Alphacool Geysir Reservoir and Eheim pumps

[Dark Mantis]

Alphacool Geysir Reservoir and pump unit

by 

Dark Mantis





Yet another newly designed reservoir from a well established watercooling company. It seems to be the time of year for this type of thing. However that isn't to detract from the quality of some of these products. This grabbed my interest right from the outset as it was just a little bit different from the norm. Of course there is a limit to what you can do with a reservoir but within these restraints this is quite forward looking. The Alphacool Geysir doesn't rely on a drive bay for location but can be fitted anywhere there is enough floorspace inside the case. The only constraint being that it must be mounted horizontally. This allows for extreme flexibility.





Basically this unit is a sealed tank to hold the coolant with a top mounted lid. The base is made of dark(black) plexiglas onto which a clear plexiglas lid is bolted with a rubber O-ring to seal the joint. All the access points and fittings are made through the lid. The two main parts of the unit are held together by fourteen 10mm M4 allen cap bolts which maintain an even pressure all round. All of the supplied fittings are made of black nickel finished brass.





Inside the base of the tank is centrally moulded a half height partition incorporating slots to base level. Apart from this the tank is empty. The reservoir is designed to hold a maximum of two Eheim pumps that stand on the floor and are decoupled with the four rubber suction cup feet that are bundled with the pumps. Several different Eheim submersible pumps are an option and the first decision is whether to use one or two. If only one pump is decided upon then a couple of extra blanking caps to seal the unused ports are going to be required. These are not supplied so make sure that you have some. Apparently there is now a kit to allow the use of two different pumps to be installed in the same reservoir.





I chose the top option of the two most powerful 1000L/h pumps which if run together should move a huge 2000L/h of coolant. These pumps can even be "overclocked" sometimes by as much as 50% giving a theortical output of 3000L/h or 50 litres per minute which is absolutely massive by anyone's standards! Of course there are lower power alternatives that are available as well. The Eheim 650 is one such less powerful option. When real world testing using my usual 10mm ID tubing and a single pump I managed 10.6 litres per minute which equates to 636 Litres per hour. Because of the large amounts involved I wasn't able to test with dual pumps but it would be normal to expect the output to be roughly double my figures. Obviously using a larger bore hose and both pumps together and I would think that the manufacturer's amounts would be about right. Eheim even offer a mains voltage pump for anyone who is interested however the 12v varieties are generally recommended for this situation. These pumps are AC not the more usual DC, this means that a converter card is required but more on that later.





Back to the reservoir though, assuming that two pumps are installed the cables for them are pulled out through the special watertight glands on the top which are tightened once the wires are pulled through. The pumps stand upright in the base and locate via their outlet nozzles to the two dedicated ports that are marked on the top. All the ports are labelled clearly so there should be no confusion. There are two inlet and two outlet ports, a fillport and a optional level sensor port that are all 1/4" BSPP fittings. This makes it easy to find fittings to suit as they are standardised. There is also one very large 1" BSPP port with fitted cap that can be also used to fill the unit. Of course there is the usual Alphacool copper nameplate fixed to the top. The fillport, one single inlet and the level sensor do have blanking caps fitted by default.





I found the whole installation of pumps and reservoir extremely easy and straightforward with no issues at all. As mentioned before these pumps are alternating current driven and Alphacool has come up with a new controller card to enable easy connections. Not only that but it also gives a lot more ways as to how to run the unit. This board is made to mount on the end of the reservoir as one option. If that is wished then a couple of M3 6mm bolts are necessary. There are a multitude of different options from using this board, the first is how to power the pumps. They can be set to be both powered, either one powered, one used with the other as an automatic redundant option etc. By the configuration of some jumpers it also has such niceties as an automatic air bleed sequence whereby the pumps will go through an on/off regime to help clear the air from the system. By the use of hardware too the pumps can be run in parallel or series and the use of a two loop system. Due to such things as the redundancy option when used together this make this kit ideal for server applications as well as desktop.





For a bit of lighting the top has four holes incorporated into it. Two 5mm and two 3mm holes but of course the two smaller holes are taken up if the board is attached. So as many as four LEDs can be fitted to show it off. Considering the power it offers it is quite a compact unit, with overall sizes before fittings are added of 208 x 85 x 110mm. It fits across the width of my case albeit with not much space to spare.





Although personally I don't find it a problem I think some people might not feel the same way about having to first specify and then construct the parts to make the finished unit. There is the choice of reservoirs dependant on the pump(s) decided upon and then the fact that the DC/AC converter board to remember also. The low voltage Eheim pumps cannot be run on DC. I think it would be advantageous for Alphacool to consider selling the end unit already built.

Extent of delivery:
 1x Alphacool Geysir Double Power pump station





The reservoir is a seperate unit and the pumps and controller card are extras, but even as such it is an extremely reasonable price for all together. It makes for a really powerful watercooling base and for much less than many other setups. It also has a lot of extra features that I don't think are available elsewhere. Well worth a score of I reckon of 9/10



Alphacool Geysir Reservoir from http://www.alphacool.com/ Price : 34.95€
Alphacool power converter card V.2 from http://www.alphacool.com/  Price : 19.95€
Eheim compact pump from http://www.alphacool.com/ Price : 24.95€



http://www.alphacool.com/product_info.php/info/p1113_Alphacool-Geysir-Double-Power-Pumpstation--for-2x-Eheim-1000-Pumps-.html/XTCsid/mpadaf437mithurvq0fqb3bin3/