Optimal Fan Placement For This Custom Loop?

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Hey everyone,

Currently in the process of setting up my custom loop, I am not sure what the optimal setup will be for my fans and radiators. The case has 2 480mm rads up top, 1 360mm at the front, 1 480mm at the bottom.

Case fans are Artic P12's x 16 which will run at a maximum of 200rpm (hopefully lol)

Currently I am thinking of setting all rads to intake and exhausting out of the back, so that rads get the coolest air, thoughts on this?

hKRx6qx.png
 
Should be ok, however always worth testing as it’s a lot for one exhaust fan to cope with so there may be some heat buildup inside the case.

Sometimes it’s better to have a rad as exhaust just to remove the heat. As well as fighting against thermodynamics trying to push heat down inside the case, especially at such low rpm.

Probably better having top as exhaust IMO.
 
I would go with the above suggestion simply to remove the heat from inside your case, with so many intakes you'll end up with a high positive pressure inside. But don't ignore the fact that airflow within the case will help cool your mobo and the vrms too.
As it stands right now you are dumping all the heat from your loop inside your case, and not giving it much of way to exhaust it. So keep the rads as intake and have the rear and top as exhaust
 
Should be ok, however always worth testing as it’s a lot for one exhaust fan to cope with so there may be some heat buildup inside the case.

Sometimes it’s better to have a rad as exhaust just to remove the heat. As well as fighting against thermodynamics trying to push heat down inside the case.
Hot air through rads an issue?
I would go with the above suggestion simply to remove the heat from inside your case, with so many intakes you'll end up with a high positive pressure inside. But don't ignore the fact that airflow within the case will help cool your mobo and the vrms too.
As it stands right now you are dumping all the heat from your loop inside your case, and not giving it much of way to exhaust it. So keep the rads as intake and have the rear and top as exhaust

My concern here is reducing the effectiveness of the radiators breathing hot air.
 
The air won't heat your loop up more than keeping all the air inside your case. I just noticed you have 2 rads in the top.
The heat from inside the case won't heat your loop up with that much rad space, and you will still be able to run your fans at a low rpm.
 
The air won't heat your loop up more than keeping all the air inside your case. I just noticed you have 2 rads in the top.
The heat from inside the case won't heat your loop up with that much rad space, and you will still be able to run your fans at a low rpm.
Okay, so I should:

Bottom 480 intake:
Front 360 Intake:
Back 120: Intake
Top 480 x2 : Exhaust

That sound like a good approach?
 
That would be my suggestion and I am running that style of airflow, but try for yourself, you can always flip the fans back on the top rads if you aren't happy.
What works for one build doesn't always work for everyone else, especially if they are using different fans for rads and case fans, with different airflow ratings and rpm.
If you decide to start going down the "Absolute best" configuration you wcan spend a lot of time in reconfiguring and tweaking. Just go with what makes you happy, and if you're not happy, try swapping something round.
But with your your radiator real estate, I am pretty sure you will never have to set your rad fans above 800 rpm to maintain sub 60C even under an all day gaming/work load
 
That would be my suggestion and I am running that style of airflow, but try for yourself, you can always flip the fans back on the top rads if you aren't happy.
What works for one build doesn't always work for everyone else, especially if they are using different fans for rads and case fans, with different airflow ratings and rpm.
If you decide to start going down the "Absolute best" configuration you wcan spend a lot of time in reconfiguring and tweaking. Just go with what makes you happy, and if you're not happy, try swapping something round.
But with your your radiator real estate, I am pretty sure you will never have to set your rad fans above 800 rpm to maintain sub 60C even under an all day gaming/work load
Thanks for the info, Ideally I am looking to run all the fans at 200rpm max while maintaining a 10 degree delta water temperature wise. Hopefully that is achievable with this setup.
 
200rpm is the absolute lowest the Arctic fans will run at, they're silent all the way up to 700rpm, you will get the noise of air moving at around the 900-1000 rpm range.
I'm lazy to install my temp sensor so I'm running mine at 600rpm until 60C on the cpu then they ramp up to 1200 rpm. Once the water temp sensor is in I will have better control on my fan curve and loop temps, but I'm doing no more work to it until I get a new gpu and put it into my loop. Right now my 5700 XT gpu is the hottest thing in my rig
 
Thanks for the info, Ideally I am looking to run all the fans at 200rpm max while maintaining a 10 degree delta water temperature wise. Hopefully that is achievable with this setup.

Should be quite easily. Depends on the hardware in question.

I have my fans to minimum idle 400rpm. They are absolutely silent at this range. And then come up to around 850rpm maximum.

If I let the fans run at idle the loop doesn’t get that much warmer and still within spec even with overclock on gpu and cpu. However my pc is several feet away and cannot be heard at 850rpm anyway so I’m happy to keep on that when under load.

I only have 2x480mm’s so yours should be much more efficient at lower rpm.

Also note that sometimes less speed doesn’t equal less noise. My pump at minimum speed for example is noisier than at 1800rpm which is what it runs 24/7 and is absolutely silent.
 
Hey everyone,

Currently in the process of setting up my custom loop, I am not sure what the optimal setup will be for my fans and radiators. The case has 2 480mm rads up top, 1 360mm at the front, 1 480mm at the bottom.

Case fans are Artic P12's x 16 which will run at a maximum of 200rpm (hopefully lol)

Currently I am thinking of setting all rads to intake and exhausting out of the back, so that rads get the coolest air, thoughts on this?

hKRx6qx.png
I would use top and bottom as intake, front and rear exhaust. In this case, at least, as some slightly warmer air being blown overt the motherboard will offer benefits, no doubt.
 
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