liquid cooling

[Sindri907]

Also, imagine the size radiator size you need to cool an amp. Look at the size of some of those CPU cooling rigs. And a top end Intel CPU uses only about 65 watts. Imagine what a 300 watt amp requires. You would probably still have to have some kind of fans to move air across the radiator unless you didnt mind it being the size of small car radiator.

You would also most likely need a pump to move the fluid. So, the noiseless aspect of this design is now out the window. You could, however, eliminate the pump and run natural circulation on the thermal driving head, at cost of a huge reduction in cooling effiency. Thus you'd need an even bigger radiator.

This could get pretty outrageous pretty quick... imagine a 200 watt head on a 4x10 cab with a 4 square foot double core radiator with an 18" fan, and a pump and all the plumbing. You've added an extra 30 lbs or so, taken up more space in the room, still have the noise of associated pump and such, and what have you gained? Its still an amp, it still plays music, it still sounds the same.



The nerd in me still wants to try it...

 

[gregoire1]

DON'T LISTEN TO THESE NAYSAYERS TOMZILLA23! I think I see where your going with this. (now I'm about to show my own limited knowledge on the subject) Isn't heat the limiting factor on a solid state amp? I have a Line 6 studio 110 which I absolutly love! Small, versatile and sounds great, but only 75watts at 8ohms... I assume if I run another speaker, the impedience drops to 4 ohms and the amps output increases to over 100watts!!!!

BUT.......

its only rated at 8 ohms and could overheat and eventually fail (and I love my Line 6!)

SO.......

if I could keep my transistors cooler, couldn't I get morE POWER!!!!!!! (insert maniacal laugh here)

 

[greenboy]

Play all your gigs in a big, freezing meat locker. Then you can run 2 ohm loads even if you are rated for 4. Or look for some liquid nitrogen. 1 ohm loads guaranteed.

 

[Passinwind]

do they make any type of a liquid cooling system for amps

I worked on some Sony (?) hi-fi receivers a few decades ago that used freon cooling and relied on convection for cooling the radiator fins, with lower weight being one of their stated targets. Their system was very finicky, but cost was the biggest put-off IIRC. If you already have a 80-90% efficient amplifier that you want to keep as small as possible, the standard approaches work pretty well. If it ain't broke...

 

[warnergt]

I bring my own tank truck to cryogenically cool my amp.

 

[gregoire1]

Ok that pic requires some kind of explaination.

 

[Absentia]

Just like PCs it would be way too expensive, time consuming, unreliable and provide very little if any benefit.

I never once actually come across someones liquid cooled computer that really needed to be.

 

[PSPookie]

Play all your gigs in a big, freezing meat locker. Then you can run 2 ohm loads even if you are rated for 4. Or look for some liquid nitrogen. 1 ohm loads guaranteed.

Yer messin' with us aren't you

I worked on some Sony (?) hi-fi receivers a few decades ago that used freon cooling and relied on convection for cooling the radiator fins, with lower weight being one of their stated targets. Their system was very finicky, but cost was the biggest put-off IIRC. If you already have a 80-90% efficient amplifier that you want to keep as small as possible, the standard approaches work pretty well. If it ain't broke...

The people that design these amps know what they're doing (read: they know more that you) and they didn't just arbitrarily arrive at their designs.

Engineering is a balancing act between performance, robustness, and cost. The reason that you don't see liquid cooled bass heads is because air cooled designs are simply better for the application in terms of cost and reliability while still offering good performance.

 

[greenboy]

Also, surround the guitar amps and guitarists with space heaters turned on full blast. Not only does it make their amps a lot quieter, but it exhausts them and they sweat like pigs. Even niftier is that the one who is still wearing hair extensions and parachute pants will at some point spontaneously combust.