BEST THERMALLY CONDUCTIVE LIQUID

[mikekosk]

mmmmmkay today i finished build my pc heat radiator and im looking for the most thermally conductive liquid. it does not necessarily have to be electrically conductive or not. As long as its cheap and disipates heat easily.
Any Ideas?

 

[koolaidkitten]

I found the most amazing stuff at Wal-Mart once.
I use it in my rig now.
It's only 98cents a gallon
Its called Distilled Water <.<

 

[JonathanDeane]

mmmmmkay today i finished build my pc heat radiator and im looking for the most thermally conductive liquid. it does not necessarily have to be electrically conductive or not. As long as its cheap and disipates heat easily.
Any Ideas?

rubbing alchy lol kidding I think a mix of 50/50 water and radiator fluid works pretty good ? Im not an expert on liquid cooling thats just from what I have read

 

[koolaidkitten]

actually dont some folks use alcohol in their systems and it works pretty well?

Anywho my personal fav *for real this time*
90% distilled water
10% Pentosin *u can even use a lil bit less for slightly better results i only use 10 to make it look cooler*


btw 50/50 is not good imo. thats too much non-water in your loop.

I heard of folks that use pure distilled water.
but you have to REALLY take some cleaning measures before that. and if the water gets contaminated your gonna be in a world of shit.

 

[JonathanDeane]

I think radiator fluid is actualy ethylene glycol (a relative of alchy) its good stuff in that it helps keep your metal parts from corroding !
I did some looking around and yeah some poeple do use it but distilled water with an algacide is also recomended. I would shoot for the radiator fluid as it is made for this stuff and has the bonus of not needing algacide lol

Edit:Yes from what I read 50/50 is for cars and computers would need much much less ! more water lol like 90/10 lol

 

[phreejak]

The reason that you don't want to strictly use water in its pure form is that radiators are typically made of aluminum and water blocks are usually made of copper. It's like a battery - the resulting breakdown of the metals because of the galvanic response of having two metals that don't work well together will hasten a breakdown of your equipment.

The thing is, it should not just be about what is the best thermally conductive liquid - if that was the case, nothing is better than pure water.

It doesn't matter what you add to water or what you use, nothing will do as good as pure water. But, since we know it is not adviseable that you use just water than we know that you will have to sacrifice a few degrees of cooling regardless. The thing to do is balance the characteristics of other coolants with what you consider are priorities.

Coolants and additives offer: prevention to biological buildup, lubrication, anticorrosion and nonconductivity (depending on what you get).

Personally, I use nonconductive fluids in my system (PrimoCHILL ICE) and have done so for almost 2 years. There may be times when leaks appear or spills happen. I've witnessed, first hand, how nice it is when coolant makes contact with a powered computer part and nothing happens - because the coolant was nonconductive.

You can't put a price on peace of mind....

 

[koolaidkitten]

The reason that you don't want to strictly use water in its pure form is that radiators are typically made of aluminum and water blocks are usually made of cooper. It's like a battery - the resulting breakdown of the metals because of the galvanic response of having two metals that don't work well together will hasten a breakdown of your equipment.

The thing is, it should just be about what is the best thermally conductive liquid - if that was the case, nothing is better than pure water.

It doesn't matter what you add to water or what you use, nothing will do as good as pure water. But, since we know it is not adviseable that you use just water than we know that you will have to sacrifice a few degrees of cooling regardless. The thing to do is balance the characteristics of other coolants with what you consider are priorities.

Coolants and additives offer: prevention to biological buildup, lubrication, anticorrosion and nonconductivity (depending on what you get).

Personally, I use nonconductive fluids in my system (PrimoCHILL ICE) and have done so for almost 2 years. There may be times when leaks appear or spills happen. I've witnessed, first hand, how nice it is whne coolant makes contact with a powered computer part and nothing happens - because the coolant was nonconductive.

You can't put a price on peace of mind....

Nuff said' :trophy:

 

[Nedkt]

mmmmmkay today i finished build my pc heat radiator and im looking for the most thermally conductive liquid. it does not necessarily have to be electrically conductive or not. As long as its cheap and disipates heat easily.
Any Ideas?

