Nanotherm Silver XTC Thermal Grease

Author : Wayne Date : 14th November 2002

...Product	Nanotherm Silver
...Manufacturer	ESG Associates
...Supplier	ESG Associates
...Price	£149.99 + VAT

 

 

Characteristics :

The leeching test basically tests to see how strongly the carrier and the conductive compound are chemically combined. In real world use the results of this test have little influence on performance although there will be a greater tendency for the carrier to seep away over time even along something as seemingly inert as a copper or aluminium heat sink base. Clearly the IceII compound has the greatest tendancy to do this but as it's been thinned considerably over the original compound this is perhaps to be expected. Also, none of the compounds dried out completely as a result of this test suggesting that the liquid being drawn away is a component of the carrier and not the carrier itself. The darker halo around the Arctic Silver seems to suggest that what ever was being leached out was also drying in air to some extent.

Paper Leeching Test

For the rather crude spread test I just placed three roughly equal sized dollops of each compound on a plastic surface and used a piece of semi-rigid card wide enough to cover all three compound to make a single wipe. By far the best "spreader" was the Nanotherm Silver partly because it's less viscous than the Arctic Silver. I've not included the Nanotherm EXP here as it's slightly disadvantaged in this test without an additional measure that will no doubt be made clear when the retail product is ready.

Spread Test Results

Having done that I then took a clean tissue for each compound and wiped ONCE. As you can hopefully see below both the IceII (BlueII also) and Nanotherm EXP came clean without a trace. The Nanotherm Silver left a fairly insignificant trace behind while the Arctic Silver performed less well and in fact smeared all over the place when I eventually tried to remove it completely..

Wipe Test Results

For the drying test I did pretty much the same as for the spreading test only the plastic panel with the four compounds on it was left on a central heating radiator for 10 days cooking slowly. After the ten days the compounds were spread and without a doubt the winner was the Nanotherm Silver, followed by the IceII, Arctic Silver then the Nanotherm EXP. Again for reasons that will become clear at release the EXP was disadvantaged in this test. The Arctic Silver had actually become quite stodgy and difficult to spread by this stage, though by no means dry.

Drying Test Results

The final test for which there are no photos as it seemed pointless was to submerge the compounds in water for two days to see how they resisted mositure. The Arctic Silver, Nanotherm Silver and IceII (and therefor BlueII also) performed perfectly while the EXP wasn't tested here as it's not really suitable for systems likely to produce any forms of condensation and is being targeted purely as an air cooling solution.

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