wave tank resevoir

craarc · 26 Mar 2012 at 01:24

sitting here contemplating a new resevoir and was thinkin..

anyone rememebr the old wave tank type sideboard things that had oil and water mix and were illuminated.?

this type of thing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBQSMB_9vfs&feature=related

well i was thinking for a bit of fun make one as a pc resevoir as long as the motion is slow and the water intake and outlet are high enough above the oil water turbulance level, the oil to not suck the oil into the pump and the diference in specific gravity of the oil used is a lot diferent from the water they wont mix. and you could have a really nice external resevoir as a feature

sort of like this but not so naff lookin you could also have like a false tank so one half is separated from the other with a film membrane. so it would look like one tank but actually there would be no chance of the 2 fluids mixing

that would then give you a wider range of oils or fluids to be used in the bottom half of the tank ... so the effect could be greater with less risk of contamination to the water side....

what u reckon i may build one for a laf

JonJ678 · 26 Mar 2012 at 20:26

Sucking oil through the loop by accident probably wont hurt anything if it does happen, I think you're good to go.

Jokester · 26 Mar 2012 at 20:30

I think you'll need a fairly substantial depth of water to avoid it mixing. Water will be on the bottom, as most other liquids you could use will be less dense and will float on top.

ThePengu1n · 26 Mar 2012 at 22:20

An interesting idea for sure, give it a go, just make sure you test it on some old components in case it goes ****-up

craarc · 27 Mar 2012 at 02:19

yer apolgies the oil wil be on top it was late and i was mulling things around a bit i just thought it would look good and be a bit of fun to set up ...

added

im on the look out for a quiet tilt mech now . and a tank maybe 500mm x 80-100 mm diameter or a tube of plexiglass i can probably get it threaded and capped then just cut a few 1/4 bsp threads with caps and then inserts

im thinking a tilt of 15-20 degrees would be enough and also to have the unit or the tilt of the unit switchable so it could sitt in the horizontal or tilting for a nice effect..

Bubo · 27 Mar 2012 at 09:34

A few things to consider.

How do you intend to fill the loop, water first, bleed, then add some oil?
How will you deal with air which would collect in this res? Bleed off and replace with oil?
When it comes to draining the loop, where will the oil go? I.e, will it be forced to contaminate part of the loop when draining.
Would oil be poisinous to microbial life so it wouldn't "go off", i.e. the same as water will kill coil?

The main benefit of this idea I guess is using the water flow to promote the swirling affect, instead of a tilt mechanism. You would only want the tilt facility when the loop is off I woud have thought, plus with tubes attached to the res it would probably be quite "stiff" to get to tilt.

As others have said your biggest problem is going to be to get enough flow for a water cooling loop, without ending up with simply mixing the oil and water.

Edit: Personally I would go to extreme lengths to ensure no oil got into the loop or into the blocks, as if a film of oil ends up coating your blocks it would probably harm the conductivity.

joemo13 · 27 Mar 2012 at 11:31

I think it will be pretty hard to do. To get a low flow rate you could try using 2 reservoirs, the wave and a normal one, a T to split the flow between them and a reducer so that you only have very small pipes heading to the wave res. Then join the outlet line from the wave res to the normal one, though I'm not sure if you would get enough flow then.

Bubo · 27 Mar 2012 at 14:33

The dual res idea above is probably the only way this will work. You could put a valve either side of the oil res so you could regulate the flow and also isolate it from the rest of the system. This also solves the problems with filling/bleeding/draining I mention above. Though to me it would still be unknown how it would behave in the long term in terms of it going off or some such, I suppose there would be some inorganic liquid that could be used as well as bog standard oil.

craarc · 28 Mar 2012 at 00:13

okie in answer

the loop wont have 2 fluids in it only the res (unless there is crossflow or contamination) so depending on where the suction side of the pump is it will only take one of the fluids. (hopefully)

the air will sit at the top of the res separate from the 2 fluids exactly as it does with one fluid .. ( i have air buffers in 2 of my 3 resevoirs in my current loop. only because i like the effect of not having full resevoirs and seeing the surface turbulance)

the oil will sit on top of the water intake and outlet either by head. or a thin membrane. (if i can get enough depth the diference in specific gravity of fluids will separate them enough)

oil contaminant... maybe i need to look at that a bit more but if there were 2 chambers with lets say a fine membrane or even a thicker one that is hardly noticable beween oil ( or a more viscous fluid) and the water its relativly easy to separate the fluids i am thinking (thats if the diference in specific gravity of fluids doesnt stop them from mixing)

yes the benefit is purely an aesthetic thing it serves no purpose other than that and fun setting it up.

i dont really need a dual loop as the oil (or viscous fluid) has only to stay in the wave tank .. if the fluids have enough separation then there will be minimal contamination . but that concern made me think of the separation of fluids by a membrane so yes it is a concern of sort..