Reasons to Choose Immersion Cooling to Cool MicroBT Whatsminer in Summer

Perhaps you have heard that liquid cooling is preferable to air cooling for cooling the Whatsminer M50/M50S, but why is this the case? To find out the answers, read this post.

Every year as summer approaches, the miners experience issues that result in Whatsminer interruptions, overheating, downtime, and lost revenue. When whatsminer cooling is done, a lot of resources are used, and the results frequently fall short of what customers want. How comes it?

The most popular but ineffective form of cooling, air, is the cause. Any climate system must solve four main tasks:

• heat removal from working equipment;
• removal of excess heat energy from the room;
• air dedusting and humidity maintaining at the correct level;
• mining farm status monitoring to ensure smooth operation.

During summer, the load on the system increases due to:

• heat from the working equipment is mixed with fresh air;
• not all excesses of heat are removed out of the room in time;
• dust and small debris get into ASIC cases;
• the supply air temperature is too high, so a powerful and expensive air conditioner for cooling is a must.

In other words, it takes a lot of work to cool the supply air, prepare it (clean it), and reliably remove heat from the equipment that runs continuously.

What Happens When MicroBT Whatsminer M50/M50S Overheats?

It is not a surprise that miners frequently use creative solutions to keep their machinery from overheating.

Some of the reasons to avoid overheating in the Whatsminer include:

Decrease in Hash Rate

We must first define what a hash rate is in order to move on. Hash rate is a gauge of how quickly a cryptocurrency miner’s computer can perform intricate calculations.

Due to the fact that productivity is frequently determined by this, it is without a doubt the most crucial component when choosing mining equipment.

When a machine overheats, it tries to reduce workload, which artificially lowers the hash rate. The hash rate will remain below average until the miner cools down.

Lower Power Efficiency

It is well known that mining bitcoin uses a lot of energy. Even though Whatsminer M50 series already uses a discouraging amount of electricity, when a machine overheats, the situation gets worse. As a result of the lower hash rate caused by overheating, more electricity is used while fewer results are produced. Productivity and profit suffer as a result of this combination.

Maintenance and Lifespan

Random shutdowns in miners brought on by overheating are a significant drawback. Mining machinery will not only shut down if it overheats, but it will also malfunction more frequently. Finally, the lifespan of a Whatsminer M50 or M50S that overheats constantly will be significantly shortened. A Whatsminer, for instance, can degrade in a matter of months when exposed to high temperatures despite having a lifespan of three to five years.

Cost Efficiency

This is connected to the earlier ideas. Electricity consumption and maintenance costs account for the majority of mining expenses. Miners cost twice as much to maintain and power when they frequently overheat. Whatsminer’s profitability is frequently affected by this.

Overall Reduction in Efficiency

This conclusion is made because equipment overheating can have an impact on power consumption, cost, and even equipment lifespan. When all these are combined, Whatsminer M50 or M50S falls short of its expected productivity. As a result, overheating causes equipment failure, increased power consumption, and a decline in profit.

Overheating is terrible. It has an impact on the profitability of the miners as well as Whatsminer’s productivity. So how can overheating be avoided? Which strategies are possible?

Cooling Methods Adopted by Miners

Miners use two strategies to try to avoid overheating. They are:

• Air cooling
• Immersion cooling

Let’s investigate them in more detail.

What is Air Cooling?

This cooling technique does exactly what its name implies. To control the temperature of mining equipment, ventilation fans and ambient air are used. Increased airflow over the mining rig in this area helps to dissipate heat. Although the majority of mining rigs are equipped with internal high-velocity fans that force airflow across their internal components, it is frequently necessary to purchase additional air cooling containers.

The mining equipment is cooled in cold weather by using a mixture of ambient air and hot recirculated air.

Energy-draining refrigeration equipment, such as chillers and air handlers, are frequently required to increase the effectiveness of air cooling.

What is Immersion Cooling?

Using this method, mining rigs can be cooled without losing money, and it is a rapidly developing technique. Immersion cooling is the process of completely submerging, or immersing, the mining rig in a thermally-conductive liquid with better insulating qualities than regular air.

Single phase immersion cooling and double phase immersion cooling are the two fundamental methods for immersion cooling.

The parts are submerged in a dielectric fluid in a single phase, which is typically an engineered fluid or oil of some kind. The fluid absorbs the heat produced by the IT components, which is then removed by pumping and circulating the fluid inside a tank.

The double phase, on the other hand, seals servers inside a bath of specially designed fluorocarbon-based liquid. The liquid undergoes a phase transition from liquid to gas upon boiling. The liquid form of the vapor is then recondensed and recycled through the system.

Regardless of the method employed, immersion cooling is very efficient and about 40% of the heat is captured and used to power the mining rig. Additionally, it boasts a heat rejection capacity that is roughly ten times greater than air cooling.

Cons of Air Cooling

95% of mining farms in the world use stock Systems for forced ventilation and air conditioning with ASIC. This is aimed at maintaining a stable microclimate in the room occupied by mining farm, its smooth and safe operation during any time of the year.

