A 250mm fan in a uATX case??

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 9:36 am

Here's my #2 computer lying on its side, with two 12" rulers. The 250mm fan is almost 10" in dia, so it obviously won't fit inside this case. But: it will fit outside the case, with a ~9.5" hole in the left side panel.

My #1 computer uses the same Evercase ECE3505, which sits to my left (and to the monitor's left). The left side panel is not visible from where I sit, and any side panel fan is not in a direct line with my ear.

Hey, I'm not considering modding my computer, or even my #2 computer. Just the left side panel, and I happen to have a spare left side panel. If this doesn't work all I'm out is $40 (w/ship) for the Kandalf side panel I ordered an hour ago. And I'm real curious about how that big fan works, and if it can be applied to my situation.

It doesn't come with a tach signal, but that's no problem. I have a Scythe Flex D that does provide a readable tach signal at low rpms, and with my flourescent light "strobe", I can easily determine the actual RPM of the 250mm fan. (See this writeup.)

If you were wondering what the black thing marked "X" is, it's the mass-loaded HDD cage.

jaganath · Post by **jaganath** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 10:06 am

The 250mm fan will sure give you some heavy-duty air-moving ability. Have you thought about where that air will come from though? I expect the whole intake/exhaust layout of the case will have to be re-configured?

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 11:10 am

jaganath wrote:The 250mm fan will sure give you some heavy-duty air-moving ability. Have you thought about where that air will come from though? I expect the whole intake/exhaust layout of the case will have to be re-configured?

The air will come from outside the case, from the room. The air will exit via the Ninja-exhaust path, via the PSU, and out - not in - the optical disk drive slot where HDD#2 is suspended with Stretch Magic. So absolutely no reconfiguration is needed. Just turn off, or remove, or run at ridiculously low speeds, the exhaust and PSU fan.

See more pictures of the fan here. The CooLive case by iCute Tech LLC (China) does not seem to be available yet.

IsaacKuo · Post by **IsaacKuo** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 11:17 am

Well, besides the obvious problem that a lot of the air will immediately slam into that Ninja, it sounds like you still need more exhaust area.

Hmm...let's say the Ninja already produces an unavoidable restriction equivalent to a 120mm circle. That still leaves the equivalent of 3 120mm circles of airflow left. Your rear case fan accounts for 1 120mm unit. Your open optical bays accounts for maybe 1 more 120mm unit. Your PSU accounts for maybe 1/2 120mm unit. That still leaves at least another 1/2 120mm unit to go--at minimum--preferably more.

I say open up those PCI slot backplanes, to give the air more area to escape with.

Anyway, I applaud your willingness to throw away $40 on just an experiment. Let us know how it goes!

Avalanche · Post by **Avalanche** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 12:02 pm

Hey Felger... No way you could make microphone measurements of that thing when it comes, is there? I'm guessing it doesn't sound much like a 120 mm fan.

As far as Isaac and Jaganath's concerns, here's my idea:
As long as the fan sounds the same when you install it in your case as when it's just operating in the open, you're fine. If it sounds a lot louder then it you might need more exhaust area.

Edit: Spelling

jaganath · Post by **jaganath** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 12:16 pm

if you have any small pets make sure they don't get sucked into it

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Fri Aug 11, 2006 12:53 pm

It's not a 250mm fan:

It's a 22cm fan, 3cm thick, four mounting ears on a 17cm square, 248g, all clear plastic, 13 blades. Being smaller will make it easier to mount on the side panel.

In fact, the fan is almost small enough to fit inside the case. With a shorter HSF and with the system HDD relocated and rearranged below the fan, I think the fan could go into the case.

Newegg got a lot of flak over shipping the fan in its retail box only, with resulting damage. Mine came double-boxed, no damage.

