AlienALX
Well-known member
Lesson learned. Don't use s**t cases. How can it possibly be the case that caused that? It's taken me 8 hours to work out.
First I took the rig down and took it apart.
However, none of it made any sense. I built the rig last year, and it didn't leak. At all. Then all of a sudden two months in it starts to drip.
That was around Christmas time. It then dripped on for another month, with me just putting a piece of tissue under it. By that time I had a chance to think about it, and immediately I blamed the thing that had leaked before - straight rotary fittings. See, if you put any lateral pressure on them *at all* and they pull they drip coolant. That is why any good rotary is friggin massive. So I was certain it was those. So at first I got out my forensic kit, which consisted of some cotton buds (AKA cue tips for people who don't understand proper English
) and set to work. I dabbed all around the rotaries and the top of the rad (fan side) and nothing. Not a single drop.
So how and why was coolant pouring out of the bottom of the rig? I still had no idea. I decided to bung up one side of the rad, put a hose in the other and give it ye olde pressure test. This is what happened.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgmEd9JSBbw&ab_channel=Zomb13k113r
OK. So quite clearly that rad has a hole in it. However, how on earth does a radiator, under hardly any pressure, spring a leak? the answer took me hours to find out. BTW I replaced the bung with two others, with and without extensions and it still leaks. From the under side, oddly enough, where the coolant was pooling.
So why then did it take two months for the rig to leak, and why did it all of a sudden go from a drip to a river? the answer was more complicated.
Basically the case is crap. Thin steel, and to water cool it you need to remove a section from the mobo side which makes it awfully flexible. The rad was bolted to the floor, acting as a brace.
Every time I moved the rig it would flex. At which point it was using the rad as a brace. When I took the rig down to work on the RGB? the floor of the case flexed, and given how tightly the rad was bolted to it it flexed the radiator and it cracked. Two months later I moved it again (about 2 weeks ago) and I come back to a river. So basically the case is what broke the radiator. I was pretty certain I had put a screw in too far, but I had not. The rad doesn't use tubes it uses these very thin veins, and as the case flexed as I carried it about it put that pressure onto the rad which has cracked one of the veins.
I always knew I should have been a detective.
Long story short? don't use a cheap, crappy case to water cool with lots of equipment. Buy something suitably sturdy.
First I took the rig down and took it apart.
However, none of it made any sense. I built the rig last year, and it didn't leak. At all. Then all of a sudden two months in it starts to drip.
That was around Christmas time. It then dripped on for another month, with me just putting a piece of tissue under it. By that time I had a chance to think about it, and immediately I blamed the thing that had leaked before - straight rotary fittings. See, if you put any lateral pressure on them *at all* and they pull they drip coolant. That is why any good rotary is friggin massive. So I was certain it was those. So at first I got out my forensic kit, which consisted of some cotton buds (AKA cue tips for people who don't understand proper English
) and set to work. I dabbed all around the rotaries and the top of the rad (fan side) and nothing. Not a single drop.So how and why was coolant pouring out of the bottom of the rig? I still had no idea. I decided to bung up one side of the rad, put a hose in the other and give it ye olde pressure test. This is what happened.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgmEd9JSBbw&ab_channel=Zomb13k113r
OK. So quite clearly that rad has a hole in it. However, how on earth does a radiator, under hardly any pressure, spring a leak? the answer took me hours to find out. BTW I replaced the bung with two others, with and without extensions and it still leaks. From the under side, oddly enough, where the coolant was pooling.
So why then did it take two months for the rig to leak, and why did it all of a sudden go from a drip to a river? the answer was more complicated.
Basically the case is crap. Thin steel, and to water cool it you need to remove a section from the mobo side which makes it awfully flexible. The rad was bolted to the floor, acting as a brace.
Every time I moved the rig it would flex. At which point it was using the rad as a brace. When I took the rig down to work on the RGB? the floor of the case flexed, and given how tightly the rad was bolted to it it flexed the radiator and it cracked. Two months later I moved it again (about 2 weeks ago) and I come back to a river. So basically the case is what broke the radiator. I was pretty certain I had put a screw in too far, but I had not. The rad doesn't use tubes it uses these very thin veins, and as the case flexed as I carried it about it put that pressure onto the rad which has cracked one of the veins.
I always knew I should have been a detective.
Long story short? don't use a cheap, crappy case to water cool with lots of equipment. Buy something suitably sturdy.
