Watercooling Flow Rates

[Zhentar]

I got my flowmeter today, so I've been testing things. I'll start off with my equipment.

I'm using a King Instruments flowmeter; I can't give you a model but it uses a metal float, and is scaled from 1 to 5 GPM.

I'm using a Little Giant pond pump, model number PCL-020. All I've found on the little giant site is this: http://www.littlegiant.com/LittleGiant/ ... 8E00524696
Different model number, but the same thing. For those that don't want to look at the link.. its rated 300 GPH at 1 foot of head, 12.2 ft shutoff head, 4 GPM at 5', 3 GPM at 8', and slightly over 2 GPM at 10'.

My watercooling loop is a Dangerden Maze3, Dangerden Z-chipset block, a chevy caprice heatercore, and a res/airtrap set up with 2" PVC. The waterblocks have 1/2" fittings, the heatercore and res have 5/8", and the pump has a 1/2" inlet on 3/8" pipe and a 3/8" outlet (I'm not restricting it there; its got 3/8" inlet/outlet).

The res will be in all tests since I don't want to spend 2 hours bleeding each test with a tee thats more restrictive than the res.

Now, some flow numbers: (yes, most of these numbers were so convienently rounded; I'm only rounding to the nearest half scale mark, or .1 GPM)

Full Loop: 1.4 GPM

Just res/flowmeter: 4 GPM

+ Maze3: 3 GPM

+ Z-chipset: 2 GPM

+ 25 feet of tubing (24 1/2 actually): 2.8 GPM

+ Heatercore: 2.4 GPM

+ Heatercore + Maze3: 2 GPM

I'm still running tests, so I'll be adding more numbers soon.

I've got a lot of the numbers I want now, So I'll start off with... I said, "Hey, I'll watercool the Northbridge, why not?' I've got my answer now. That little thing is by far the most restrictive part of my system. In fact, it alone is half of the flow restriction. Seeing as I can't get past 218 FSB with it, and even with the awful contact of the lousy stock cooler got to 200 FSB, and probably more. I clearly need a better NB block.