EK Nickel water block issues?

[jwright30]

Hello all, a few quick questions here. I have a XSPC water cooling system that I wanted to add my video card to, but since my card is a asus gtx 670 with the direct cool, it has a non reference layout and requires a specific water block. The only one that I can find that says it is a match for it is made by EK. I have heard that they had issues with plating in the past. Is that still true today, and would mixing a nickel plated vga water block cause galvanic issues with copper in rest of cooling system?

thanks

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Hello all, a few quick questions here. I have a XSPC water cooling system that I wanted to add my video card to, but since my card is a asus gtx 670 with the direct cool, it has a non reference layout and requires a specific water block. The only one that I can find that says it is a match for it is made by EK. I have heard that they had issues with plating in the past. Is that still true today, and would mixing a nickel plated vga water block cause galvanic issues with copper in rest of cooling system?

thanks

The nickel-plating is a choice by the manufacturer to protect the copper from corrosion. Nickel is close to Copper on the galvanic table. But nickel-plate also has a higher thermal resistance than a mating surface of copper-to-copper. So some of us prefer to lap the nickel from the CPU IHS and heatsink base. With watercooling, it doesn't seem worth the trouble -- given the higher efficiency of heat-transfer.

 

[Blain]

Go with all copper (if you must WC).
There's no reason to pay for the privilege of adding an insulating layer of nickel between the fluid and water block.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Go with all copper (if you must WC).
There's no reason to pay for the privilege of adding an insulating layer of nickel between the fluid and water block.

When some of these manufacturers nickel-plate a water-block, is the plating done on the block's interior? I would not have thought they do it that way. If it's only on the outside of the block, one can just lap it off the mating surface . . .

 

[nitromullet]

When some of these manufacturers nickel-plate a water-block, is the plating done on the block's interior? I would not have thought they do it that way. If it's only on the outside of the block, one can just lap it off the mating surface . . .

Nickel plating helps prevent oxidation which occurs over time on copper blocks.

http://www.ekwb.com/support/index.php?act=article&code=view&id=22

 

[aigomorla]

Go with all copper (if you must WC).
There's no reason to pay for the privilege of adding an insulating layer of nickel between the fluid and water block.

i dont like my copper oxidizing and turning brown..

When some of these manufacturers nickel-plate a water-block, is the plating done on the block's interior? I would not have thought they do it that way. If it's only on the outside of the block, one can just lap it off the mating surface . . .

its done on the entire cold plate...

Nickel plating helps prevent oxidation which occurs over time on copper blocks.

http://www.ekwb.com/support/index.php?act=article&code=view&id=22

+1

however i dont like eK plating jobs, and i will never trust them.
Especially after there bogus report on how silver oxidizes nickel.

Also not all silver is the same. I dont trust many vendors who sell silver coils now especially since a lot of them are from china.
If it aint Iandh i wont run them. Its just that plain and simple.
I made the silver kill coil with Iandh, i saw his vendor who promised it would be .9999% pure.
I havent had ANY problems with silver and nickel using koolance blocks, or swiftech's which eK has stated.

If your going to run eK blocks, go with the straight copper.
You cant go wrong with those.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

i dont like my copper oxidizing and turning brown..
- - - -
its done on the entire cold plate...
. . . .

I havent had ANY problems with silver and nickel using koolance blocks, or swiftech's which eK has stated.

If your going to run eK blocks, go with the straight copper.
You cant go wrong with those.

Just my "historical" observations, but it seemed the air-cooling hot-dawgs were more keen on the "last grains of rice" with incremental cooling improvement back in the days of the TRUE coolers. After the D14 (and now D15), I don't see posts anymore which evidence folks lapping their cooler base or the IHS, as though any gains are so small it's not worth the trouble.

I WILL stick by my own story, though. I measured an improvement of as much as 2C per surface when the nickel was removed. Others who do "lapping" noted that it was only the flatness of the surface area, but I was sure I had that covered in my little experiments.

Then there was the choice of a thermal paste, giving way to nano-diamond and then to "metal pads" and liquid metal -- also mere increments of improvement.