Gallium.

Francium may work but you will have a harder time coming by enough to use. Plus it fails your "cheap" criteria as you would probably need a particle accelerator to get it.

 

[shawnlizzle =]]

rofl,

to OP

if you don't mix metals, then straight distilled water is optimal. you might want to add a bit of algecide, but dont' add bleach because it'll eat away at copper.

professional "water cooling liquids" are a huge rip off and is basically water and some other corrosion preventing additives.


a general guide line is that the less crap you put in water, the better heat transfer it is going to be


(antifreeze or radiator fluids make crappy heat conductors)

 

[crapback]

i use straight distilled water and keep a little suckerfish in my reservoir to keep the algae at bay...(get it)

 

[die4die]

i think it's SEA WATER if i'm not wrong.

 

[phreejak]

You know, since a waterloop is sealed, you could add a drain valve and a DangerDen Fillport and use coffee as your coolant. That way, your coffee would always be hot and you just need to add water and more coffee grounds when the coolant is low (from you drinking it of course).

 

[deviantdave]

Mercury but it's extremely dangerous, after that good ole H20

 

[mkaibear]

>coffee

Oh, good lord, that would be horrible! You'd end up brewing it for *hours*, it would be the most bitter stuff in the world!

Nah, you want to use water... and then have the water drip through a coffee percolator! That's the way to do it!

 

[DeaconW]

Mercury but it's extremely dangerous, after that good ole H20

Liquid sodium is pretty good too...but there are some "issues" with that substance as well... :mrgreen:

 

[Ningenpo]

Hi,

As most people who actually have watercooling, I use distilled water and in my case I use waterwetter from waterchill. I use like 1 litre (~1/4 galon) of distilled water with 10ml (~0,0025 gallons) syringe of waterwetter. Works like a charm, no corrosion or such. Sorry, I'm bad at non metric systems... Hope you get the point anyway. Better to get more water cooling hardware than destroying what you have chasing 1deg C.

Good luck!

 

[phreejak]

Alright then, how about hot chocolate? or something like mocha mint latee'? lol

I'm just a straight PrimoCHILL ICE user - been for almost 2 years. I've had a leak or two spring up and spill coolant on parts while the computer was running and I've spilled it on the PSU and various other parts and nothing happened so I'm a believer.

 

[jonkc]

I'm just a straight PrimoCHILL ICE user - been for almost 2 years. I've had a leak or two spring up and spill coolant on parts while the computer was running and I've spilled it on the PSU and various other parts and nothing happened so I'm a believer.

So do you use JUST PrimoCHILL Ice or do you mix with distilled water? What's your mix?

 

[Guest]

Water. Nothin more nothing less. Has the best possible heat capacity. Prolly a little algicide and fluorescant for the looks of it.

 

[phreejak]

Straight PrimoCHILL ICE.

It comes premixed. If you add water to it then that defeats one of it's functions as you would be adding a conductive fluid to a non-conductive fluid. It has other benefits, though, besides its non-conductivity. It has a biological retadant, a lubricant (helps the pump), is UV reactive and, of course, the coolant itself.

Again, you shouldn't use just straight water (distilled or otherwise) - even adding an algecide and some form of UV reactive dye still doesn't help with the most glaring reason this is frowned upon - the galvanic response resulting from water running through two metals which do not react well with each other. Most radiators are made of aluminum and most water blocks are made of copper - think of a battery. Coolants (like Hydrix - an additive, or PrimoCHILL ICE - premixed) are chemically prepared to handle this issue. Straight water will speed the process of the metals reactions to each other and the result will be a breakdown of the metallic components of both parts.

I have two cooling loops in my computer (look at my sig) and it usually takes almost two bottle of PC ICE but that's just once a year. (I clean my cooling loops once a year - adding new coolant each time)

$40 for peace of mind is pretty cheap to me.....

 

[jonkc]

$40 for peace of mind is pretty cheap to me.....

I totally agree... I will have to pick some up as it is time to change my fluids anyway...

Thanks for the response...

 

[phreejak]

Your Welcome

Glad to be of help