# Would You Like Fries With Your PC?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [January 11, 2006, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421 "2006-01-11T02:09:28Z")
**Posts on this page:** 16
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/1 "2006-01-11T02:09:28Z")
[Cooling a PC with vegetable oil.](http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/01/09/strip_out_the_fans/)
> [@](#):
>
> Common sense dictates that submerging your high-end PC in cooking oil is not a good idea. But, of course, engineering feats and science breakthroughs were made possible by those who dared to explore the realms of the non-conventional. Members of the Munich-based THG lab are only too happy to confirm this fact. And not only did we find that our AMD Athlon FX-55 and GeForce 6800 Ultra equipped system didn’t short out when we filled the sealed shut PC case with cooking oil - but the non-conductive properties of the liquid coupled created a totally cool and quiet high-end PC, devoid of the noise pollution of fans. The PC case - or should we say tank - also offered a new and novel way to display and show off your PC components.
No mention of how much that sucker weighs with eight gallons of oil inside the case, but I bet it’s pretty hefty.
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### Author:  [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/2 "2006-01-11T02:17:42Z")
Vegetable oil is approximately .89 g/cc[sup]3[/sup]. 8 gallons is 30,283.2 cc. Total weight is therefore ~26,952 g or 59.3 pounds plus the weight of the PC. Yeah, a little on the heavy side. But, what do you expect when your PC is filled with _fat_?
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### Author:  [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/3 "2006-01-11T02:55:36Z")
It’s been done by several OCers and hardcore cooling enthusiants for years now.
But it KILLS your fans. They are meant to move air, not oil.
But I wonder…how often do people use a watercooling system and just replace the water with oil?
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### Author:  [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/4 "2006-01-11T03:04:56Z")
If you follow the pages in the link, you’ll see that they ditched the fans for that reason.
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### Author:  [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/5 "2006-01-11T03:09:37Z")
> [@bouv](#):
>
> But I wonder…how often do people use a watercooling system and just replace the water with oil?
Not very often, if they’re smart. Water has about 2 1/2 times the heat capacity of oil. Plus, it’s considerably less viscous, so it takes less energy to circulate it. Overall, water wins as a coolant, hands down. Unfortunately, it readily dissolves many, many things and dissolved gases and stuff can make it corrosive, and can make it more electrically conductive, so for some things it’s not well-suited. Filling your PC with it is one of those things.
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### Author:  [@autobulb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/autobulb)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 8:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/6 "2006-01-11T08:55:06Z")
I wish they posted temperature readings.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 9:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/7 "2006-01-11T09:29:07Z")
I like the idea, but why vegetable oil; OK, it’s cheap, but it has a tendency to turn into sticky goo and is otherwise perishable. Why not a light mineral oil?
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### Author:  [@Lok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lok)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 10:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/8 "2006-01-11T10:18:33Z")
They did post the temperatures later in the article, the last couple of pages I think. And they actually recommended lightweight motor oil rather than vegetable oil as more stable, but they didn’t use it because it wouldn’t have looked as cool. I think a mineral oil might cause problems, wouldn’t it have more ionizing agents present?
**Q.E.D.** , they actually tried out distilled water first. It would make it about 5 minutes, then short out. But it didn’t hurt any of the components.
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### Author:  [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 10:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/9 "2006-01-11T10:36:11Z")
> [@Mangetout](#):
>
> I like the idea, but why vegetable oil; OK, it’s cheap, but it has a tendency to turn into sticky goo and is otherwise perishable. Why not a light mineral oil?
I read something a few years ago about a kid who did this and had some pretty good luck. The case was a styrofoam cooler (although I seem to recall he made it) and he used aquarium pumps to move the oil around.
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### Author:  [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/10 "2006-01-11T10:47:19Z")
I _sort of_ found the article I remembered. The mod was done by “Dr Freeze” back in 1999.
Here’s the [slashdot](http://slashdot.org/hardware/99/05/29/1632246.shtml) entry for it.
I forgot the bit about dropping an air conditioner cooling unit in the oil. 😃
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 10:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/11 "2006-01-11T10:56:28Z")
[Rustlick EDM-500](http://news.thomasnet.com/fullstory/459397/1083) looks promising; low viscosity, high dielectric strength, transparent, odourless, resists thermal degradation…
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/12 "2006-01-11T10:58:23Z")
Oh, Man! I just found a [picture](http://www.itwfpg.com/images/rustlick/edm500_success_story_sm.jpg) of the stuff - the colour is a case modder’s wet dream.
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### Author:  [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/13 "2006-01-11T11:54:44Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#):
>
> If you follow the pages in the link, you’ll see that they ditched the fans for that reason.
Actually they reveal this in the first 4 words of the heading.
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### Author:  [@N9IWP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/N9IWP)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/14 "2006-01-11T12:29:12Z")
One fluid that is used is “florinert” - it is an ozone safe liquid floricarbon.
Non conductive, good thermal properties, etc. Not cheap though.
It is / was used to cool Cray supercomputers. Someone has used it in a home computer.
Brian
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### Author:  [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/15 "2006-01-11T15:14:42Z")
> [@Q.E.D.](#):
>
> Not very often, if they’re smart. Water has about 2 1/2 times the heat capacity of oil. Plus, it’s considerably less viscous, so it takes less energy to circulate it. Overall, water wins as a coolant, hands down. Unfortunately, it readily dissolves many, many things and dissolved gases and stuff can make it corrosive, and can make it more electrically conductive, so for some things it’s not well-suited. Filling your PC with it is one of those things.
Ahhh. For some reason, I thought oil had a higher heat capacity.
What about antifreeze? Is that a better coolant than water? Is there any common chemical one can buy that won’t completly ruin a water cooling system or kill you that you can use?
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### Author:  [@Dorjan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorjan)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2006, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-fries-with-your-pc/339421/16 "2006-01-11T16:38:42Z")
Hmm, distilled water with [Watter Wetter](http://www.redlineoil.com/products_coolant.asp) should work like a charm. It’s used in motorcycles to replace coolant. Added to water, in increases the heat capacity, has anti-corrosive properties, and is a cool pink color to boot!