Popular Post Menace Posted April 15, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted April 15, 2022 Backstory: I got this RS in December 2020. It is a 1st gen. Old big bearing with old bearing shields. No LCD. Green Controller. It frequently got pretty hot, especially since I live in NM. What I have done to it: 1. Speaker grills (made from speaker grills from a radio 2.silicone between shell halves 3. knobby tire 4. drilled drain holes in bearing shields 5.Clark pads gen 3 foam 6.clark bumpers 7. clark pedals 8. zen bearings (old ones got water in them a while ago) 9. headphone jack wired in parallel to beeper (I will be putting LEDs in my helmet) 10. liquid cooling for the control board 11. Some cool stickers 12. outer shell screws switched to Allen head Liquid cooling system: I removed an area of fins from the feeble heatsink on the back of the controller and attached a 40mm copper water block in its place using thermal paste and glued with epoxy. The water lines run from the water block through the hollow motor bore to the front left compartment, where a 5v water pump is housed. The pump pulls cool water from an externally mounted radiator and pushes it though the water block and back to the radiator. The pump is wired in parallel with the usb port and cannot be turned off. The radiator fan is connected to the unused 12v headlight fan port. It can be turned off with a small switch and easily removed because I used a modular connector for its wire. The front of the radiator is attached with 2 screws through the outer shell and the back is mounted using a brass bracket. The bracket is attached to the radiator with strong double sided tape and to the power pad using a slit filled with silicone that I slid the bracket into. The holes where the water lines exit the shell are sealed with silicone. I left the stock fan untouched and sealed the two little airflow holes on the right side of the shell. Beeper: I soldered a headphone jack in parallel to the beeper. The port is right next to your leg on the right side above the power pad. Idea is that I run a coiled audio cable up to my helmet to a 12v led strip so I get a visual warning ( I can't hear the beeps well) 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizra6ot Posted April 16, 2022 Share Posted April 16, 2022 Nice how many degrees did you gain? 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Menace Posted April 16, 2022 Author Share Posted April 16, 2022 (edited) I have yet to test it in the really hot weather, but today at about 60F riding hard the stock fan didn't even come on. Hopefully it will be warmer tomorrow so I can really test it. The LED beeper in my helmet works so well though. I have a red led strip mounted in my helmet just in my peripheral vision and I noticed the flashes immediately. I highly recommend it since it is actually pretty easy to do. Edited April 16, 2022 by Menace 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tawpie Posted April 16, 2022 Share Posted April 16, 2022 Just a thought... have you considered using something non-water based for your cooling fluid? Mineral oil or something like that? Just in case of, you know, leaks. I suppose though, in NM any moisture is gone pronto. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Menace Posted April 16, 2022 Author Share Posted April 16, 2022 2 hours ago, Tawpie said: Just a thought... have you considered using something non-water based for your cooling fluid? Mineral oil or something like that? Just in case of, you know, leaks. I suppose though, in NM any moisture is gone pronto. Hmm, no I hadn't. I used antifreeze like they use in cars, since I didn't want to have to worry about freezing. So far no leaks, but I may look into mineral oil anyways. Ok, looks like it is not electrically conductive too, I may actually switch to mineral oil! Thanks! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
litewave Posted April 16, 2022 Share Posted April 16, 2022 18 minutes ago, Menace said: Hmm, no I hadn't. I used antifreeze like they use in cars, since I didn't want to have to worry about freezing. So far no leaks, but I may look into mineral oil anyways. Ok, looks like it is not electrically conductive too, I may actually switch to mineral oil! Thanks! I have never heard of anyone using mineral oil as internal liquid cooling on PC builds. I believe mineral oil has poor thermal properties for heat exchange and does not dissipate heat effectively. There has been much experimentation with mineral oil as an immersive coolant over the past 10-15 years: ie, submersing an entire pc in a tank filled with it, but that would be too bulky and impossible to do. iirc the consensus is that it is not as good as conventional liquid cooling. