Full Aluminum system

Samaus

Samaus

Samaus

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I am in the planning stage of doing a scratch build PC (soon to be posted on this forum) including all my own milled water blocks. Trying to find thick copper at a good price and the suitable size is proving to be very difficult but I do have plenty of aluminum as most of the case is made of it. There is endless posts about mixing metals in water cooling systems but what about full aluminum systems what are your thoughts?
 
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You will be more or less forced to use plastic fittings if you go aluminium, so bare that in mind too.
 
If there is one metal you don't want to mix with in a water loop its aluminium...as above if you go aluminium your choices on other components becomes very restricted.

Any reason not to just buy pre-made blocks?
 
thanks for the quick response guys some interesting things to think about. its stating to look like its more trouble then its worth making them out of aluminum can anyone suggest a good place to get 3-5mm copper plate? offcuts will most likely do.

don't think there's many cool looking plastic fittings out there and even fewer aluminum fittings.

I'm making the case why stop there ;) CPU and RAM blocks look relatively easy to make. Motherboard may be tricky but doable if done is pieces. The GPU will be too big and tricky with the multiple heights and complex layout so will probability end up buying that.

Planning to polish them up and make them look really good possibly nickle or even gold plate them to match the theme of the case.

or am I a little crazy for giving this a shot? :D
 
There's no issue in using aluminium in a loop as long as you take steps to counter act galvanic corrosion. As mentioned earlier, if you don't use plastic fittings (I would suggest you don't bother with plastic) you'll need to ensure your liquid of choice includes corrosion inhibitor of some description as most fittings are brass or nickel.
 
Jokester said:
There's no issue in using aluminium in a loop as long as you take steps to counter act galvanic corrosion. As mentioned earlier, if you don't use plastic fittings (I would suggest you don't bother with plastic) you'll need to ensure your liquid of choice includes corrosion inhibitor of some description as most fittings are brass or nickel.
Click to expand...

it also really helps if the aluminium and other metal are not in direct contact - the worst examples of corrosion I've seen are on some of the really early CPU blocks that had a copper base and ally top

I'm running an ally rad in my loop - mounted externally on rubber bumpers and I have 0 corrosion issues
 
My loop contains a pair of Zalman Reserators (giant anodised aluminium cooling towers), a brass/copper 240 rad, loads of nickel plated brass fittings and a pair of nickel plater copper blocks, I use coolant with corrosion prevention and have never had an issue.
 
Aluminium has roughly half the thermal conductivity of copper so your temps won't be brilliant. just to throw that out there...
Cheers
 
Just make sure you use decent corrosion protection and if i was you id go for a concentrate and double up on mixture for extra protection. Make sure you clean your system out every 6 to 9 months as well. You will should have no problems this way. You may wish to add a galvanic anode (sacrificial anode) to the set-up as well. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galvanic_anode

Alu is fine to use but some times if done incorrectly can be a nasty but this is only on the rare occasion when some one missuses or doesn't under stand the concept of water cooling in a closed loop system.
 
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