Bloo Balls by Cheapskate

The Cooling

From the beginning, I wanted to make my own watercooling components. I knew I could not increase the surface area of the waterblock by cutting neat fins, so I worked with the biggest flat surface possible. I had some 1 1/4 inch thick plexi sheet that I cut into a maze pattern top. I used copper pipe because I wanted the tubing to help with heat transfer, while also avoiding hose kinking. I sanded and polished all the tubing. I’m still waiting for my fingertips to heal after that.

While the CPU block was a great success, my attempts at north bridge cooling were terrible failures. I was forced to shop around for an outdated replacement motherboard once the last attempt failed too miserably.

The reservoir was a simple tube, cut at an odd angle. It became a source of many fitting issues as parts started to compete for space. Seated with it is the fill port, which is a self-sealing connector that I nipped from a soda syrup canister.

To avoid the sometimes catastrophic effects of thermal expansion, I added an accordion bottle to the reservoir. I knew the reservoir would pop like a zit if I kept the loop sealed, but I didn’t want to leave the coolant exposed to the air.


Massive Pentium 4 real estate has kept me from upgrading. The copper plate weighs a full pound. I milled the channels out on the drill press and sealed the parts with silicone glue. The springs are from a Delta faucet repair kit. Reduce, re-use, recycle!


I have a lot of experience in plumbing, but this was some crazy work. I had to re-solder several parts until the fit was perfect. I filed off excess solder and appled lacquer to keep my polish work shiny.


The north bridge blocks are bad ideas number one and two. The first was made with polycarbonate, which I later found deteriorates when exposed to antifreeze. Oops! The second block was simply too massive to seat on the chip properly.


The reservoir mount has a locking holder for the fill port. The self sealing port looks awesome, but I've found it to be difficult to use in practice. Live and learn!