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyTop Posted April 16, 2022 Share Posted April 16, 2022 They do make non conductive coolants. Not sure what they are made out of. just google search. @Menace Nice project. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Menace Posted April 16, 2022 Author Popular Post Share Posted April 16, 2022 (edited) Here are my results: 80 degree Fahrenheit ambient temperature. I threw basically everything at it. High speed cruising at 65-70 kph for about 10 min, pushing it hard up several steep 100 m long hills, strong headwinds half the time, strong braking, hard acceleration. The highest temperature I saw was 52C right after a hill. Most of the time it was hovering around 49-50C. It took approximately 30-45s for it to drop down below 45C (where the stock fan will turn off when stationary) after stopping. Overall it seems to be about an 8-10C improvement over the stock heatsink that I remember floating around 60C under similar conditions. I believe the overheat warning on the RS is 70 or 75C and when it gets hotter in the summer it often got into the 65C range. Overall I am really happy with my results. Time will tell how durable it is. The only weakness I see are the potential for a leak or breaking the radiator in a crash. Luckily these 80mm radiators are cheap and I routed my water tubes to avoid electronics and was careful to make sure they sealed nicely. They don't go on the right side at all and only in the front bottom compartment on the left side and all internal ones have beefy hose claps at the connectors. Edited April 18, 2022 by Menace 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul A Posted April 17, 2022 Share Posted April 17, 2022 Nice work. Next project, water cooled riding jacket if you could, thanks. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
windowmaker Posted May 4, 2022 Share Posted May 4, 2022 On 4/15/2022 at 2:12 PM, Menace said: Backstory: I got this RS in December 2020. It is a 1st gen. Old big bearing with old bearing shields. No LCD. Green Controller. It frequently got pretty hot, especially since I live in NM. What I have done to it: 1. Speaker grills (made from speaker grills from a radio 2.silicone between shell halves 3. knobby tire 4. drilled drain holes in bearing shields 5.Clark pads gen 3 foam 6.clark bumpers 7. clark pedals 8. zen bearings (old ones got water in them a while ago) 9. headphone jack wired in parallel to beeper (I will be putting LEDs in my helmet) 10. liquid cooling for the control board 11. Some cool stickers 12. outer shell screws switched to Allen head Liquid cooling system: I removed an area of fins from the feeble heatsink on the back of the controller and attached a 40mm copper water block in its place using thermal paste and glued with epoxy. The water lines run from the water block through the hollow motor bore to the front left compartment, where a 5v water pump is housed. The pump pulls cool water from an externally mounted radiator and pushes it though the water block and back to the radiator. The pump is wired in parallel with the usb port and cannot be turned off. The radiator fan is connected to the unused 12v headlight fan port. It can be turned off with a small switch and easily removed because I used a modular connector for its wire. The front of the radiator is attached with 2 screws through the outer shell and the back is mounted using a brass bracket. The bracket is attached to the radiator with strong double sided tape and to the power pad using a slit filled with silicone that I slid the bracket into. The holes where the water lines exit the shell are sealed with silicone. I left the stock fan untouched and sealed the two little airflow holes on the right side of the shell. Beeper: I soldered a headphone jack in parallel to the beeper. The port is right next to your leg on the right side above the power pad. Idea is that I run a coiled audio cable up to my helmet to a 12v led strip so I get a visual warning ( I can't hear the beeps well) Cool project. Share some pics of the internals and parts used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Menace Posted May 4, 2022 Author Share Posted May 4, 2022 13 hours ago, windowmaker said: Cool project. Share some pics of the internals and parts used. Parts (from amazon and the hardware store) -40mm pure copper waterblock -5v usb water pump (this was connected in parallel to the 5v USB port) -80mm radiator and fan (the fan was connected to the unused headlight fan port on the motherboard) -Silicone tubing, hose clamps, double sided tape, thermal paste, epoxy, a small switch, hose couplers, woven cable protectors, some wire, hex screws, some other hardware odds and ends 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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