Welding Tips and Tricks

I am in the process of gathering the parts to build my own Tig cooler, and was thinking of changing up the standard flow path wondering what your thoughts are on it if there would be any advantage or disadvantage to it. Instead of having the radiator inline with the tig torch instead running a second pump and circulating the tank water through the cooler and just have the tig torch dump to tank.
I was thinking the cooling effects would be more effective since you would be able to get a higher flow low pressure centrifugal pump pretty cheap also wouldn't have to worry about pressure capacity of the cooler you get.

besides the extra cost of the pump and lines would there be any other disadvantages??

Welcome Joe.

I'm afraid I can't be of much help to you, but there are plenty of people here with water cooler build experience, I'm sure someone will arrive with answers for you in good time.



Kym

If you boost the flow from your tank through a your coil with a second pump your gains would be very small. The cost of electricity for running second pump would almost wipe out what little you might gain. If you try to run a large pump off of a small resavore you can end up with turbulence issues. Possible foaming of your coolant. that could cause problems with the smaller of the two pumps being able to move enough liquid to cool you torch. There is also heat gain from pumping liquid with a pump. Bigger pump bigger heat gain. You would also need to add strategically located baffles inside your tank to cause mixing of the two differing pump streams. Otherwise the discharge from the larger pump will be drawn directly to the suction port for the same pump. This principal of a laminar flow stream through a tank is commonly used in large hydronic heating systems but with a small system like a tig cooler it would work against you.

I have a Dynaflux cooler which consists of a polyethylene tank, asmall radiator, a fan, a procon pump and a motor. Water goes from the tank to the radiator to the pump, the torch and back, and on the return just dumps back into the tank. I can weld extensively at 200-250 amps doing aluminum practice on a bunch of quarter inch scrap plate I have, and the water in the cooler barely gets warm. I am not sure you need all that much more cooling power. There are stories of guys running their procon pumps out of a 5 gallon bucket of water, with no radiator and it doesn't get very warm. I would keep it simple.

Ya I guess turbulence could be a issue in a smaller tank.
There main reason I was thinking of going with a separate pump was that I was thinking of putting a gas and water flow Interlock, and have a smaller more efficient pump circulating the tank so it would still cool the tank if not welding. I guess that depends on how loud the pump I have on the way is. Ended up finding a carbonator with pump and motor for $50cad

Like Louie said. Mass is the answer if you were to ever find a need for additional cooling I would just keep a second batch of fluid in a second bucket. When your tank gets hotter than you like just drain some out and pour in from the cold bucket.