AIO Liquid Cooler Bursts, $3000 in drain.

[Explicy]

So I was finally happy I got a new cooler, as many of you know I am active on this forum and recently was having trouble previously with a corsair cooler and was happy to find I found a new one. Now this one failed.

cooler http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835856025

I was randomly playing CSGO when the red transparent tube connected to the block explodes, causing the liquid to shoot out onto the window inside the computer, all the components, and case it self.

I immediately shut off the computer and took everything apart and laid it on a bed cover to dry, The GPU's were soaked, the motherboard was soaked, and the case was like a pool of water.

Im leaving everything for 24 hours to dry but I wonder, what exactly could have caused such thing?

Here is what the waterblock on the cooler looks like

Here is what it looked like after it burst

What is very sad is that I believed this was a great product so I branded the company on my YouTube channel and actually led about 4-5 or more people actually buy this product, and I advertised them for free pretty much with my review.

With that being said hopefully they can reimburse me for not only a new cooler (Im not sure if I want a new one) but for the damaged parts because it's not my fault that im on my computer and the pipe just bursts and ruins my whole computer. Im pretty sure AIO coolers are supposed to not Burst.

Overall, Let me know if you think these parts are going to live as they are drying now, the motherboard is completely messed up and my question is, If i get a different model motherboard will my computer still boot with RAID 0 And overclock normally on my Harddrives?

But I emailed the company, NewEgg did offer $99 instore credit if I return the item, but this case is more than just $99, hence the fact why I contacted the manufacturer.

THE MAIN QUESTION:

Do I get another water cooler? Or Fan Cooler? Why could this have happened? and is it the Companies responsibility to reimburse me for the components?

P.S. when contacting the manufacturer they could barely speak English and directed me to email their contact email so thats what I did.

 

[gondo]

Live and learn. When I was selling components I quickly learned which manufacturers were better to deal with for warranty issues. For example Abit was awesome for motherboards but people are stupid and didn't support them so they sold out. Antec was always a favorite of mine back in the day. Now EVGA has good customer support.

Also when it comes to liquid coolers, AIO systems are known for reliability problems. If you want a good liquid cooler you need to purchase your parts individually and assemble them yourself. Assemble the hoses, acrylic, or copper tubing yourself using connections that won't let go. You can clamp hoses to barbs. Solid tubing connects similar to plumbing in your house so it's pretty safe.

Now a good air cooler will perform almost as good as a liquid cooler and better than some of them in fact. Air coolers are also reliable. A good one can run on the heatsink alone without the fan so it's fool proof. They are quieter since the fans are isolated inside the case and not on the surface of the case mounted to a radiator. They are cheaper.

To be honest I don't see the appeal of AIO systems. They are fixed in assembly so you can't route hoses as you wish. The pumps are of mediocre quality. They are more expensive than a good heatsink. Now if your going for a custom build your own system that's different. It's the hobby aspect and the look. You can put a dye in the water for color and use UV lights, etc... It looks sharp.

I'd say good luck on warranty with deepcool. And replace with a good heatsink. Cryorig H7 is good and well priced. Noctua is the bling bling of heatsinks and the 15 series has 18 dba fans so it's very silent. The noctuas are to drool for but expensive at the $100 point, which when compared to an AIO system is not bad.

Let us know how the fight goes with Deepcool.

 

[Explicy]

Live and learn. When I was selling components I quickly learned which manufacturers were better to deal with for warranty issues. For example Abit was awesome for motherboards but people are stupid and didn't support them so they sold out. Antec was always a favorite of mine back in the day. Now EVGA has good customer support.

Also when it comes to liquid coolers, AIO systems are known for reliability problems. If you want a good liquid cooler you need to purchase your parts individually and assemble them yourself. Assemble the hoses, acrylic, or copper tubing yourself using connections that won't let go. You can clamp hoses to barbs. Solid tubing connects similar to plumbing in your house so it's pretty safe.

Now a good air cooler will perform almost as good as a liquid cooler and better than some of them in fact. Air coolers are also reliable. A good one can run on the heatsink alone without the fan so it's fool proof. They are quieter since the fans are isolated inside the case and not on the surface of the case mounted to a radiator. They are cheaper.

To be honest I don't see the appeal of AIO systems. They are fixed in assembly so you can't route hoses as you wish. The pumps are of mediocre quality. They are more expensive than a good heatsink. Now if your going for a custom build your own system that's different. It's the hobby aspect and the look. You can put a dye in the water for color and use UV lights, etc... It looks sharp.

I'd say good luck on warranty with deepcool. And replace with a good heatsink. Cryorig H7 is good and well priced. Noctua is the bling bling of heatsinks and the 15 series has 18 dba fans so it's very silent. The noctuas are to drool for but expensive at the $100 point, which when compared to an AIO system is not bad.

