What do most people use for liquid in their cooling system?

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WCES Ryan

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Mar 28, 2005
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What type of water or liquid or coolant or whatever do you guys use in your water systems? From what I've seen so far, people don't seem to be using straight water. Is it typically water mixed with some type of coolant, or are there specific coolants that can be used as an alternative to water?

Something non-conductive would be VERY nice, I've heard of such a product, can't remember the name, but it seemed expensive.

What should I use in my soon-to-be watercooling system and why?
 
All of my past builds have been distilled water with a little bit of anti-freeze and a spash of water wetter.

The build I am currently doing I decided to try out some MCT-5 and see how much I like it. I'm still waiting for my video card blocks before I put it all together.
 
been using the "reformulated" Primochill PC ICE in my comp. i have only had my setup for a week now but everything with it seems A-OK. i decided to go with it because I didn't want to mess with antifreeze and have to worry about disposal laws and crap. PC ICE is biodegradable and non-toxic, plus it has a few other benefits such as lubrication.

here is a review.
 
I use the Koolance premixed stuff. It's not too expensive, it's blue, premixed, and when I had a leak my system did not fry....
 
De-ionised water and ACFluid (clear additive to prevent corrosion etc.)
 
Most people either use some "secret" blend of Distilled Water and a bit of antifreeze or additive, or a premixed premium coolant such as PC Ice, MCT5/40, FluidXP+ etc.

I've personally been using the reformalated blue PC Ice without event and for the money I haven't found a better performer that is non conductive. :)
 
PC ICE. ill use nothing else. non-conductive and glows extremely bright under uv.
 
90% distilled water, 10% this stuff
dscf0308medium2mh.jpg
 
prophetx2 said:
I use the Koolance premixed stuff. It's not too expensive, it's blue, premixed, and when I had a leak my system did not fry....
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I'm with prophet on this one. Had my own mix of distilled water, Fluid XP and some blue dye and it gunked up my tubes. The Koolance premix stuff has done well by me so far...
 
I pour a whole bottle of supercool stuff from dtek in a gallon jug of distilled water and it lasts for a long time.
 
xdkimx said:
49% eth glycol antifreeze
49% distilled water
2% dawn dishwash soap
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50% ethylene glycol? Far more than you need for anticorrosion protection...and it really reduces your cooling efficiency at that concentration.
 
85 distilled water, 15 pentosin (blue) and a few drops of aquarium good start stuff to help keep out bad guys, although the pentosin will probably do that anywayz.
 
doox00 said:
85 distilled water, 15 pentosin (blue) and a few drops of aquarium good start stuff to help keep out bad guys, although the pentosin will probably do that anywayz.
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I'll be re-doing my loop with that, minus the aquarium stuff.
 
prophetx2 said:
I use the Koolance premixed stuff. It's not too expensive, it's blue, premixed, and when I had a leak my system did not fry....
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Same. I used to mix distilled water and pentosin... but this is just as blue, cheaper, and works just as well. However, I do mix it a bit further with distrilled water. Its mixed at 70% distilled water, 28% monoethylene glycol, and 2% dye. Bit to much for my tastes. Anything higher than 90/10 or so is just to much antifreeze.
 
i'm setting up my first wc system this weekend

going to use distilled water not deionized

w/ 10-15 ethylene glycol (antifreeze) = pentosin blue

should be fine and cool well
 
doox00 said:
85 distilled water, 15 pentosin (blue) and a few drops of aquarium good start stuff to help keep out bad guys, although the pentosin will probably do that anywayz.
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That's exactly what I'll be doing... my pentosin came in yesterday and I'm picking up the aquarium stuff tonight. I ordered a crapload of pentosin though, 2 huge jugs. Good thing it was cheap!
 
xhx said:
That's exactly what I'll be doing... my pentosin came in yesterday and I'm picking up the aquarium stuff tonight. I ordered a crapload of pentosin though, 2 huge jugs. Good thing it was cheap!
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kinda curious how cheap and from where? :) was 21.89 a gallon at the local vw dealership
 
WCES Ryan said:
What should I use in my soon-to-be watercooling system and why?
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My own system uses distilled water (95%) with Zerex surfactant / anticorrosive (around 0.5%) and a biocide (90% isopropyl alcohol; balance). The surfactant / anticorrosive does two things - it ensures that the distilled water wets out properly against the radiator and the block (thereby optimizing heat transfer) and it prevents galvanic corrosion in your system if you have a mixture of metals present (e.g. aluminum radiator with copper block). The biocide kills bugs, algae, etc.

Water is currently the best bang for the buck. It has high specific heat, which means it can absorb great whacking gobs of thermal energy from your processor, and as long as you give it sufficient time and surface area it cools pretty quickly as well. The downside of course is that it conducts electricity. That's why most of us on water do the standard 24- hour leak test before we mount everything in the case.
 
I'm using HydrX and distilled water. It's been many months and no gunk buildup that I've noticed.

Although I should probably get around to draining it... It won't be too much longer before I hit a year...

-dB
 
topcat989 said:
I'll be trying out mtc-5 on my new $2500 system. Here's why.
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]

QFT!! After seeing this, I decided to get some MTC-5 aswell. I figure 20$ is worth not loosing my system. Throw in that even if you do everything correctly, there is a chance that a block escaped a companies quality control. Better safe than sorry
:D

-Cameron
 
I Use This it is not non-conductive but the price is good and it looks great. It is also pet and people safe. non lethal.
coolant_uvbb.jpg
 
more like $40 Plus shipping for 2 bottles to fill mysystem...Which I have already drained once because I had a bad pump...

I guess thats not too bad though, the Pentosin from VW Dealership was like $30! although it's enough to re-do my system many many many many times over..

I don't know if Pentosin will glow in UV light though...
 
sfuller said:
I'm using prestone 50/50 and I think I made a mistake.
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I know you made a mistake ;). 50/50 is way to much antifreeze... its just going to hurt performace. At the max you should go for 80/20, but even 90/10 should be fine for keeping out any creepy crawlies.
 
Actually, I ran rthdrbl and prime95 all last night and found my temps had dropped 15F. Maybe it's not so bad, could be the new case though.
 
jman1 said:
Until the little fuzz ball gets a drink of it!
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Mine doesn't leak either. ;) Also with the bottle you have left (which would last for 20 years of watercooling) you can also super cool your regular slot car too.
 
in all my systems I have used 90% Distilled water and 10% Royal Purple's Purple Ice Racing Coolant... and a little rubbing alcohol.

never had any troubles at all and the Purple Ice was relatively cheap... 1 litre bottle for about 12$ CAD at the high performance shop across the street from me.

~NortH~
 
 
My mix:

Steam distilled water
Innovatek Pro-protect or Zerex Supercoolant
Listerine
Dye-Lite

Ancient Chineese secret, hu?
 
The main difference between the MCT-40 and -5 are the low temps. They are each named after the minimum temp. So -40 can hit neg 40 degrees, and -5, well you can guess that one.
 
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