ahillsbe

My name is Andrew and I am from Idaho. I have only done some mild air-cooled overclocking with the ultra-120.
I recently bought a htpc case that I want to throw my hardware in. obviously the ultra-120 will not fit... i need a new cooling solution. enter my idea...

I want to control this

using this method

using this

Basically, I want to use the crydom circuit to control the TEC with the PC. I will chill a loop of coolant outside of the pc, and use some sort of heat exchanger to cool the internal water loop. Maybe a submerged coil of copper tube..... in the externally chilled reservoir.

What do you guys think? Any ideas or other solutions would be great. Let me know if I need to clarify anything.

DuckieHo

This is in a HTPC? Where will you place the 2nd PSU?

Better yet... why does a HTPC need TEC cooling? A HTPC should be able to get away with near passive cooling.

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ahillsbe

The pump and cpu/video card blocks will be the only watercooling components in the htpc. I will have the loop exit the htpc to a heat exchanger that is cooled by the TEC. Think chilled aluminum tank with submerged rad/copper tube coil. This is not your typical htpc...

flak-spammer

First problem how do you plan to chill the water with the TEC?

ahillsbe

I dunno... I could use a plexi-glass container, cut out a rectangle on the lid, buy a rectangle of copper, screw the copper to the outside of the plexi-glass container covering the square hole with a sealing gasket, mount cold side to copper block. Maybe throw some heatsinks on the inside....

or..

Mount a hard drive cooler to the cold side of the tec and pump this external loop to a heat exchanger, for the internal loop.

or...

mount the tec to an insulated aluminum container.

a few ideas off the top of my head.

I am more concerned about providing power to the tec via the usb/crydom circuit. (take a look at my original post... I fixed the dead links)

flak-spammer

Uhh so you want to use a relay (electro-mechanical switch) to power a TEC? Perhaps you should try something simply by using a meanwell PSU to power the TEC. A relay is simply just a switch.

t_russell

Most people use a water cooling loop to cool the hot side of a TEC as the cold side is on the CPU. Not the other way around, What will you do with the heat?

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flak-spammer

I think he intends to watercool the hotside as well as directly cooling water with the cold side. However my interest is with how much he knows about TEC's before entering this project.

t_russell

Complicated and inefficient for a chiller.

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flak-spammer

I would agree with you there, since the more surface area on both sides the better. I would say he should buy a few proper TEC blocks for cooling and something that will increase the surface area for the chilled side ie buy or build a block.