Tap water safe for 1-2 weeks?

Neuromancer · #1 10-26-2009

I should have some CLR in the house somewhere, so soaking hte rad afterward will not be a big deal.

Forgot to pick up distilled water last time I was out by Wally world, so was thinking about running Tap water for a week 2 at the most!

Will I have to run a descaler like CLR through the rad if I run tap water for a straight two weeks?

Thanks

(Oh, going to go distilled with about a 10% antifreeze mix to help out on those) wintertime windowBox sessions )

FACE · #2 10-26-2009

I don't know about all of that..... Tap water, depending on where you live, could have some acidity to it, and if it corrodes at all you risk pitting the copper interior, leave nice little pockets for gunk to build up in.

If you have a fish tank, use the pH test kit to test your tap water first....

Better safe than sorry!

Ol'Bud · #3 10-26-2009

Your temperatures are not high enough to boil off the water and cause minerals to precipitate out of solution.
And watch that distilled water,
Chemists call it hungry water,
it dissolves stuff because it isn't carrying anything in solution.
Get the right chemicals or ethylene glycol 50%.

karmakazi · #4 10-27-2009

Im not big into water cooling, but I been told to never run tap.

Neuromancer · #5 10-27-2009

Thanks for the tips.

I thought distilled was what was recommended.

I do have a Ph kit (last fish just died) and also have a swimming pool test kit, so should be good to go there.

50% antifreeze??? Thats about 2-5 times more than I thought was recommended.

Neuromancer · #6 10-27-2009

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ol'Bud

Your temperatures are not high enough to boil off the water and cause minerals to precipitate out of solution.
And watch that distilled water,
Chemists call it hungry water,
it dissolves stuff because it isn't carrying anything in solution.
Get the right chemicals or ethylene glycol 50%.

Hey, are you sure you are not thinking of DeIonized water? Which will pull Ions out of your copper block?

Anywho, tap water is moot now, my Aunt asked me to go grocery shopping for her.

So I grabbed 2 G's of Distilled.

Might push it off tonight. And start building the temporary loop tomorrow. Rainy days suck.

Will be adding antifreeze at a later date. (after the 1st probably)

Quote:

Your temperatures are not high enough to boil off the water and cause minerals to precipitate out of solution.

LOL are you sure? I am running an overclocked i7

Ol'Bud · #7 10-27-2009

DI Water Is Worse.
You never want to put just water in those coolers any way.

Bones · #8 10-27-2009

One thing you could do is to install a in-line water filter to help catch what's in the water you use.
Filtering it will help reduce the amount of trace elements that could cause scale and mineral deposits to build up. I've been thinking about doing that with my stuff lately and just may set it up soon. Since we're talking about corrosion and the like, there are chemicals you could use to help too. Also the materials your system is comprised of is important, such as avoiding a Galvanic reaction, not to mention electrolisys (Hope I spelled that right). I've seen pumps literally eaten away internally by that even if the water was treated chemically. Replaced one last year at work that had simply quit moving water because the impeller wasn't there anymore due to electrolisys. It was an old pump but this effect can still be a problem sometimes. I've never heard of a PC WC'ing system with problems from that before but it could happen.

BTW, that's why you hear sometimes of a "Sacrificial Anode" being in a pump system. It gets eaten away by the electrolisys instead of the hardware itself. It in effect sacrifices itself to save the rest of the system.

Ol'Bud · #9 10-28-2009

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bones

One thing you could do is to install a in-line water filter to help catch what's in the water you use.
Filtering it will help reduce the amount of trace elements that could cause scale and mineral deposits to build up. I've been thinking about doing that with my stuff lately and just may set it up soon. Since we're talking about corrosion and the like, there are chemicals you could use to help too. Also the materials your system is comprised of is important, such as avoiding a Galvanic reaction, not to mention electrolisys (Hope I spelled that right). I've seen pumps literally eaten away internally by that even if the water was treated chemically. Replaced one last year at work that had simply quit moving water because the impeller wasn't there anymore due to electrolisys. It was an old pump but this effect can still be a problem sometimes. I've never heard of a PC WC'ing system with problems from that before but it could happen.

BTW, that's why you hear sometimes of a "Sacrificial Anode" being in a pump system. It gets eaten away by the electrolisys instead of the hardware itself. It in effect sacrifices itself to save the rest of the system.

That's right!
Magnesium anodes are sacrificial anodes used for cathodic protection.

Aluminum radiators will get holes bored in them and leak all over the place if the chemicals in them are not the right PH.

Neuromancer · #10 10-29-2009

Rad looks to be entirely copper and brass constructed.

Going to be down for another week though ARGH

Stupid Black Ice uses m4 threaded screws, which means out of the thousand screws I have laying around I have none that fit. (M3 is standard PC size)

Going to order some 12mm M4 bolts tomorrow, and meanwhile I guess I will get the rest of the "case" built

http://www.boltdepot.com/product.asp...&cm=19&cd=1258 look right? not ordering from them as they want 12 bucks for shipping :s