But in winter and summer, the equipment’s cooling requirements are different. For example, one of the most popular ASIC model – Whatsminer M50, has the following characteristics:

• power consumption with a stock power supply unit of 3306 W;
• operating temperature range – from -5 to 35 degrees Celsius;
• cooling fan capacity – 338 cu.m per hour.

Equipment of this type has a thermal capacity. Taken as an example, the electrical energy used is equal to the thermal energy produced. In actuality, heat is produced using all of the electricity used. As a result, each ASIC needs to have 3306 watts of thermal energy removed from it. In the absence of this, the indoor climate will deteriorate, the temperature outside will increase, and the machinery may even fail due to overheating.

A 300 kW ventilation and air conditioning system is required to dissipate the heat from 100 ASICs. Pumping nearly 68,000 cubic meters of air per hour is necessary for hundreds of devices. It will require the assistance of specialists, because improper installation of the filtration system or illiterately designed cooling system leads to a number of troubles:

• the drop of equipment operating frequency;
• the occurrence of errors;
• overall performance reduction by 5-20%;
• dust, debris and insects;
• equipment lifespan reduction by 1.5-2 times;
• shutdowns and failures.

Aspects of Whatsminer Cooling in Winter and Summer

The performance typically declines by 5% when the room temperature reaches about 40 degrees Celsius. It begins to fall by 10% at a 45-degree angle, and so on. And while such a temperature is practically unattainable in a cold room during the winter, it is quite typical during the summer with an ambient temperature of 25 to 30 degrees Celsius. In other words, because each Whatsminer device generates heat, the temperature at the outlet will be higher the hotter the supply air or air itself is in the room.

Cooling the Whatsminer M50 or M50S is simpler in the winter. The average air temperature values are still slightly above zero. The behavior of Whatsminer equipment at negative temperatures is unknown, it is crucial to keep in mind. Condensate loss is another possibility, which could be disastrous for delicate electronics components. In order to prevent the air supply to the ASIC from happening at below-freezing temperatures in the winter, the air should instead be heated.

Summertime problems with cooling the ASIC are more severe for those who consider them. In most cases, the supply air is above 25 to 30 degrees Celsius. The maximum values that Whatsminer M50 or M50S is permitted to operate with are as follows. The incoming air is cooled by air conditioners. Commonly, the ventilation system consists of:

• fan – blows the air in for cooling from the street;
• filtering system – provides air purification from dust, debris, insects, creates dust-free environment;
• control and automation system – regulates the flow and supply of air, monitors the temperature in the room;
• air ducts – supply fresh air through “cold” corridors to the equipment;
• hood – creates a “hot” corridor for heat.

When designing a ventilation and air conditioning system, you must consider the seasonal differences of fluctuations in between the internal and external temperatures in order to understand how to effectively cool the Whatsminer. This leads to a “floating” energy load on the system. In the event of power surges or outages, you must also supply a backup power source.

However, since it does not use air as a coolant, there is a solution that does not rely on changes in the ambient temperature or the temperature inside the room. With immersion cooling, the Whatsminer is completely submerged in dielectric fluid. It is uniformly heated there to create the perfect microclimate for ASIC operation. A heat exchanger removes heat, which is then either directed to the heating system or released into the atmosphere by a dry cooling tower.

Immersion Cooling of Whatsminer M50 or M50S

Summer is the exact time of the year when it is much more profitable for miners to switch to immersion cooling and “fix” them in a homogeneous environment, which is free from climatic changes, uneven supply air temperature and organization of corridors. There are at least five reasons to do this:

• More effective heat dissipation: the fluids used in immersion, called dielectric coolants, are much more thermally conductive and dense than air, making them better at absorbing heat and moving it quickly away from the miners.
• Increased hardware lifespan: small vibrations and rapid temperature fluctuations degrade hardware lifespan and immersion cooling greatly reduces both of these because the fluid temperature is more stable than air and the fans, which produce the vibrations in air, can be removed in immersion.
• Better operating conditions: the immersion fluid prevents dust and debris from getting into the hardware, decreasing cleaning and maintenance requirements. Additionally, since there are no fans and the fluid is dense, the noise that can be deafening for miners in the air is virtually eliminated.
• Improved Efficiency (J/TH): on a new-generation miner like a The Whatsminer M50’s two fans use about 35 W each, or about 5% of the machine’s overall electricity use in air. By removing them to run in immersion, the 5% energy savings can be used to increase hashing, increasing the J/TH by about that much.
• Safer Overclocking (more TH/s): the more effective heat dissipation and operating conditions in immersion also enable miners to overclock their Whatsminer M50 to a very significant degree.

Regardless of the climate the miner is operating in, immersion cooling is preferable to air cooling due to all of these advantages. However, it comes at a much higher up-front cost, so there’s still a question of whether or not immersion cooling is worth it. Although a lot will depend on the environment where the operation is taking place.

Summary: Reasons to Choose Immersion Cooling to Cool MicroBT Whatsminer M50 or M50S in Summer

It is clear from a scale’s readings that immersion cooling containers are preferable to air cooling systems for cooling the Whatsminer M50/M50S. In addition to its many benefits, immersion cooling also offers a tidy, peaceful, stable, and comfortable working environment.

FAQs