Water cooler suggestions ? will this work ?

[cr500dom]

Hello, I really want to go to a water cooled torch for my 200A DC TIG, to get a more manoeuvrable Torch and lead set up for the majority of the welding I`ll be doing.

I`ve had a search through the forum and had a look at the various home brewed setups designed on here Which are very neat too.

I`ll keep the aircooled one for jobs where I need to be a bit more portable, but right outside my Workshop is a 330L Water Butt, which I use for garden duties and washing the cars via pressure washer.

It seems to me, if I were to put a cooling coil inside this waterbutt, I could run a closed cooling circuit for the torch through the coil placed inside the waterbutt.

I have a variety of 12v automotive type cooling pumps (Designed for chargecooling setups on turbo/supercharged installations) which would be ideal for a small circuit like this.
Then a 12Vpower suppy to run the pump ?

Does anyone see any potential issues with this type of arrangement ?

Cheers
Dom

 

[hotrodder]

The only issue i can see is what happens if the water butt ends up very low/empty after washing cars/gardening. Granted not an issue with recent weather but if we ever get a long dry spell in summer and you forget to fill it...

If you're not bothered about portability could just build something with a big resevoir instead of using a heat exchanger. Less work than having to modify the water butt and run coolant lines through to the workshop too? Bear in mind that most DIY coolers have far more capacity than needed for a 200A machine... the factory coolarc 20 for my lincoln only holds a little under 2 litres and the heat exchanger ain't exactly big either. The coolant lines never get uncomfortably warm let alone hot even with the welder turned upto 11 for extended periods.

Personally if i was building one i'd use a coolant header tank and suitable heat exchanger (oil /auto gearbox cooler) from a car and assuming the welder has the facility to power a cooler i'd want it controlling the thing so i can't forget to turn it on and fry £100 worth of torch. My Lincoln outputs 230V for the cooler but other brands can vary

 

[cr500dom]

Thanks Hotrodder,

The waterbutt never fully empties, as the tap is part way up the side.
but like you say, I could just use a larger reservoir as effectively its just acting as a heat sink.

I just figured I have a huge heat sink sat directly outside, so its a couple of hose runs and a coiled copper tube, as opposed to a heat exchanger / header tank arrangement ?

More thought needed I think

I have a Digital R-Tech so not sure if it has external switching or not ? They do offer their own cooler so I`ll probably ask them how they control that ?

Thanks again

 

[Shox Dr]

The serpentine rad from a car heater, is good choice: small, readily available in most importantly cheap as chips

 

[Paul G]

I used a pond pump, free standing kitchen fan, and a car heater matrix. It all runs off 230v.

Just had a look on the bay and there are loads of heater matrix's on there for around the £15 mark.
Done this way and you would have a more portable unit than your water butt.

HTH
Paul G

 

[Bristolbulldog]

The water butt would work with 50l in there.

If you want high efficiency cheap, then get a copper tubed heat exchanger from an older aircon car (range rover classic has a good one). Pond pump (make sure the pump has the lift head your using it at I.e. 4 meters up your looking at a ddc mag pc water cooling pump, if level anything cheap.

 

[hotrodder]

I have a Digital R-Tech so not sure if it has external switching or not ? They do offer their own cooler so I`ll probably ask them how they control that ?

From a quick search of their manuals it appears the 200A DC model doesn't have an auxillary output, just the AC/DC models. Not surprising given the cost differences but it appears that those with aux out just switch on whatever's connected when the welder is turned on as opposed to controlling it properly- switching the cooler on/off as needed

Dunno how spendy they are but you can get fusible links to protect the torch incase of cooler/memory failure for example... http://www.ckworldwide.com/fuse_block.htm

 

[scotty41]

Hi Dom, ive been hanging on to a air con unit with a remote cooler, got to clear the garage out its free if any use to you. i figured it would make a cooler for my spot welder but sold the spot welder a while ago. looks like this one on ebay but has a plastic surround. its basically a rad with a fan.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Andrews-S...arden_Hearing_Cooling_Air&hash=item461b0cd7b3

cheers
Scot

 

[derekm]

make an ally tank from 1 or 1.5mm sheet with these dimensions
50x300x400. Its a combined tank and radiator. Use solar heating propylene glycol.
mistral chemicals do it.

 

[FranV8]

Corvette power steering cooler and domestic central heating pump from Screw fix...

http://www.mig-welding.co.uk/forum/threads/diy-tig-cooler.35721/page-3#post-423833

 

[dannyp]

for ages I used an old land rover radiator, I duffed an in tank fuel injection pump into a piece of rubber hose and clamped the hose to lower outlet. batterd the top hose connection flat and soldered it up and then soldered on a small outlet for the return at the top. tank and radiator in one and it didn't appear to ever need a fan
.

 

[citizen kane]

I picked up an old water cooler with a broken pump off ebay for next to nothing. Fitted an old suds pump and it works a treat. The original pump had a large fan on an extended shaft, this was replaced with an old PC fan which has proved more than adequate.

I've always been a bit worried about losing flow and while the welder has an output to power the cooler there is still no guarantee that just because you have power you have flow. I fitted a flow switch and linked it to the pedal so the welder wont supply current unless there is flow.

 

[Shox Dr]

I can feel the water running through the leads on mine.

 

[Burf86]

I made my cooler too and used a pond pump. The pump needs to be fully submerged and with that much water in there, there is no need for a radiator etc. to cool the water. I have heard of people using the kitchen tap to pump water through and then down the drain. Maybe you could set something like this up on the water butt. would need to be filtered so the torch doesn't get blocked up though.