My liquid cooling exploits have not been entirely successful. I recently noticed an increase in gurgling noises in the system, and discovered an unusual decrease in the coolant level.
Since Inertx no longer seems to be available, this is rather a concern, especially as my reserves have been depleted by the previous problems and inevitable losses whilst draining the system. However, I could not discover the source of the leak, and I couldn't believe that evaporation was suddenly the cause of the problem. This is actually a downside to Inertx, very small leaks cannot be seen, since the fluid evaporates too quickly.
With no other alternative, I prepared a mix of distilled water and the originally supplied additive. Once having filled the system, I ran it without powering up the mainboard for sometime to try to spot any leaks. It was only after sometime that the problem became apparent. The pump had developed a tiny leak (so small I could not see the fault under a 30x microscope):
I have no idea whether this is due to some effect of the InertX or a latent defect in the pump. What is particularly galling is that I threw out the spare pump body from previous failure in a junk clearout.
So now the watercooling has been removed and I'm back to air cooling (irritatingly noisy) until the arrival of the new Asetek 12V pump system. We'll see how that goes.
