H80i in custom loop?

[Outlaw85]

1. I'm new to water cooling.
2. I plan to overclock now, in the future, after the loop is completed.
3. Got over excited and bought a little too much. (not a bad thing yet).

What I'm cooling
EVGA GTX 660 SC
i7-4770K

Hopefully fit in (with some mods OK);
Fractal Node 304 ITX case

Currently installed on the CPU is an H80i which seems to be OK for keeping the 4770K at 4.2Ghz. Doing stress test, it peaked at 75c on one of the cores with a single fan on low/med. I don't stress this thing much other than gaming at the moment.

Also, with looking to use the kill coil and distilled with colored or uv tubing, should I use a reservoir or just stuff into the tubing?

I am looking to mount whatever I add to the inside of the case. I am OK with cutting some holes/slots in the top to accommodate the large rad.

I am wondering if the H80i pump is strong enough to;
A. Add another 120mm rad/fan
B. Remove 120mm rad/fan and change it out for dual fan rad using 140mm's.

I don't have a CPU block at the moment and looking to just kill 2 birds with one stone. The Corsair link software is pretty neat as far as monitoring goes. If the pump isn't up to the task, I can use an MCP355 although it will change my current plan of install.

I've done some research but I haven't found much where people are modding the loops of the H80/i like they did with the originals (H50's.. and such).

Any help is appreciated.
Outlaw

 

[W.Feather]

Ill just give a brief answer now, and when more awake (if no one beats me to it) elaborate...

Short answer, dont do what you suggest. The H80 is a all in one cooler, its is not designed to incorporate anything additional in the loop. This is just asking for trouble all around. If your going to go with a water system your best off using parts designed for the purpose.

 

[dragonstongue]

not to mention the cost, adding parts to said H80i, you are best off on getting a custom loop kit, the low cost ones can be had for ~$140, H80i is what $90+, so while H series coolers are decent for what they do, Haswell does not deal nicely with liquid to begin with at least in the case of AIO coolers when most decent air get the exact same temps +/- a few c, custom loops however are a different story as they have a much higher liquid capacity, more efficient rads, better pumps(generally) a wider range of cooling fans that will work with them etc.

In other words, be happy with the H80 for what it is doing, haswell gets hot to begin with when you start overclocking it, you cannot expect to beat physics, and like W.Feather stated, you are asking for trouble if you try and mod that H80, can it be done yes, but do you know what liquid to be using, the proper liquid to be using, are you sure it will not kill the pump, is it worth trying to mod a unit that works to maybe make it work a bit better?

IMHO sell it or worry about custom if that's what you would like to do, don't try to make a sealed unit a custom loop.

 

[Outlaw85]

Thanks for the responses.

Fair enough. I will stick to full custom. Like I said, I do have the majority of the parts. It is just getting the last few pieces. My experience is with the closed loop AIO's only.

On to the custom loop.
Looking to do;
Pump MCP355 > CPU > GPU EK Full Cover > Rad Coolgate 280 > Res Bitspower Z-Multi 150 > Back to Pump

I would still need to see how and where the pump/res would fit but my thinking was having the rad above the res entering it from the top, then the pump pulling from the bottom to push to the cpu.

Due to space restrictions, I would be limited to fan configuration on the rad. I would either be able to do a push OR pull OR push/pull on one side only with a push OR pull on the other.

Thanks,
Outlaw