Worklog: Water Cooling with a Vengeance

[NatePo717]

Took the feedback I received from a previous thread regarding parts, made my purchases, and have just now started putting things together! (with a few minor setbacks…) I figured I would record a build log of my first go at water cooling and give my impressions of the parts as I went along for anyone else who might be pondering venturing into water cooling.

As there is a 10 image limit to posts, I'll be segmenting this build into a part by part breakdown in separate posts.

The components!

• CPU - Intel i7 2600k
• Motherboard - Asus P8Z68 V Pro
• RAM - 4 x 4 GB Samsung DDR3 1600
• Graphics - 2 x Zotac GTX 560 Ti OC
• PSU - PCP&C Silencer 750W
• SSD - Corsair M4 512
• HDD - 1 x 1TB and 1 x 2 TB

• Case - Corsair Vengeance c70 Black and White version
• Radiators - XSPC RX240 and EX240 cross-flow
• Pump - Swiftech MCP655
• Reservoir - XSPC Dual bay reservoir for the D5 (the injection molded version)
• CPU Block - XSPC Raystorm
• GPU Block - 2 x Heatkiller GPU-X3 Hole Edition
• Fans - 6 x GT AP-15
• TIM - Phobya HeGrease
• Fittings - 3/8” – 5/8” compression fittings
• Tube - XSPC 3/8” – 5/8” White.

I've also purchased the Heatkiller SLI bridge buuuut... I ordered the wrong size. Oops... Have the correct size on order should be here for this weekend! There was also a mistake with my compression fittings. One of the six that came with the XSPC kit was the wrong size! That is also being replaced.

Here’s the whole system in the old case. Goodbye R3 and hello Vengeance!

And all the new parts! (with system moved over to new case)

 

[NatePo717]

Meet the Corsair Vengeance c70. It’s lighter than the R3, a little more flimsy, and slightly bigger (but not significantly so). I was quite happy with the build quality. No sharp edges that I could find. It does not look nearly as tacky as I had thought it might in person. The powder coating is difficult to scratch or mark with general use. The window on the side is a simple bolt on. It would be easy to replace, which I plan on doing at some point with a clear plastic panel. The smoke color and the fan mounts take away from being able to see inside. I was also very happy to find I could attach the bottom front fan from the drive canister (removed in the photo) and attach it behind the cases face plate. The front fan intake does come with a fan filter inside. Just a nice surprise the fan fit. I’ll be putting the second fan in there as well to clear up space inside the case for tubing.

The case comes with little rubber grommets that are supposed to be used to protect the outside of the case when fans are attached to it. My case was short one grommet. This isn’t much of a problem as I find them quite useless. When you tighten a screw they twist off or pop through the case. There are a few other difficulties with the case, but those will be talked about later.

 

[NatePo717]

First up, we have the GPU Block. The Heatkiller GPU-X3 Hole Edition. It was quite a bit heavier than I had anticipated.

The bottom of the heat sink could do with less tooling marks but I doubt it will make much impact on temperatures.

Zotac 560 Ti OC all nice and naked.

Now with some Phobya HeGrease applied and the thermal pads provided with the Heatkiller. I was surprised at the consistency of this TIM. I am so used to the thickness of Arctic Silver 5. This felt much lighter and “airy” than a grease. Easy to spread with the provided applicator.

On to heat sink installation. This was a piece of cake. It fit perfectly just as it should. Lookin’ good!

Second card finished.

And now the bridge installed. Couldn't have been easier!

 

[NatePo717]

To preface, I apologize for not taking these images BEFORE test fitting… I was rather excited to get working and forgot to take pictures. I was not expecting the paint on the radiators to be so… brittle. It flakes off easily! Here are the XSPC RX240 and the EX240 cross-flow.

I had decided on the RX240 as I had the room for it in push/pull at the bottom of the case. Make the most of the space I have.

The EX240 cross-flow seemed like an excellent idea for cutting down on the use of tubing and streamlining the appearance inside the case.

My only complaint, as I mentioned before, was just how easy these are to scratch. While I was test fitting, any misalignment of the screw when trying to attach the radiator meant a scratch on the paint. It was a little disappointing. Scratches aside, I hope these perform well.

WHOOOOSH! Fan time. Gentle Typhoon AP-15’s. What is there to say about these that has not already been said? Excellent build quality and feel. Giving the blades a spin, the bearings feel very smooth. I can’t wait to give these a try. My only complaint is the blade color (wish they were white). PWM would be nice as well but I am not running these off my motherboard. I have a little internal fan controller for that. It is a set voltage controller but easy enough to change where things are connected. I plan on placing this on the back side of the RX240. I may take the blades off and give them a coat of white paint. I’ve not decided if it is worth the hassle yet or not.