Do you think the components will live.

 

[gondo]

I did a quick search on some reviews and you're not alone. Others have had problems with the deepcool units. leaking and failed pumps or air pockets.

 

[Explicy]

I did a quick search on some reviews and you're not alone. Others have had problems with the deepcool units. leaking and failed pumps or air pockets.

Ah, hopefully they will pay for my components.

 

[gondo]

What happened when it burst? Did you here shorts and did the computer shut down? I know you shut it down yourself but the few seconds before what happened?

The CPU, RAM, Hard drive might be good. I wouldn't be surprised if the motherboard or video card are toast. Liquid coolers use distilled water with an additive or some pre-mixed coolant. It is less conducive but not 100% non-conductive. Only mineral oil systems are non-conductive.

The reason for the fail? That tubing connected to the block has a pretty tight bend in it. It looks like tygon or plastic hose and not solid acrylic tubing. It may have heated up do to a failed pump or air bubble trap that stopped the pump and then the hose slipped off the fitting. I have read other people who claim air trapped in the system can cause the pump to stop and the system to heat up. The potential result is what you encountered.

A pump doesn't like air. You need to prime a pump and keep it air free. The build your own systems have methods for purging air from the system. Unless your vain about the look of your system I prefer an old fashioned air cooler. When I was younger I did all the crazy stuff before liquid coolers were even popular. I had systems built in refrigerators, transparent cases with 20 UV lights in it that would give you a sunburn after 30 seconds of game time. Now I prefer a good silent insulated case like a Fractal and some reliable components that just work great.

 

[gondo]

Just a FYI - for AIO systems Fractal kelvin and NZXT Kraken systems seem to be favorites and more reliable systems. And DIY kits for open systems are $250+.

 

[Explicy]

What happened when it burst? Did you here shorts and did the computer shut down? I know you shut it down yourself but the few seconds before what happened?

The CPU, RAM, Hard drive might be good. I wouldn't be surprised if the motherboard or video card are toast. Liquid coolers use distilled water with an additive or some pre-mixed coolant. It is less conducive but not 100% non-conductive. Only mineral oil systems are non-conductive.

The reason for the fail? That tubing connected to the block has a pretty tight bend in it. It looks like tygon or plastic hose and not solid acrylic tubing. It may have heated up do to a failed pump or air bubble trap that stopped the pump and then the hose slipped off the fitting. I have read other people who claim air trapped in the system can cause the pump to stop and the system to heat up. The potential result is what you encountered.

A pump doesn't like air. You need to prime a pump and keep it air free. The build your own systems have methods for purging air from the system. Unless your vain about the look of your system I prefer an old fashioned air cooler. When I was younger I did all the crazy stuff before liquid coolers were even popular. I had systems built in refrigerators, transparent cases with 20 UV lights in it that would give you a sunburn after 30 seconds of game time. Now I prefer a good silent insulated case like a Fractal and some reliable components that just work great.

When it burst the monitors blacked out, and my guess is because when the cpu gets too hot it shuts off. I feel if it was because the GPU got wet nothing would happen, it could have been a short circuit, but due to the water spuing out that would cause the cpu to not be cooled for a split second causing a turn off right away. It could be that or something else. But yea

 

[gondo]

Motherboards are set in the BIOS to shut off at a certain CPU temperature limit. Usually 75' Celcius or so. If the water failed it would take more than a second for it to reach that temperature. Just the water block alone would sink the heat away before it got too hot.

The water flying all over the place shut your system down There is no denying that. And your power supply is probably sitting at the bottom of the case so it probably got wet. It may be toast as well. Video card, motherboard, and PSU may be gone. If you're lucky the RAM and CPU might still be good. If you're even luckier deepcool will compensate you.

It would be in their interest to compensate you or else you will log onto every site imaginable like Amazon, Newegg, NCIX, Tiger Direct, etc... and give very bad and nasty reviews of deepcool. They will loose many sales over <$1000 worth of components. Just this post alone will stop anyone who reads this from buying a deepcool product. Not that it will make a difference since it seems everyone is buying Corsair's AIO coolers for some reason.

 

[gondo]

Let everything dry out good and test it out. I'm curious to see how you make out.

 

[f-14]

gondo, my abit k7 raid 950mhz is still going strong running win98se had it running Xp for awhile until i built a new machine with the xp3200 using soyo kt series. you forgot to mention air coolers are extremely heavy on pcb that's getting thinner and thinner and can actually break the traces when the boards heat up after intense or prolonged use and cause severe slow expensive deaths to any cpu and memory you stick in trying to diagnose the problem.
Chris Angelini actually did a whole story write up on his experience with one of the system builder machines he was testing with a cryorig cooler that broke the pcb due to weight what was it 2014 2015?

my corsair h80 has been going strong and with out noise or hiccup or that silly back flow bearing rattle noise others are posting about. i replaced the corsair fans with cooler master sickle flows before even installing it in 2011.

