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View Full Version : Bored with your computer? Try taking it for a ride in mineral oil! :D


Lucifiel
June 4th, 2007, 02:34 PM
Bored with your computer? Try taking it for a ride in mineral oil! :D But besides that, take a good look at the video. ;)

http://www.youtube.com/v/PtufuXLvOok
starcraft.man
June 4th, 2007, 02:49 PM
Uhhhh, uh....... I'm not that daring, I think I'll pass. I aim to keep my old p4 for years....
init1
June 4th, 2007, 05:01 PM
Wow! I didn't know you could do that. I would have thought that the mineral oil would cause shorts, but I guess I was wrong!
Sunflower1970
June 4th, 2007, 05:26 PM
Uhh wow. That was interesting. I'm not that daring...

I wasn't able to watch it with sound, so I don't know if they explained anything...but would one do this for cooling purposes? Or just for fun...
srt4play
June 4th, 2007, 05:27 PM
cooling purposes.
Sunflower1970
June 4th, 2007, 05:29 PM
cooling purposes.


Thanks :)
FuturePilot
June 4th, 2007, 05:30 PM
Mineral oil doesn't conduct electricity.
Dylnuge
June 4th, 2007, 05:31 PM
Sounds like an interesting video. I will take a look when I get home (where YouTube is not blocked).
Lucifiel
June 5th, 2007, 05:24 AM
Hehehehe... it's fun to tinker around with your pc. Perhaps one day, I'll give this a try. :p
Adamant1988
June 5th, 2007, 05:29 AM
The instant the funds are available for me to try that.. I'm doing it. Wow. How's that for a novelty PC to sell, haha. I would think that would have very negative effects on the hard drive though...
FuturePilot
June 5th, 2007, 05:31 AM
Except if you ever need to get at a piece of hardware, that could be a mess:shock:
kvonb
June 5th, 2007, 05:49 AM
That's actually a damn good solution to heat problems.

I've been searching for an efficient and silent cooling method for my main system, I'm so sick of the fan noise.

I might have to look into a variation of that.

Are there any other names for "Mineral Oil"? It might be called something else over here.

.
Emerzen
June 5th, 2007, 06:00 AM
Interesting, but does it actually keep your equipment cooler than air? How is the heat dissipated if there's no circulation?
freakavoid
June 5th, 2007, 06:00 AM
This is an engineer's nightmare. Sure, this piece of hardware works now but what if they use it in mineral oil!!!!
southernman
June 5th, 2007, 07:20 AM
SWEEEEEET! Thanks Lucifel


but what if they use it in mineral oil!!!!Didn't you see the video?
Lucifiel
June 5th, 2007, 07:28 AM
Geez... c'mon, didn't anyone pay attention to the LCD screen when he did the first setup? :p

That plus the cool factor of this video makes it a rather awesome thing to pass around! :D
Bigbluecat
June 5th, 2007, 07:36 AM
The instant the funds are available for me to try that.. I'm doing it. Wow. How's that for a novelty PC to sell, haha. I would think that would have very negative effects on the hard drive though...
__________________

If you look carefully you will see that the hard drive is not immersed. It is sitting at the side of the tank for most of the video and right at the end for the final build it is sitting on top.
southernman
June 5th, 2007, 07:44 AM
Geez... c'mon, didn't anyone pay attention to the LCD screen when he did the first setup? :p

That plus the cool factor of this video makes it a rather awesome thing to pass around! :DDuh... I noticed the Ubuntu splash screen, just didn't say anything about it. It's such a natural sight now. :-\"
Lucifiel
June 5th, 2007, 07:49 AM
Duh... I noticed the Ubuntu splash screen, just didn't say anything about it. It's such a natural sight now. :-\"

Yeah but it's awesome. :D

Doesn't anyone care about Ubuntu? :(:lolflag:\\:D/ (I'm joking!)
southernman
June 5th, 2007, 07:55 AM
Now that I think of it, that's the main reason I replied originally the way you saw it. (SWEEEEEEET!) Other than being a really ingenious thing to do. They are fellow Ubuntuers (sp) as well.


Doesn't anyone care about Ubuntu?*looks around while whistling* lol - jk!
Lucifiel
June 5th, 2007, 08:09 AM
Now that I think of it, that's the main reason I replied originally the way you saw it. (SWEEEEEEET!) Other than being a really ingenious thing to do. They are fellow Ubuntuers (sp) as well.

*looks around while whistling* lol - jk!

Yeah... it FREAKING rocks!!!!

JUMPS IN JOY!!!!

Sorry, I'll stop with the caps now. ;)
Pugwash
June 5th, 2007, 08:14 AM
That's great, I can't believe it worked! Thanks for this.
Polygon
June 5th, 2007, 11:35 AM
i chuckled when i saw the ubuntu feisty splash screen on that guys comp

i laughed even harder when i saw he was running 3dmark05 on his computer......submersed in mineral oil. that is really epic... i wanna try that
init1
June 5th, 2007, 12:05 PM
Uhh wow. That was interesting. I'm not that daring...

