SPCR

fmah wrote:More pipes may be in the works, but it still appears to be limited by the cooling on the other side (the large heatsink).

How about a big heatsink that covers much of the unused side of the PC box (right side when looking at the front of the PC)? There's lots of area there. A 1/2" (maybe 3/4") heatsink wouldn't look bad there if it were close enough to the size of that panel that it looked like it was the panel. The hard part would be getting the heatpipes to reach there -- around the motherboard & sliding MB drawer & through the case panel.

CraiginNJ

It's mainly a matter of what's available. I can get larger stuff but there are going to be some limitations concerning cost and availability.

Sorry if my question is bit silly and redicilous…

How about building the heat pipe only..??? I mean using liquid cooler inside as R134a or others,as like inside in www.benchtest.com …actually I was really interesting to build one of those…but because the limitation of the material.in here (indonesia) I couldn’t find any heat pipe seller...only brand product and will not interesting anymore isn’it….

I would know how the formula of the heat pipe such as the length of the pipe,diameter pipe,etc..for my rig (P4 on 3.2G)….

If apparently that question is hard to answer…at least I want to know lenght and diameter pipe which is common to sell in the D.I.Y shop.it’s pitty that my online order is not came yet till 4 month…!!! (was order 2 time)

Does anyone can help….???

What kind of motherboard are you using?

The typical maximum diameter I've seen is 6 mm. If you want to build them, that's a lot of work, but it could be interesting. I'm should be getting some pretty soon, so if you actually want some send me a private message (PM).

I'd like to make something like this to cool an Athlon64.

Anyone know where these large heatsinks and blocks of copper can be purchased in the UK?

Do you think it would work if the heatpipe holes were drilled into a solid block of copper?

One source of heatpipes would be to cannibalise a Zalman hard drive cooler.

thanks

I've found a similar heatsink at RS components (www.rswww.com)
Part number 264-670
Larger than fmah used (300*300*40mm)
quoted 0.29 c/w passive
£60.03

now i just need to find some copper blocks. Maybe aluminium would be sufficient?

The copper bar available from RS is not large enough for this task

Aluminium bars are available in the right size
Part 446-6808
£30.88
100*50*600mm

I'll try that if I cant find a copper alternative.

Now I just have to wait for Socket 939 mobo/cpu with PCI express slot and a PCI express fanless x800 Radeon gfx

brett wrote: Do you think it would work if the heatpipe holes were drilled into a solid block of copper?

It would work, but you have to be careful about the fit. The two things to ensure are to have good contact pressure and contact area. You will get good contact area by drilling a hole and inserting the pipe into the hole, but the contact pressure will not be so good. My personal feeling is that the pressure would be low enough that you'd create a sizeable thermal resistance from the pipe to the block.

I would like to construct something like this (hi hi, fmah ), but the contact with the heatpipes are obviously critical
As fmah noted, they are slightly bigger that 6mm rated size, so even creating the hole is like a art, because from the contact with the both cooper surfaces are definitively determined the thermal resistance of the cooling solution
I would even definitively use AC3 for all the connections, BTW. Might help a little bit, when the layer is right

I am looking for a large heatsink about the same size as the one you used or larger. I am in the usa so I would like to fine one within the states to cut down on shipping. Thanks, jason

I hate to repeat, but where can you get such a large aluminum heatsink? I'm assuming they dont make those for computers - then where could I get one?

Also, are there any stores that ship to Canada for those heat pipes and copper blocks?

So, does anyone know where you can buy heat pipes, two years+ after this article was first published??

Cheers,
Shoebox9

I'd like to know this as well. Also, are flexible heatpipes possible? I don't see why not, as long as the tubing used was rigid enough to withstand the vacuum of the heatpipe. I'd think this could be done with some kind of rubber tubing, probably reinforced with metal ribs of some sort so it isn't crushed by outside pressure? And then each end of the rubber tubing could be attached to a piece of copper tubing (using clamps) where the actual heat transfer would take place.

Actually, how possible would it be to build home-made heatpipes? All you'd really need is the tubing, a wick, and the working fluid, correct? I'd imagine inserting the working fluid while creating a vacuum in the heatpipe would probably be kind of difficult without special tools, though.

I never noticed this article before! Funnily enough I made a very similar test rig myself in early 2003 for my dissertation!

Biggest difference is that I tested using a test rig rather than an actual CPU. This incorperated a machined alu block (shaped like an athlon XP processor) with a resistor so that i could generate a set amount heat consistently.

Unfortunately I only have a couple of pics online atm
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/marc.merce ... p_expl.jpg
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/marc.merce ... CF0001.JPG
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/marc.merce ... CF0004.JPG

Back then it was quite hard to get hold of heatpipes - and they were pretty expensive. I was forced to use 2 x 8mm rather than 3 x 6mm pipes because of the cost.

2 x 8mm x 400mm (from memory) cost approx £150! I believe i bought those from thermacore. I still have 4 of them sat in my loft doing nothing :O
I have often wondered if they are a lot cheaper now 2 years on .... but I imagine in small quantities they may still be expensive though. No harm in giving them a call - there are probably other companies cheaper than thermacore too - there was at least one other in 2003, but they took 6 weeks to make the pipes to order.

My original plan was to actually build my own heatpipes. It's not as hard as you'd think at all. I only went with premade ones in the end as time was running short and I needed results!

You don't even need a wick or a fancy working fluid. Water works in just about the ideal range for this kind of application. The hardest thing is filling the tube with the correct amount of working fluid.

I'm sure i found an article where someone did just this about a year ago. I'll try and dig it out.

The biggest problem with building your own system like this is thermal contact. The machining tolerances were pretty poor on my rig and the thermal interface between heatpipe/heatblock and heatpipe/heatsink were one of the biggest areas of thermal resistance.

Marc

Article on home made heatpipe:

http://www.benchtest.com/heat_pipe1.html

He used R132a as a working fluid

Marc

shoebox9 wrote:So, does anyone know where you can buy heat pipes, two years+ after this article was first published??

Some digging in my memory and a quick Google search found some places in Germany. Alternately ask the manufacturer who their resellers are.

Wow, Thermotek look hot.

I only found this article via google, thinking I'd exhausted SPCR's knowledge base on this subject some time ago.

I believe it would be very helpful if this article could be moved from being buried amongst every product review SPCR has ever done, to the DIY page.

Cheers,
Shoebox9

Here's a place to buy heatpipes from:

http://www.t-balancer.com/catalog/index.php?cPath=21_42

http://www.t-balancer.com/catalog/index.php?cPath=43

According to thermacore, heatpipes use gravity and capillarity to function.

FMAH Could you please tell us what happen when you turn your set
1) 1/4 left
2) upside down

That 's it ! Asus just released Arctic Square, a cooling device with 4 heat pipes !

http://www.google.fr/search?hl=fr&q=Arc ... ogle&meta=