Explicy, my condolences.
can't exactly tell in the picture but the tubing at the elbow looks thicker on the underside and very thin on top, but if that's the actual disposition of the tubing it's just a bad piece of tubing that never should have been used.
i have no idea why it broke due to so many reasons. it's made of mostly plastic that breaks easy, from the mounting ears to the tubing... my personal experience is plastic is bad for things you have to depend on for more than anything but looking nice.

#1 suspect is it was dropped on the tubing end at some point from the manufacturing floor to any where sometime after installation. i have no idea except that that hard acrylic tubing cracks easy. i have no idea why they didn't use clear rubber soft tubing like fuel lines for motors that can handle even extreme temperatures, all they needed was a stent at the ends and plastic compression fittings.
#2 the plastic mounting was over tightened and caused pressure stress capable of warping the body of the pump
#3 the hoses were pressed against the acrylic tubing in mounting the radiator to the top of the case and caused stress on the acrylic enough to snap/crack (from your pictures this doesn't look like the case as the inlet and outlet tubes are off to the front of the case on the side and the particulate matter on top of the pump body doesn't suggest this was changed after the break)
#4 the side panel was pressed against the acrylic tubing ( doesn't even look possible in that case with the tube not even passing beyond the 120 rear fan blade center hub)
so that is what led me to examine the picture of the tubing more closely than the first glance i gave that last picture. i did not see any other smaller cracks that i can discern around the break and my experience with acrylic tubing is that small curved notch in the break is caused by something either striking the tubing there or pressure applied from the opposite side of the tube and pulling force is used. the curved notches typically i would hazard around 80% of the time come from the opposite side of force being applied and i have no idea how that would happen with that tube with out hooking a finger or wire under the tube and pulling away. a screw driver would have left a flat mark or scratch like indentation.
i don't know what to say other than that's as far as my experience goes.

frigid temps and a bump while packaging or shipping caused a crack on the underside is my best guess.

as far as if your parts are fried, i have no idea. if it's filled with water, rust on everything metal will screw you over rust is slow silent and deadly, if it was veggie oil, you are safe, if it was some other fluid, it depends- mineral oil could render parts SOL also. the fans should all be fine, just pray there is enough protective coating sprayed on all the pcb's to save the solder from rusting. it's a good sign there probably is with the way you were able to power down when it broke. there might be some thermal damage to the cpu, but i have no idea if for sure and how bad, as once again quick thinking to power down might have saved you. the PSU will be shot if it was on the bottom and water got inside. i wouldn't trust it with out a psu tester on it running for a year straight.
there is no warranty on other components provided by deepcool, only their own products.

you overclocked your machine and thus the warranty is voided" 3. Disclaimer

Under no condition shall Deepcool be reliable for any indirect, incidental or consequential damages due to improper installation, misuse, usage not in accordance with product specifications and instructions, or unauthorized modifications."
http://www.deepcool.com/support/warranty/58_70.shtml

this sucks balls imo, again my condolences.

i had thought about switching to that deep cool captain AIO cuz it sure is pretty, but could not justify the wasted expense based on looks, other wise i'd have to trade in my woman and truck on that basis also!

 

[PatrioticPickle]

Make sure all your parts are spread out in a place that isn't too warm, like on a table or something and let them dry for like a week at least.

 

[gondo]

Yeah heatsinks are big and heavy and that's one drawback. They have the big back mounting plate but still. That Deepcool disclaimer says they are not responsible for damage caused by modifications, improper installation, etc.... it looks like a manufacturing defect so they should cover you.

 

[Explicy]

UPDATE: I have been refunded $1150 from the Company.

 

[PatrioticPickle]

UPDATE: I have been refunded $1150 from the Company.

Thats good to hear, does that cover what you have lost? What are your specs?

Have you tested any of the parts out

 

[gondo]

Congrats. That's great to hear that Deepcool lived up to their warranty in a timely fashion. 2 thumbs up for Deepcool.

So what needs replacing, give us the goodies

I just installed an EKWB Predator liquid cooler. That is one nice beast for an AIO.

 

[Explicy]

So should I buy another AIO 360mm cooler from a different company or do a custom loop?

 

[gondo]

Custom loop takes the pump off the waterblock which I like. They also usually use a Liang DDC pump or higher end D5 quieter pump. It also has a reservoir for more cooling capacity.

There are 2 AIO kits that offer similar hardware. Swiftech X2 and EKWB Preadator. The problem with these is the swiftech puts the pump on the surface so only one side of the radiator can have fans limiting installation options. The EKWB puts the pump on the end of the rad so a 240mm is actually more and a 360mm is longer so it doesn't always fit in a 240 or 360mm spot.