I wasn't able to watch it with sound, so I don't know if they explained anything...but would one do this for cooling purposes? Or just for fun...
No explaining in sound, just music. You didn't miss anything
init1
June 5th, 2007, 12:08 PM
Interesting, but does it actually keep your equipment cooler than air? How is the heat dissipated if there's no circulation?
Manual stirring, maybe?
eentonig
June 5th, 2007, 12:16 PM
Actually, this experiment has been done before a few years back. And it was indeed a study for cooling purposes. But you would need to create a current (is this a correct word? To move the water.) so the heat gets spread.
regomodo
June 5th, 2007, 12:26 PM
definitely an improvement on vegetable oil systems.

Surely the vast amount of oil and surface area of the case would be sufficient to not require a circulation system. I wonder if anyone has tried this with all the fans turned off as that oil must be putting hell of a load on them.
Lord Illidan
June 5th, 2007, 12:37 PM
Looked good.. I laughed hard when I saw the bubbles though!
mips
June 5th, 2007, 02:20 PM
Are there any other names for "Mineral Oil"? It might be called something else over here.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mineral_oil

The above has a long list of other names.

Another option is 3M Fluorinert, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluorinert
tedbeau
June 5th, 2007, 02:43 PM
I was wondering about the fans on the power supply and the graphics card also. It would seem that the oil has to be keeping them from spinning at their designed speed. I would assume that this is not ideal for them.
I would suggest removing or disabling them and providing another method to create a current flow in the mineral oil, perhaps an aquarium filter pump. I suppose the bubbler would provide a flow but I would also be concerned about a bubble settling on a motherboard chip surface and causing a hot spot.
Tundro Walker
June 6th, 2007, 03:59 PM
Yeah, I thought I saw something like this a while back, and they didn't it as a cooling measure for their computer. (I think it was on "ghetto-tech" web-site...where they do all kinds of $0 cost mods to their computers, like using pennies as RAM heat sinks, tubes made from paper to dump cold air from outside directly onto the CPU, etc). I'm not sure how the oil would cool the computer though. Yes, it has a greater surface area on the parts (it's covering everything), but I would think over time the ambient temp of the oil would go up, and after a while it'd fry the computer. And what's the point of having the fan? Anyways, looks like a one-way trip for your hardware. Needs to have some fake fish bobbing around in there...and a little scuba guy with a chest.

I noticed they used Ubuntu for the "crappy hardware" and then said "and now for the good stuff" and booted Windows XP on it. At first, I was kinda insulted..."hey, are you saying Windows XP is 'the good stuff'?!" Then I realized they probably had to boot Ubuntu on the old hardware, because

1) it was old, crappy hardware that they wanted to quickly install on OS on (which Ubuntu does wonderfully)

2) They wanted to know for sure that the OS would detect and run all the hardware in one go without screwing around with drivers (again, which Ubuntu does wonderfully).

I wasn't too insulted then...LOL!
EdThaSlayer
June 6th, 2007, 05:54 PM
I would never try this. What if, what if something goes wrong and you need to change a graphics card?Would you have to drain all of the mineral oil first?
Lord Illidan
June 6th, 2007, 06:08 PM
I would never try this. What if, what if something goes wrong and you need to change a graphics card?Would you have to drain all of the mineral oil first?

It gets worse.. what if you have to return the graphics card to the reseller?..um, don't worry about the grease, I just put it in mineral oil.
mips
June 6th, 2007, 06:15 PM
I was wondering about the fans on the power supply and the graphics card also. It would seem that the oil has to be keeping them from spinning at their designed speed. I would assume that this is not ideal for them.
I would suggest removing or disabling them and providing another method to create a current flow in the mineral oil, perhaps an aquarium filter pump. I suppose the bubbler would provide a flow but I would also be concerned about a bubble settling on a motherboard chip surface and causing a hot spot.

A better option would be to run the mineral oil through a small chiller like those used in marine aquariums or you could use one from a water fountain.

I would not put the PSU in there though. What if you get condensation and get some water in there ?
Henry Rayker
June 6th, 2007, 06:16 PM
Cray did this with some (or all?) of their machines at some point. They were submerged in, I believe, liquid nitrogen, but I could be wrong...I believe they had a waterfall type structure in a display constantly flowing over the machine...
mips
June 6th, 2007, 08:07 PM
Cray did this with some (or all?) of their machines at some point. They were submerged in, I believe, liquid nitrogen, but I could be wrong...I believe they had a waterfall type structure in a display constantly flowing over the machine...

Cray used Flourinert (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flourinert) in the Cray-2, -3, -4, T90 and X1, the waterfall was to 'degass' the liquid