Have you used acrylic tubing? Advise me please

tipes

tipes

tipes

Soldato
Joined
5 Nov 2006
Posts
3,133
Hi all,

Have been researching online and looking at some wonderful builds on here using hard acrylic tubing. I fancy having a go at doing this on my system, but I have a query.

As far as I can gather - the tubing between components has to be cut to exact length, so I am puzzled as to how you can possibly fit it between two fixed components for example res and cpu block as neither are movable - so how do you have enough room to get the tube in too the fittings at both ends seeing as it does not bend? Obviously it can be done - so I am missing something here - please enlighten me as to how it is done please.

Need to know before I think about ordering parts etc, also which is the best system to go for - fittings and tubing wise?

Thanks in advance to all you knowleadgeable geeks out there.

Mark
 
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for the bends, you can either heat up the acrylic tube itself and bend it, or use angled fittings. check on youtube there are a few informative videos on the subject.
hope it helps
 
With difficulty is the answer. (mine is project bloodfang in the buillds section).

Ideally you get the fittings to come away and around a corner, which then gives you flexability to put them in both sides and join at the corner.

Doing directly into 1 fixed compentent into another you have to put the tube in before fixing the second component in place.
 
kindai said:
With difficulty is the answer. (mine is project bloodfang in the buillds section).

Ideally you get the fittings to come away and around a corner, which then gives you flexability to put them in both sides and join at the corner.

Doing directly into 1 fixed compentent into another you have to put the tube in before fixing the second component in place.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that, Just what I imagined would be the case having thought about it. How difficult in practise did you find this to be?

Mark

Update just looked through your bloodfang build - superb. If there are any more tips you can give me, I would be most grateful.
 
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With forward planning, not very, just be prepared to spend a lot of time measuring, cutting, grinding down, fitting, more grinding, etc etc.

The tighter the space to work, the harder it gets.
 
kindai said:
With forward planning, not very, just be prepared to spend a lot of time measuring, cutting, grinding down, fitting, more grinding, etc etc.

The tighter the space to work, the harder it gets.
Click to expand...

Ta very much - worth the effort though, especially looking at your wonderful creation, love it.

Mark
 
Hey tbh its not that difficult at all.
You can plan out the configuration and build them out side the case,
just make sure your using dual rotary fittings and then you can just screw the pieces in.

Also now primochill do compression fittings which are a lot easier to use then the multi link fittings.

Monsoon do the pro bending kits as well, to make all sorts of bends a lot easier
All of which are on ocuk.

Theres a good bending guide on oc.net
 
fantasticCG said:
Hey tbh its not that difficult at all.
You can plan out the configuration and build them out side the case,
just make sure your using dual rotary fittings and then you can just screw the pieces in.

Also now primochill do compression fittings which are a lot easier to use then the multi link fittings.

Monsoon do the pro bending kits as well, to make all sorts of bends a lot easier
All of which are on ocuk.

Theres a good bending guide on oc.net
Click to expand...

Thanks for that - was thinking that if I did give it a go I was going to get the monsoon bending kit to make it easier. Looks like the primochill might be worth a good look. Think you have just given me the courage to try it, but it wont be for a little while yet - waiting on funds.

Thanks for your input.

Mark
 
kindai said:
Doing directly into 1 fixed compentent into another you have to put the tube in before fixing the second component in place.
Click to expand...

I have been wondering about that myself too.

I'm almost ready to start tubing up my own build and have been wondering how to fit the tubing from the GPU to CPU. :confused:
 
I put my acrylic setup using EK-HD fittings. When I assembled them I used Silicon Lubricant on the fittings o-rings, which allowed me to pop the fitting on to the end of the tube & then screw the fitting in to the waterblock

Personally I found working with acrylic tubing very satisfying, although I did waste a fair amount of tubing as I eyeballed all the bends as opposed to measuring it properly.
 
Just finished my first attempt at acrylic tubing, I used the monsoon hardline bending kit which made it much much easier. Its still a major headache though as mentioned with lots of measuring , cutting, measuring again, realising an angle you have bent is wrong and having to re-do that piece again. Well worth it in the end though.
 
Surely if you are using this it would sorta negate the requirement for a res as you could have a T piece tap in one section and extend that to the chassis roof and just add a fillport... Or am I losing the plot? You could do the same at the bottom of your loop with a drainport..

:D
 
bFjD71o.jpg


There's my little attempt at acrylic I did last week. My tips would be

-Make sure you get more tubing than you need ;).
-Don't heat it too close to the gun.
-Heat evenly and thorough.
-Have your case next to you do you have a little bit of play room once taken away from the heat.
-You can always re heat and adjust slightly.
-Slow and steady, Don't rush.

It's really rewarding once you finish though and looks IMO 100x better than flexi tubing which goes dull.

What size tubing were you thinking? I used 10/13mm EK.
 
TheyCallMeAndy said:
How much extra acrylic should you buy to be on the "safe" side...
Click to expand...

I honestly depends. I managed with 1M but they came in 2x 50cm lengths so it was a real push. If you look at my build the bridge between the cpu and mosfet block is really tight and not as high up as I would have liked it. So if you think you will only need 2 50cm lengths best to get 3 ;). If you have enough money to be spending £200+ on a watercooling loop, you can spare an extra £10 for more tubing.


@jimbaw

I really wish I had now but It was all done on the day so I was pretty occupied to be taking photos. If you need any advice though I'd be happy to share my knowledge since it was my first time too. :D
 
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