While I'd say the increments all add up, I can't imagine someone with a water-cooled system taking the time and trouble, especially if the water-cooling is significantly better than AiO coolers.

On the matter of oxidation, I can't see how it would occur much with distilled water, but then -- what do I know? And if it occurs on a heatsink or water-block base/plate, how would that adversely affect cooling? I'm only guessing "not much."

I could imagine, even so, if the interior surface of a water-block had been plated, and if the plating would begin to flake off, you could really have some troubles. So . . . no nickel-plating for me -- when I "get there."

 

[aigomorla]

On the matter of oxidation, I can't see how it would occur much with distilled water, but then -- what do I know? And if it occurs on a heatsink or water-block base/plate, how would that adversely affect cooling? I'm only guessing "not much."

I could imagine, even so, if the interior surface of a water-block had been plated, and if the plating would begin to flake off, you could really have some troubles. So . . . no nickel-plating for me -- when I "get there."

the parts which are exposed to air oxidizes making the block look really ugly.
It turns brownish, instead of its original copper brilliance. I would say copper tarnish.

You cant really reverse this without using some form of clear coat polish, which is worse then nickel plating.

The nickel plating is also a very thin layer. Its electrostatic plating, and if done correctly, it doesnt really flake off unless ur running an injector through the block.
If your running an injector, then your running steel, which naturally oxidizes in water leaving a black layer which people often confuse for corrosion.
It doesnt impact the cooling potential on the block to any noticeable degree.

The nickel chromium plate is also very resistant to tarnish.
So it stays shiney for a long time.


And not all of us are straight performance junkies..
We do watercooling as Art in a sense.
This is why "bling" can triple the cost of your H2O gear in an instant.

I WILL stick by my own story, though. I measured an improvement of as much as 2C per surface when the nickel was removed. Others who do "lapping" noted that it was only the flatness of the surface area, but I was sure I had that covered in my little experiments.

Thats probably cuz the heat sink was bowed..
Remember my thread on bowed heat sinks, and how poor they were with the imporper mounts required for bowing?

By lapping you most likely made the sink flat which offered a better contact surface with the IHS.

Example:
Pass1:

Notice how the copper is showing in the center, which indicates a bow.
Pass 2:

Shows how much of a bow the Heat sink had.

This type of bow requires a tremendous amount of mounting pressure which is very difficult to do on a heat sink of that size due to Torque.

On a waterblock, its fairly easy to get the required mounting pressure... on a Tower heat sink... no so much due to the torque presented on the top portion unless the board is mounted horizontally.

This is why i <3 horizontal mounted board cases like ITX, and the Coolermaster one.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

And not all of us are straight performance junkies..
We do watercooling as Art in a sense.
This is why "bling" can triple the cost of your H2O gear in an instant.

Definitely -- it had become an art-form back-when -- back-when I saw some guy's chrome-and-green miracle. You can spend a lot of time on the trimmings.

Thats probably cuz the heat sink was bowed..
Remember my thread on bowed heat sinks, and how poor they were with the imporper mounts required for bowing?

By lapping you most likely made the sink flat which offered a better contact surface with the IHS.

Sure, but I did my very best to assure that the base was perfectly flat with the nickel-plate -- and without. There were no gaps or convexity when I put my metal straight-edge on the IHS under strong light -- either way.

On a waterblock, its fairly easy to get the required mounting pressure... on a Tower heat sink... no so much due to the torque presented on the top portion unless the board is mounted horizontally.

This is why i <3 horizontal mounted board cases like ITX, and the Coolermaster one.

Some of the towers -- especially the dual-towers -- would be fitted with 3/4 lb of fans if the formula is 2x fans in push-pull. Take the fans off, much of the weight is in the base, with less addition to torque from fins and pipes. It's not rocket-science to hang the fans on the case (somehow). How this would influence a need for more mounting pressure, I might only guess . . . I might be tempted to de-lid a processor for use with such a cooler and NO IHS -- direct-die. But why do that, if you went to all the trouble, and you could use either AiO or custom-chosen water parts?