The EKWB is the better system using a ddc pump and nice hardware including compression fittings. The swiftech has the prestige series that includes better fans and compression fittings.

I'd go the EKWB predator for the price. But if your willing to to spend a bit more a custom open loop is best. You'll get a tower reservoir and pump and seperate radiator that's easier to mount. EKWB has all the hardware in a kit ready to install but again it costs more than the predator AIO.

If you want to cheap out and just get a bsic AIO kit I like the Enermax Liquimax 2. I has supposedly a long life pump and better designed water block for better performance. It also uses the rubber hoses for no maintenance or evaporation.

 

[synphul]

Glad to hear the company reimbursed you. Some have, some haven't. One of the reasons I tend to avoid aio's, many people like to say they don't have issues or don't leak or how rare it is. Which may be true, but 'rare' and 'impossible' are two entirely different things. As you've seen yourself, it can and in fact does happen.

Some look nice visually but I just haven't seen a real need. At least with the cpu's I've overclocked big air coolers are more than sufficient to handle the heat and they're nearly silent. I always run into a wall with core voltage limits before overheating issues. Depending where you live prices may be different. Even large coolers like the noctua nh-d15 and bequiet dark rock pro 3 top out around $90 usd, the nh-d14 is $70 and there are plenty other high quality air coolers for less than $90.

 

[gondo]

Glad to hear the company reimbursed you. Some have, some haven't. One of the reasons I tend to avoid aio's, many people like to say they don't have issues or don't leak or how rare it is. Which may be true, but 'rare' and 'impossible' are two entirely different things. As you've seen yourself, it can and in fact does happen.

Some look nice visually but I just haven't seen a real need. At least with the cpu's I've overclocked big air coolers are more than sufficient to handle the heat and they're nearly silent. I always run into a wall with core voltage limits before overheating issues. Depending where you live prices may be different. Even large coolers like the noctua nh-d15 and bequiet dark rock pro 3 top out around $90 usd, the nh-d14 is $70 and there are plenty other high quality air coolers for less than $90.

True air cooling works. And without overclocking they work good. But they are so big. I hate having a 3lb heatsink hang off the motherboard. And the fan is in the way of some wires sometimes. Liquid is just so convenient with the tiny water blocks. Especially to get the massive heatsinks off the video cards and shrink them up to single instead of dual space.

And without the video and CPU fans, all the airflow is dictated by case fans. I'd like to see a smoke effect with and without CPU and video card fans to see the difference. Also the difference in temps to see if it makes a big difference.

Also many smaller cases can't fit a large heatsink. And some devices like an Intel Extreme and FuryX video card jsut require water cooling.

 

[Explicy]

Glad to hear the company reimbursed you. Some have, some haven't. One of the reasons I tend to avoid aio's, many people like to say they don't have issues or don't leak or how rare it is. Which may be true, but 'rare' and 'impossible' are two entirely different things. As you've seen yourself, it can and in fact does happen.

Some look nice visually but I just haven't seen a real need. At least with the cpu's I've overclocked big air coolers are more than sufficient to handle the heat and they're nearly silent. I always run into a wall with core voltage limits before overheating issues. Depending where you live prices may be different. Even large coolers like the noctua nh-d15 and bequiet dark rock pro 3 top out around $90 usd, the nh-d14 is $70 and there are plenty other high quality air coolers for less than $90.

True air cooling works. And without overclocking they work good. But they are so big. I hate having a 3lb heatsink hang off the motherboard. And the fan is in the way of some wires sometimes. Liquid is just so convenient with the tiny water blocks. Especially to get the massive heatsinks off the video cards and shrink them up to single instead of dual space.

And without the video and CPU fans, all the airflow is dictated by case fans. I'd like to see a smoke effect with and without CPU and video card fans to see the difference. Also the difference in temps to see if it makes a big difference.

Also many smaller cases can't fit a large heatsink. And some devices like an Intel Extreme and FuryX video card jsut require water cooling.

I went with the Thermaltake Water 3.0 360mm liquid cooler. Yes its AIO.

 

[synphul]

Good luck with it and hopefully no more waterfalls inside the case.

 

[turkey3_scratch]

Dang... That's crazy.

 

[Gam3r01]

I personally trust water coolers in my own systems, but in your situation Im surprised to see you moving back into water so quickly.
Glad to hear you got money back (is it enough to get the full system replaced?)
Now heres the real question, do you get to keep the damaged components? If so, you might have some workable hardware in there.

 

[gondo]

I used to hate Thermaltake. They were so popular in the early 2000's, but they used to use an odd size of case fan around 92mm. But they do make nice stuff. That looks like a nice AIO with the ZMT hoses and they claim a reliable pump.