BANISHING FLAKY ELECTROPLATED NICKEL
Flaking, disintegrating nickel is a widespread problem in liquid cooling. After all, nickel PC fittings and blocks prohibit use with plain water, or you void the warranty. Instead, you must use anti-corrosive fluids to protect nickel components Why? Because the industry standard electroplated (aka electrolytic) nickel is a cosmetic nickel finish that isn't meant to be used in liquid applications. Often called chrome or shiny nickel, electroplated nickel is cost effective and looks good.
Unfortunately, water, anti-fungals and fancy fluids, including opaques, will rapidly strip electroplated nickel. The gunk that will appear in block fins isn't just broken down fluid, it's often disintegrated nickel, paint and cheap plastics. If this seems crazy, it is. After all, the cheapest home faucet can handle tap water, so why can’t expensive PC fittings survive basic H2O?
Alas, eletroplated nickel is the PC industry standard. What's the solution?
PRO-XE NICKEL
Optimus parts are finished with our proprietary nickel process called Pro-XE. Pro-XE Nickel is an industrial-grade professional electroless nickel plating.Electroless is an aerospace industry finish with extreme chemical resistance, hardness and superior fluid lubricity. Pro-XE is specially tailored for liquid cooled PC components with both extreme corrosion resistance and excellent visual appearance. So why isn't everyone using electroless? Electroless is far more difficult to manufacture, especially when achieving perfect finishes needed for premium PC builds. And electroless can't achieve that easy chrome look of electroplating, which is why electroplating is the industry standard, even if it shouldn't be used.
SAFE FOR H2O
Aside from reliability, our Pro-XE nickel is able to withstand saltwater, corrosive chemicals and, yes, even plain water.With Optimus, you can use distilled water without fear of flaking. Distilled, aside from being cheap, is also the highest performance coolant readily available. Anti-corrosive additives lower the thermal conductivity of the liquid.That's why we can offer a 10 year warranty, even with regular H2O. It has been a herculean task to create Optimus's electroless products, but the results look great and are nearly indestructible.