I have a WC loop, and it is running a little low on water. Just recently it has been looking a little cloudy. It is not too bad, but I was wondering if I could kill two birds with one stone.
I have a metric but ton of rubbing alcohol and I was wondering if I could use it to top of my reservoir.
It should kill what ever is in the loop (if anything at all), and it would be such a small amount that I doubt it would really effect the chemical properties of the water. (ie, lubricating the water pump and such)
I have not really heard of anyone using alcohol in their loops before, so I am assuming there is something probably wrong with the idea.
Is this a dumb idea? Am I a genius? Or is this so stupid that I should hide my face in shame?
Yeah, adding alcohol will not improve the cooling any, but you probably won't notice. If you are just worried about bacteria and gunk build up, they make an antibacterial solution used for home humidifiers. That will be more effective than tremendously watered down alcohol. Are you just running straight water or are you actually running a cooling solution?
Well hehe this is where it gets fun.. if you add more than capful or you have ANY rubber parts.. it will slowly eat those away... put rubber in 30 percent isopropyl solution and come back in a day or two.. you will see what happens.. but hey if you use no metal.. I do not see why not... (silver kill coils are BETTER)
I actually do have a silver kill coil in the loop. For the longest time, it was working (its been well over 2 years with the coil and maybe 3 months since my last clean out) and now it seems like it might not be doing such a good job.
In any case, I just said screw it and threw in some tap water. I am trying to hold out until AMD can get their shit together and release the 390X. Then I will do a complete tear down and do a proper custom rig.
Yeah dont add any IMO if you dont know If the o rings or tubing is compatible with the alc. Distilled water and boil the blocks and such if your worried or for a few bucks get a kill coil or some ethylene glycol.
From what I remember from microbiology class, around 50% alcohol is most effective at killing pathogens. The things growing in a loop may not be pathogens, but I imagine alcohol has a similar effect. In short, it would take a large volume of alcohol to kill any microbes while surely doing damage to various plastic and rubber bits, as others have stated.