Taking out a Heat Sink

Clarifications

The screws that won't come out all the way are remaining captured by the CPU itself. Do not remove the allen screws, they hold the colling element to the header or bottom of the heat exchanger element. Once the four screws are loose, turn the socket screw that locks down the CPU socket lever, lift the lever and remove the whole unit as one. Once you've done that, you can seperate the heat sink unit as a whole and remove it from the CPU chip. The heat sink compound, most commonly white in color, goes between the chip and the heat sink itself. Clean the mating surfaces with alcohol and apply a small drop to the top of the CPU chip and remount the heat sink. Only a small amount is needed as any excess will be squeezed out and make a mess on the CPU and socket.

Before you do anything more you need to drain the Liquid Cooling system so you can disconnect the Heat Sink from the CPU. Well so you have enough room to work you'll need to remove the Liquid Cooling lines from the Heat Exchanger so you are not stuck with a 3 inch length of line that you have to work at the end of too close to the M'Board.

As you have cracked the seal on the Liquid cooling element you need to replace this seal as well to prevent any leaks from starting. Once you open a Liquid Cooling Element and have some seep out it will start to leak from there some time in the future. As this is all very thin Copper involved you may be required to replace the Heat Exchanger depending on what the company who makes these recommend.

Col

You didn't mention how long you have been running this water-cooled system.

As a basic rule you should flush the liquid reservoir with distilled water EVERY six months to prevent the build-up of green goo and sludge. This build-up interferes with the efficiency of the water pump system thereby causing heat dissipation problems.

When the system is re-filled with water, be sure to leave some free space then activate the water pump to get rid of any air bubbles.

Finally you should introduce some coolant liquid to the water composition to inhibit further growth of algae in the next six months, until the next re-flush.