Copper shims with Eiswolf 2

Spawny

New member
I own an EVGA RTX 3080 Ti and I've mounted an Eiswolf 2 AIO cooler on it and combined it with the active backplate. I added the backplate because even when gaming my memory temps (memory junction) would still spike to close to 100 degrees and sometimes higher with just the waterblock. Sadly for me, adding the backplate hardly improves the situation. I'm using all the included thermal pads from Alphacool.
Just to see how bad it is, I started up a miner and ran it for some time to stress the memory. And after not too long, the memory chips would hit a toasty 100+ degrees and started throttling.
I've taken the card apart, checked all the pads and remounted the waterblock and backplate several times now, but I can't find anything wrong. All pads have perfect imprints of the memory chips. I double checked to make sure I haven't left a plastic cover on a pad somewhere. So I'm out of ideas as to why my memory temps are so poor.
So now I wanted to try and see if adding copper shims can improve the situation. But before I start addings shims, I wanted to ask what the distance is between the memory chip and the cold plate of the Alphacool waterblock. The pads are 1mm thick according to the manual, but they obviously get compressed when the block is installed. Ideally, I want to add the copper shims with just thermal grease on either side of the shim. So the fit needs to be as tight as possible without compromising the contact between the GPU die and the waterblock.
I'm guessing I would need 0,6mm thick shims, but I want to be sure.
Alternatively, if you have any other ideas as to why my memory junction temps are so bad, I'm open to suggestions.

Thanks!
 

Thomas_S

... the nice marketing guy next door
Staff member
To cut a long story short: I would ask you to send us pictures of the pads and the thermal paste so that we can check the marks again. It cannot be ruled out that your card is affected by the well-known Nvidia package problem. If so, the distances between the thermal pads do not fit and the components do not get enough contact. If this is the case, you will immediately receive the required thermal pads from support.
 
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