Alphacool VPP655 with pump head unit.
by Dark Mantis
This pump supplied to me for review by Alphacool is a special version of the well known Laing/Swiftech 655 pump. This pump is the
mainstay of the watercooling fraternity because of it's power and durability. Made mainly of Delrin and stainless steel it features
ceramic bearings and no moving parts apart from the magnetically driven sperical impellor giving it a working lifetime of roughly
50,000 hours which works out to over five years of continuous use without a break. This is some achievement and because of this and
it's legendary reliability it is of no surprise that it is so widely used. The pump will work almost silenty even at full speed and
can be decoupled from the chassis it is located on if necessary by various means if even more dampening of the sound/vibration is
required.
This particular pump was supplied complete with the head unit into which I will go into more depth later. The motor unit also comes
as a seperate part for people needing a replacement or a power source for a custom head unit. This is a very useful addition to the
range and makes a cutomised version of this pump very affordable.
The motor itself is a powerful compact affair which will run off anything from DC 8 - 24V although obviously it is aimed at 12V usage
for computers. At 12V and maximum speed it requires 23W of power with a reduced need as the speed drops. On the back of the motor
there is a small variable resistor with a screwdriver slot to enable easy adjustment continously from 1 to 5 with 1 being the lowest
and 5 being the highest speed.The speed markings are rated as follows :
1 = 1800 rpm
2 = 2550 rpm
3 = 3300 rpm
4 = 4050 rpm
5 = 4800 rpm
At top rate at 12v with zero head it is really powerful and will shift coolant at the rate of 1500 lph which is 25 lpm!
Visually the complete unit has a nice clean look and instead of the more standard head with the moulded on 1/2" ports this pump comes
with a more versatile head which will accomodate any normal 1/4" BSPP screw fitting. This now means that it is much more
straightforward to use with a smaller bore loop like 10mm. It also give the opportunity to decide on different inlet and outlet
directions which can make siting in some cases much easier. There are two ports for both inlet and outlet and two blanks are supplied
for the unused ports this makes it even better than the EK head kit that I reviewed recently which had only three ports. Personally
I would have preferred to have the blacks as black nickel or plain black to match the housing rather than the copper coated ones but
it is a minor point and they can easilly be swapped. The other negative point I would pick up is that the power cable should have
been braided to give a good finish instead of bare red and black pvc. This is terminated in a standard molex plug with just two of
the four pins used. The lead measures a fairly long 1.1 metres.
The main pump is by no means new design but it has adapted well and there is no doubt that it wll do the job and now with the
modified head make it even easier for all concerned. I would award it 9/10
Supplier: AlphaCool International
http://www.alphacool.com 
