NoSnipeLimit Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 Hey, Warning long post - but very much worth the read. (feels like kid getting new toys) Been a while since my last post Mostly because my pc was being modded So what have I done? First i'll answer a different question. Why have i done this. Well since i like Zalman's cooling solutions i bought a cpu cooler, gfx cooler and chipset cooler. On installation i noticed the chipset cooler is in the way of the gfx cooler. Not cool, as most of you know DFI puts there nforce chips at the back of the agp/pci-x slots. Not very good placement if your installing big cooling solutions. So after a while of thinking i thought about a solutions to the problem. I would make my own heatpipe and by doing so it will be lowered so that the gfx cooler can go over it, and my heat transfered to a different place and cooled there. Hehehe easier said than done. So i started looking for something that will deal as a chipset block. Guess what, those integrated heatsinks you take off your cpus and use as key chains can actually be usefull .I have 2 of them laying around, and they make an excellent model for encaptulating some heatpipes, plus they fit perfectly on chipsets (first planed on 3 x 6mm pipes, but settled for 1 x 15mm after much search and disapointment) So i fitted the IHS with the little arms from the zalman so i can put in on my board. All holes were drilled at 3.5mm and then tabbed to 4mm. Heatpipes bottom part has been silver soldered aswell as the top part. (Tried lead solder but i kept having leaks at testing on my test bed system). Putting my test bed to 90 degrees celcius and installing the cooler with the fan at full speed impressed me dropping the temperature to 29 degrees celcius. Fan turned off temps are around 80-90. Reason for this is the heat transfer gets to a point of balance, where it can't cool down the liquid. The idea of heatpipes are having a moving liquid by means of capillary. Capillary is brought forth by cooling one side and heating another side, the hot side then wants to become cool, and the cool side wants to cool the hot side. Some pressure builds up when the liquid is heated and my top part kept leaking, so after serveral tries i ended up putting a nut in the top of the pipe and using a bolt to seal it off with silver solder instead of lead solder. The main aspect wasn't really to cool it, but infact to just be able to put my gfx card in without having to bend my poor heatsinks. I'll post the pictures a little latter, as it's now 1:45am, and i don't know where my datacable for my cam is. It was a hell of a lot of fun making a heatpipe and having it work But there are a lot of danagerous aspects in creating one. Firstly the tourch used is very hot and I'd advice you to use it with causion. Always wear eye protection specially because your working with a pipe that could close up and build serious pressure due to heat. Secondly if your anything like me, there'd be lots of flameable things laying around. It would be wise to move them away from the area your working at (hey i didn't see the black powder laying there...) Things not to try Filling the pipe (oh i used oil as liquid, not compressed gas as it's much more difficult) and trying to solder it. In my case the pipe cooled off so fast that it couldn't reach high enough temperature to melt the solder. Which was pretty cool actually. Also don't try to enclose the heatpipe then heat it up too hot, what your doing is making a bomb if it can't cool down. Just keep that in mind liquid that heats up and goes over in gas form can easily blow up a 5bar pipe. (the one i used) Don't put copper on the grinder. Most grinders stones will crack if you then latter use it again. That also goes for alminium though. All in all I'd say I like the idea of having made my own heatpipe and would suggest those who are experianced to try it. So what was the total costs of this whole experiment?: 1.5Meter Copper Pipe 15mm $12 Filling of LPG gas bottle $10 2 x 1 meter Silver Solder Rods With Flux on $8 (didn't even use half of one of them) Old Duron heatsink and old chipset cooler. (Used for cooling heatpipe) 2 x IHS might not be in everyones collection, but i'm sure you could find something to replace it with. Brass nut + screw and seal MY Test bed i build from an old Asrock motherboard, i heated the motherboard (ROFL) and cleaned off most of the components. I used a hot air gun (very hot air the kind that burns wood yep i burned my table). I took out a copper core from one of the old 478 intel heatsinks (i have like 5 of them just laying around) then i cut it about 1cm in hight havinga nice core, i drilled a hole in the middle and screwed it to the board. Having a Silent tower II i was able to use the plate they give with to fasion off most of the types of sockets. Having different chipset coolers i also drilled the holes for that. So i can test basicly all coolers in my test bed. I put some resistor wire around the core inorder for me to heat it up. Also connected it to the power supply i build. One needs a very good power supply though as the amperage needed to heat up a small piece of wire is quiet a lot. Something fun to do is heat the core up and lick your finger and just touch the core quickly. Ttttsssss. ooooh ok it's hot HEHEHE, i just like doing that. Anyways, i'm planning on doing another onefor my gfx card next. As i'm very impressed at the moment. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Puck Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 Custom heatpipes Thats some advanced stuff you got goin on there, nice. You know you need to get those pics up ASAP tho . Seems like it worked well too, cant wait to see it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tazwegion Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 Yeah... the pics! * jumps up & down with impatience * Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
flareback Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 wow, thats impressive. I'd love to see some pics Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoSnipeLimit Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 Here's some pics for now Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
GlimmerMan Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 lol that looks so custom, and ridiculously large. Couldn't you bend the pipes to make it sit a little lower? nice job though Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoSnipeLimit Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 well it is custom... i could have put the cooler lower but i had the space. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silverfox Posted October 1, 2006 Posted October 1, 2006 any chance of higher resolution images? those are really tought to examine Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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