MagDrive Pump Tips and Tricks

With the new rage in the H2O scene being the Mag Drive Pumps for cooling your rigs.  Its bout time someone talked about the problems and solutions for these pumps.

Mag Drive pumps have a VERY simple layout. All they consist of is a funky magnetic impeller with 3 "blades" on it.  The back part of the unit is nothing but a huge epoxy block with the electronics embedded in it to make it 100% water proof and maintenance free.  The magnetic drive is dead silent when there is no air trapped in it. The first problem comes up at the front plate. It is secured with 4 bolts.  Those bolts are a problem we will get into later on.

The pump is darn near bullet proof, except for the front plate. I noticed that on my latest setup (double header II), the pump would leak if I would move it to hard. I thought a fitting was leaking. The fittings were all taken off and resealed, but still I was getting massive amounts of air and leaking water.  It still seemed like it was coming from the Exhaust port on the pump. After some very close investigation I found that the weight of the line, and the fittings was enough to warp the font housing enough to allow a bunch of water to escape and air to get in. (for the rest of this article remember air is a death blow for these pumps)

So I whipped out my RTV Sealant (Form-A-Gasket). As you can tell from the tube.. its been used a lot. I mainly use it for the exhaust systems on my RC cars. I took a flat blade screwdriver and used to spread an even coating over the surrounding and surrounding area.  I made it thick enough to make a very solid barrier for water. I did that around the entire pump housing area.  Make sure there isn't any on the face of the pump area, if there is it could clog the impeller and make it very inefficient and loud.

When you bolt the face housing back on, apply even pressure to seat it correctly back onto the pump housing and the now coated O-ring. The RTV sealant will cure and turn into a rubber gasket in a day, but can be used right after applying because of its composition, and also the seal the O-ring makes itself.

As with every project you have to break something. Well this time it was one of the 4 PLASTIC screws that hold the front on. Yes, Plastic. When you are tightening these be damn careful, they give little notice before shearing off.  Well even with the Form-A-Gasket, I couldn't run it without all 4 screws. So I got inventive. The screws used to hold the fans on a case worked PERFECTLY!. They dig in and make their own threads, but are solid. I will be replacing all the screws with these.

After that, I beat on the pump and could not get it to leak at all.  I would suggest this to anyone running a MagDrive Pump:

• Check the screws on the front, make sure they are secure. (Not to tight or you will break them)
• If you are using this in an In-Line config, you may want to seal the housing with RTV sealant.
• Make sure all other connections have Pipe Sealant or RTV sealant on them also.
• If you are getting air in your lines but don't know why, you prolly have a leak on the pump somewhere.

Hope this helps anyone who has been banging their head wondering where that air is coming from. 

With this setup and my newly milled cooling blocks, I pushed my Celeron 366 SMP setup to 605Mhz with just liquid cooling, and no pelts. the system never broke 65Deg F.  Also made an easy chipset cooler modification for the BP6... but stay tuned for the Double header 2 article. :)