 

[NatePo717]

There is not much to say at this point regarding the two as I don’t have it running and can’t comment on the noise. The bay is well built and seems solid enough to me as does the Swiftech MCP655. I do have one complaint regarding the reservoir... it did not come with instructions or markings as to which is the inlet and outlet. I had to go online to find the manual. For those wondering, the bottom is the inlet and the top the outlet. Installation was a breeze. Just unscrew the pump from its stock housing and screw it onto the back of the reservoir. Just don’t forget the O-ring. Testing it in the case, it is quite snug to the point of almost not fitting in correctly, but this was only just a test. I’ll get a better look when I start doing tubing.

 

[NatePo717]

The XSPC Raystorm. I was most excited to have a look at this block. I’ve always been interested in block design, having tried my hand at designing one back in college. I never got past the design stage. Blame the lack of time and funds.

The Raystorm came neatly packaged. Wrapped in plastic with a plastic sheet over the thermal surface. It was so shiny I almost missed the fact there was a piece of plastic there.

The block itself is rather small. The Mounting kit adds substantial size to it.

Look at that mirror finish! My camera phone is only so good… but you could easily read the reflection.

The backplate and mounting hardware

I couldn’t resist mounting it… it was just too pretty. Installation is a breeze. Put on backing plate and screw down the 4 posts. It is an interesting mechanism. You screw down the posts and then have the ability to increase the pressure more by the 4 larger thumb screws on each post.

And of course I just -had- to check it out with the LED’s.

 

[NatePo717]

This was a bit of a challenge to figure out. While the case is rated for two 240mm radiators, the bottom 240 can only be situated in one way with the inlet/outlet towards the front of the case. It just won’t fit any other way with a PSU installed. This was quite annoying as it wasn’t exactly how I wanted to run my tubes but as you’ll see it turned out alright in the end.

I neglected to account for my PSU being 2 cm longer than a lot of PSU’s these days. The PCP&C Silencer 750 is 180mm long and is NOT modular. A 160mm long PSU would have made things a hell of a lot easier on me. There is only a few mm between the radiator and the PSU. The cable bunch also comes out of the lower half of the PSU making it a little more difficult to run cables though the cabling holes in the case. After some swearing, hair loss, and an hour of searching online for a deal on a 160mm psu replacement, I gave fitting it another try. I had to cut the cable tie around the bottom of the cable bunch in order to fan out the cables to fit the radiator. It’s a tight fit. There’s going to be no removal of that psu without removing the radiator.

I did some of the tubing right away seeing as how there really was no other way to run them. Running the tubing was a piece of cake. No problems there. The DVD drive had to go on the bottom or it would block getting tube to the top radiator from my reservoir. Not a big issue either. The last bit of tubing I did by leaving my bay reservoir partially out of the front of the case so there was enough give on the tube I could just pull the bay reservoir out to get to the fill port.

Everything was ready for the leak test.

Bleeding the system was a chore. It was difficult to tell if I was getting any flow from my pump or not as it didn’t seem like there was any flow going through the tubes. I was worried the MCP655 pump wasn’t going to cut it and that I had underestimated the restriction. I guess I just expected 1gpm to seem a little faster than it actually is. I wasn’t convinced till I actually saw my temperatures. In retrospect I should have added a flow indicator into the loop. Using the bay reservoir where you do not see flow and having solid color tubing, I’d recommend a flow indicator.

I can now also comment on the MCP655 pump. This thing is quiet. I could barely hear it on its highest setting. It was also cool to the touch after 24 hours of operation for the leak test after bleeding the air from the system. It did not transfer a lot of vibration to the case, and the vibration that it did transfer was not audible. The case has no rattle to it either so all in all I was quite happy with the pumps performance.

The bay reservoir itself was easy to work with as well. It would have been nice if the little window on the front were a little wider so that you could see the inlet but that’s just a “would be nice”. My killcoil also seems to have disappeared. I dropped it in the reservoir but as I was tipping the case about during bleeding it must have gotten wedged somewhere.

 

[NatePo717]

Running the cables was easy enough. The Vengeance includes three clips and a channel in which to run cables. I'm big on clean looking interiors and at some point I'd love to sleeve my cables in white. I don't think I'm up for that task just yet. It's a LOT of cables...

And now, without much more talking… here’s the finished product! I went ahead and bought a piece of acrylic to replace the window that comes with the case (which you can see in my review of the case).

Performance tests will be coming soon.

 

[WoodButcher]

I've never cared for white on a PC but yours is a beauty. I like the "ammo can" look of the case and you did a nice job keeping the build clean. The cross flow rad and new window are big contributors. Grilles molded into a window always irked me too.

 

[Gunbuster]

Looks really good. I went with the green C70 and am super happy with it. Replaced a circa 2005 gateway 6400 server case I was using. I love being able to hide all the cables behind the motherboard tray!

GA-Z77X-UD5H
2600K
Phanteks PH-TC14PE
16 GB Samsung low profile 30nm RAM
EVGA GTX670 FTW