Integrated air-spring for hydraulic force damping of a rigid liquid cooling subsystem

A liquid cooled (LC) node of a Rack Information Handling System (RIHS) including a rack having one or more node-receiving slots each slot having a front opening for node insertion and a rear section opposed to the front access, the node comprising:

• a node enclosure containing heat-generating functional components;
• a system of conduits supplying cooling liquid through the node enclosure and including a supply conduit extending from a node inlet coupling and a return conduit terminating in a node outlet coupling, the node inlet port and the node outlet port positioned in an outward facing direction at a rear of the node enclosure and aligned to releasably seal to respective inlet liquid port and outlet liquid port in the node-receiving slot for fluid transfer through the system of conduits;
• and
• an air-spring reducer conduit in fluid communication with the system of conduits and shaped to trap an amount of compressible fluid that compresses during sealing engagement between the node inlet coupling and node outlet coupling and the inlet liquid port and outlet liquid port, respectively, positioned to be inwardly facing for blind mating to a node inlet and outlet ports of a liquid-cooled (LC) node inserted in the one node-receiving slot.

A method of assembling a Rack Information Handling System (RIHS), the method comprising:

• provisioning a node enclosure with heat-generating functional components;
• assembling with a system of conduits in fluid communication an air-spring reducer conduit that is shaped to trap an amount of compressible fluid that compresses during sealing engagement between a node inlet coupling and a node outlet coupling and an inlet liquid port and an outlet liquid port, respectively;
• attaching the system of conduits supplying cooling liquid through the node enclosure and including a supply conduit extending from the node inlet coupling and a return conduit terminating in the node outlet coupling, the node inlet port and the node outlet port positioned in an outward facing direction at a rear of the node enclosure and aligned to releasably seal to the respective inlet liquid port and outlet liquid port in the node-receiving slot, for fluid transfer through the system of conduits to form a liquid-cooled (LC) node;
• and
• mounting the LC node insertably received in the one node-receiving slot of a rack having one or more node-receiving slots each slot having a front opening for node insertion and a rear section opposed to the front access for blind mating of the node inlet and outlet ports to a node-receiving liquid inlet port and a node-receiving liquid outlet port located at the rear section of one node-receiving slot and positioned to be inwardly facing to the LC node inserted in the one node-receiving slot.