIG an I was replacing my dual radiators with this uber water chiller http://www.ftssystems.com/multicoolbath.htm
and I was going to eliminate my res as well since the chiller has a 1.5 gal res and I was installing my Eheim 1250 inside the chiller res.

Everything started out OK. I plumbed my loop, filled the chiller with the uber Prestone windshield washer fluid good to -40 and ran it for 24 hours with no leaks with power turned off on my rig. I didn't have the chiller going at the time since I wasn't insulated against condensation yet (possibly a fatal error!).

Next I removed my mother board and covered all the chips, slots, connectors, jumpers and the CPU socket pin holes with masking tape.
I then proceeded to spray down the board front and back with KonForm SR conformal coating (following the directions on the can - 3 light coatings on each side rotating the board 90° each time) and watited for the coating to dry. I removed all of the tape and filled the CPU socket pin holes and the void in the center with dielectric grease.

Next I reinstalled my motherboard. I covered all of the tubing with pipe insulation and sealed the ends with RTV silicone. I filled the CPU socket pin holes with dielectric grease as well as the void in the center. At this point I decided to power it up and test it before covering the socket area with foram which would make it difficult to see anything. I turned on the chiller and pump and the the PC. I wasn't getting any power to the MB and it took me a while to figure out that the ATX power jumper was off by on pin. Once this was solved I was able to power up and noticed a slight leak from the CPU block. The PC itself started momentarily and then shut down. It appeared that most of the washer fluid had landed on my video card.

I shut everything off an went to work with a hairdryer. I fixed the leak by coating the tubing with dielectric grease where it entered the cpu block and did this on all the other swiftech quick connect fitting thinking that the rubber seal might be shrinking or getting brittle with the cold temp. No more leaks after that. Unfortunately it will now power up (power led lights up on the MB and the NIC) and the fans and everything start up but I can't hear it post and ther is no video. The voice reporter doesn't make any sound. It does so hear noise from my floppy so it may be seeking.

At this point I had my brother bring over his rig which I built for him.
A7N8X-E Deluxe, 3200+ Barton, etc.. and we swapped in my video card, CPU and RAM with all operating normally. We did try his video card (a 9800XT and an old nVidia GeF 4 MX400 PCI I had laing around and still no video).

I have also tryed resetting CMOS and switching the FSB jumper to 100.
Unfortunately I gave away my system with a TBird 1.2 so I don't have an old 100 MHz FSB chip to use.

Any suggestions? Or should I just assume that my MB is toast? I don't think an RMA is an option, ethics aside, since I have coated the board and have replaced the NB cooling and have epoxied on SB cooling! This is very bad timming since I have just gone through a series of financial setbacks. If I don't have to replace my MB I would really prefer not to!
Also my wife is giving me endless grief. You know the tale .. Why did you have to go that extra mile? Your system was super fast already and worked without any problems ... blah blah blah ...

I have read the stickies on BIOS death which do bear some similarities to my symptoms but I'm not really sure that's whats going on here. Once again, any suggestion that you might have would be greatly appreciated.
 
What you might want to try is to stick your speakers in the external out jack, pull the CPU, and listen for Bicthin' Betty (The voice reporter). The A7N8X Deluxe I had speech error reporting when the CPU was removed, your's should too. It was gratious enough to let me know that my old Duron 650 was toast by not speaking when it was plugged in. If you get speech with the CPU removed, you probably just fried the CPU, but I'm not sure if I would ever trust a motherboard like that with a good chip again. One more thing, when you did your leak test, did you do it with food coloring and a paper towel? Dye or coloring traces are really the only way to see if a block is really leaking, as the water will evaporate quite quickly.

BTW, how did you get a lab chiller? How much (if any) did you pay for it?

Matt.
 
Enraged your FX chip needs watercooling to hit 2.4Ghz, mine will do 2500Mhz on air, just curious bout that cause 2 of my friends can hit 2.4Ghz on air as well.
 
Actually I got 2 of those chillers for FREE!
The are from my work and were replaced with $20K Julabos because they lacked sufficient heat capacity for an increase in workload. I have one and I gave my brother the other.

PS I tried my CPU in my bros A7N8X-E Deluxe and it was fine.
Looks like I need a new MB. I am thinking of trying the
DFI Lan Party Ultra B - people are reporting outrageously high FSB with this board without mods!
 
