Water Reservoir question - Co2 Laser tube's

Hey all, dumb question… is it better to have your water tank above or below the tube height?

If you have the tank higher than the tube, water stays in the tube when the machine is off.

If I have it lower than the tube, obviously the water drains into the tank when the pump is shut down.

I can see pro’s/con’s to both… Scouring the various forums I cant seem to find anyone talking about this (although I’m sure some ninja is going to link me a thread talking about it 5min after I post this).

If your cooling system water tank is below the tube, and you have a check valve leak or failure, the water will drain onto the floor.

I personally keep my reservoir above my tube to prevent air bubbles from accumulating within the loop. Yea there is the chance that if something leaks then ill have a puddle of water on the floor but that seems less worrysome than a hot spot in my tube from trapped air.

Im not so much worried about leaks… thats gonna suck if/when it happens no matter where the tank is.

I was thinking more about the water sitting in the tube helping reduce thermal shock when I first start the pump up on an empty tube. Sometimes I have a 40° difference between my tank (w/o chilling) and ambient temp. Plus I would think that an empty tube would develop some scaling from the evaporation that is bound to occur on an empty tube, even with a good clean distilled tank.

Every time I watch a video of a pro in their shop, their tank’s are always sitting on the floor, so the tube is higher… but I cant quite figure out the reasoning.

With a closed loop system, if you run it long enough to get water into the tube, you can stop it, pinch the lines, and then add more water. That will get most of the air out of the loop, and make it impossible for water to flow out of the tube no matter where you put the unit.

If you don’t have a sealed system it won’t work, but a CW3000, CW5000, or similar are closed & sealed.

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