ok, so my idea is illustrated below and describes my idea.
please note that this is just an idea i had and will not be able to try this for at least 6months to a year (or later), but i would just like to know if it would work
Flow rate is really important to heat exchange, so a pump would be best, also I'm pretty sure the fluid would just level out and not move without one. Another thing is that having less fluid is better for water cooling. The heat exchange is most efficient once the system has reached it equilibrium, which will happen faster if there is less fluid, so a small loop is best.
It would work. Tho you are going to need something larger then a stranded PC pump. I would also not use the pipes that are in the home but rather some new clean tubeing as you don't want the water block to get clogged.
in the middle is a pump to push water from the "cool" (blue) tank to the heat sources (cpu, gpu, ram, etc).
the question is: will the fact of fluid dynamics (here) were the two tanks will try to level the water level out work / work fast enough to keep up with a PC water pump (say a D5 or something) lowering the level in the blue and filling up the red to flow around the bottom (car radiator) and back up the the blue for the pump to start the cycle again.
2nd, the part about having a smaller loop is better doesn't make since. 1. i'm trying to get the heat from my computer out of my room (particularly during the summer were my room reaches 90F) so it will have to be a big loop. 2. the bigger the loop the more water there is to warm up, thus the water doesn't get as hot, and thus easier to cool which means better cooled pc.
1. the point of the question is to see if I can use a standard pc pump to move water from blue to red and have the natural effect of water equalizing to move the water to the basement and back up.
2. the old pipe will only be used to route the nice new clean hose through. although i am thinking that i am going to use 1" hose for a good flow and 2x 1" hoses will not fit in the old pipe so i will just have to run it the other way i know of, it is just not as straight of a shot to the basement.
You're not trying to store the heat in the water, you're trying to remove the heat from the system. Less fluid means that the heat is moving from the source to the sink faster and therefore the heat exchange is more efficient.
You also don't need a separate reservoir for the hot and cold liquid, ideally the liquid should be moving fast enough that there isn't much of a difference in temperature between the water at the water block and the water at the radiator. What will happen is that the liquid will be cooler than the cpu and will therefore absorb the heat, the temperature of the water will increase until it reaches a point where the difference in temperature between the water and the air at the radiator is high enough that the energy absorbed from the cpu will be released at the radiator and the water will no longer gain temperature. This is called equilibrium and is the point at which the heat exchange is most efficient. So the less liquid in the loop the quicker you reach this point.
What I'm saying is that having the radiator in a cooler location would work, as having a greater difference in temperature between the hot and cold parts will be better for energy exchange. But I don't think the liquid will move fast enough (or at all, it will probably just level out) without it being pumped though the radiator. Also considering the size of the loop, the size or the radiator and the fact that you're pumping against several meters of gravity by going down the the basement, you may even need more than one pump to keep the flow rate up.
EDIT: I've had a better look and I can see how it would flow through the system if the reservoirs are sealed, but you really don't need to have two reservoirs, having a single one and pumping the liquid though the loop would be simpler and work much better.
the whole point of the project would be so i do not need to invest in a big pump or multiple pumps in order to get the water to be pushed against several feet of pressure. if the natural flow of water will work i'll use it.
and you stated that
But I don't think the liquid will move fast enough (or at all, it will probably just level out) without it being pumped though the radiator.
the water will try to equalize naturally. which would be the reason for using a 1" hose to allow for a higher flow of water (with out the presure of a water pump forcing it) through the fluid dynamics of equalization.
I don't think it will work, not well anyway. I can see how water would move from the higher tank to the lower tank, but what you are essentially doing is sucking out of the red tank via the radiator, all the hose, and the blue tank. This will very hard for the pump to do, it will be much easier to suck out of one tank and push the liquid through the rest of the system, but even that may be too much for a small pump.
I understand what you're saying about the tanks equalizing, but that only works in one direction, to get the liquid back up to the red tank again you need to overcome all the gravity in the system, otherwise it would just be perpetual motion.
With that air hose going between the two tanks what will probably happen is the level in the blue tank will drop as the level in the red tank rises, either the pump will suck air or the red tank will fill to the point where liquid goes in to the air hose and completes the loop. If the tanks were sealed the pump would be pumping not just the blue tank but also the radiator and the hoses all the way back to the red tank. If they were open the pump would drain the blue tank and suck dry. I really think it will work better with a single reservoir, but one small pump may not be enough, but it will work better sucking from one reservoir and pushing in to everything else than trying to suck through half of the system.
the point of the 2 tanks is so that the water pump isn't pushing against the pressure of all the water in the rest of the loop, and have the equilization effect move water to/from the basement.
I understand what you want to do. But i think it would be much easier to just have something like a aquarium pump move the water to the PC and back to the rad and then to a tank where the pump is.
I think what will happen is that because the equalization effect will be much slower than the pump the blue tank will either suck dry or the red tank will overflow and fill back in to the blue tank, so the loop won't go through the radiator.