Damn ... I'm really curious as to how this would turn out with one of those waterchillers. Are they rated for long-time constant use?

Keep us informed, I hope you get it fixed enough to show us what kinda stuff can be done with this kinda setup.
 
Try douching under your northbridge with isopropyl. If your videocard got sprayed with fluid you might have some residue under the BGA balls providing some strange impedances. Same thing has happened to me before on an old swiftech pump failure, albeit with above ambient type coolant. The mobo just needed a cleaning under the BGA and was fine again. Worth a shot anyways.
 
Originally posted by Spidey329
Damn ... I'm really curious as to how this would turn out with one of those waterchillers. Are they rated for long-time constant use?

Keep us informed, I hope you get it fixed enough to show us what kinda stuff can be done with this kinda setup.
Click to expand...

Yes, in our lab they were run 24/5. I'm going to order a new DFI Lan Party NF2 Ultra B and see what I can do.
 
Originally posted by 101
Try douching under your northbridge with isopropyl. If your videocard got sprayed with fluid you might have some residue under the BGA balls providing some strange impedances. Same thing has happened to me before on an old swiftech pump failure, albeit with above ambient type coolant. The mobo just needed a cleaning under the BGA and was fine again. Worth a shot anyways.
Click to expand...

It sounds like it's worth a try. Just the sort of suggestion I was looking for.
 
Originally posted by Marcdaddy
Enraged your FX chip needs watercooling to hit 2.4Ghz, mine will do 2500Mhz on air, just curious bout that cause 2 of my friends can hit 2.4Ghz on air as well.
Click to expand...

Marc,

The FX-51 didn't really NEED watercooling. I hit just about the same ceiling on air as I did with water. It ran at 2.40Ghz on aircooling, and hits 2.43 with water. I'm a little more stringent on what I consider 'stable' than most people, though. If it doesn't run at 100% for a week straight, it's not stable. This chip has hit 2.62Ghz on water, and it will benchmark, just not up to my standards. Also, it should be noted that this is one of the first FX-51's made (engineering sample), and that most newer chips should clock higher than this one.

If you have any other questions about this, PM me.

Matt.
 
Originally posted by enraged78
If it doesn't run at 100% for a week straight, it's not stable.
Click to expand...

How many windows computers can run for a week straight at 100% and not crash for just running windows :D
 
I had a similar problem with my system. Let me tell you why I'm glad as hell I added UV dye...
When I re-plumbed my system, I had a loose hose end fall and it hosed my system pretty good. I dried everything out, but had the same problem your having. I ended up shining a blacklight into my system and sure enough, there were spots glowing all over it. I ended up taking the system completely apart and board by board, cleaning it by flushing areas with alcohol under a blacklight until nothing glowed anymore. It was a real mess. I ended up having to take the plastic CPU socket apart as there was glowing liquid all over inside it. It took a few hours, but eventually I got it all cleaned out. Without the UV dye in the liquid, who knows if I ever would have been able to get it all off.
 
Originally posted by cgrant26
I had a similar problem with my system. Let me tell you why I'm glad as hell I added UV dye...
When I re-plumbed my system, I had a loose hose end fall and it hosed my system pretty good. I dried everything out, but had the same problem your having. I ended up shining a blacklight into my system and sure enough, there were spots glowing all over it. I ended up taking the system completely apart and board by board, cleaning it by flushing areas with alcohol under a blacklight until nothing glowed anymore. It was a real mess. I ended up having to take the plastic CPU socket apart as there was glowing liquid all over inside it. It took a few hours, but eventually I got it all cleaned out. Without the UV dye in the liquid, who knows if I ever would have been able to get it all off.
Click to expand...

Great post. I don't know if the winshield washer fluid will flouresce or not. I didn't add any dye to it.
 
Originally posted by killernoodle
Squeeze the liquid from a hilighter (sp?) into the loop if you want UV for cheap.
Click to expand...

Is it water soluble? I assume it would work in washer fluid due to teh methanol content, but would it work in ordinary distilled water?
 
Oh great guys. Now a bunch of stores are going to buy up the supply of highlighters, squeeze them into bottles and sell them for $20. Real good .. just reeeeaaaallllll goooood. You let the cat out of the bag ..

:) :D
 
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