The 13 blades are gonna mess up my plan to use the stroboscopic technique along with the S-Flex "D" to measure RPM. So I'll have to monitor the exhaust temperature before and after so I can compare noise under constant cooling with the PSU and exhaust 120mm fans. My Harbor Freight dremel-alike is gonna get a workout!

edit: more info - starts at 3.43V. Thermaltake part #TT2230A, not on Google. Did a horseback comparison with the YL D12SL-12, both rated 12V .3A. Very roughly the same noise. At a distance of 10", I seemed to get more air blowing in my face from the 22cm fan. Considering its size, the total airflow was almost certainly greater, but how it cools the chassis will be what counts.

jaganath · Post by **jaganath** » Fri Aug 11, 2006 1:58 pm

I can't see the pic, it's not displaying correctly for some reason (only a little red cross on a white background).

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Sat Aug 12, 2006 9:29 am

Examining the possibilities:

This is the 220mm fan sitting on an unmodded left side panel from an Ever Case ECE3505]. I'm actually going to mount the fan on the outside of this panel, but this shows some detail. At center left is the panel release latch, which the installation can't interfere with. In this picture the small-pet protection black grill that came with the Thermaltake side panel is placed on the fan. You may recognize the EAR F-245 blue fan mounts; I got these at McMaster, part 5801K8 on page 1252. I actually have the fan (temporarily) connected to the side panel using two of these mounts in existing CAG holes, and an additional mount is in one of the CAG holes at the top right.

The large red rotary tool is what I'll use to put the ~18.25" hole in the side panel, and drill 4 mounting holes. The small blue tool is used for fine work. It drilled the holes in the soft white rubber that you see on a bolt that came with the fan, along with some commercial washers.

The soft white 1/4" rubber can be used to make soft washers (as shown), or for serious damping. It glues firmly to steel plate (such as the side panel) using super glue. What you want is a gel that has a 75 second setup time instead of the usual liquid with a 15 second setup time. You can get that here. Rubber is porous, so you need more glue than when fastening steel to steel.

This rubber can be easily cut with hobby knives, as you can see by the damping part I cut out freehand. This rubber does not crumble like the 3/8" stuff DickBlick also carries; you can bend this double.

This gives you an idea of what I have to work with in planning this fan installation. For a first test I'm not looking for something perfect, just something that works properly. I'm a damping and mass-loading-sensitive person, so don't expect a bare fan bolted to a bare side panel with a big hole in it (the panel, that is)!

I don't have any small pets, so I don't have to use that black fan grill! And best of all, I'm only modding a spare side panel. If this doesn't work I take it off and re-install the old panel. Don't want to mess up a perfectly good computer!

Rory Buszka · Post by **Rory Buszka** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 1:29 pm

It seems like the 250mm fan gimmick is just another development from the "Let's Blow Air Everywhere And See If It Cools Anything" department. With a fan that big, who needs airflow management? How would someone even attempt it?

That said, having the biggest fan at the LAN should count for something. At least until all the LANners get their own 250mm fans. Bragging rights never last for long.

zenboy · Post by **zenboy** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 2:06 pm

Well, if you had a system set up with a bunch of passive coolers and hooked this up blowing gently over the top of everything, it would be a single fan solution. Or you could use it as a single exhaust and just create a long ducted path from one item to the next.

jaganath · Post by **jaganath** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 2:20 pm

Or you could use it as a single exhaust and just create a long ducted path from one item to the next.

Too many kinks in the airflow, lots of backpressure. Positive pressure setups are the optimal layout for this fan.

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 2:38 pm

Here's a size comparison between the Thermaltake Armor/Kandalf side panel and my uATX side panel, with the fan in its final position (but on the wrong side of the panel):

The two hardest parts were figgerin' out how to mount the fan - there were too many possibilities, and I'm a retired electronic engineer, not mechanical - and drilling the mounting holes (for lack of a proper workshop). But those hurdles are out of the way now, and I'm cutting out the big circle.

After that, applying the sheet rubber mass-loading/damping, mounting the fan (trivial), and taking some before and after temperature measurements with the fan turned down barely enough to not be heard. Should have some results Sunday or Monday.

I agree with Jaganath: positive pressure is the way to go.

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Fri Aug 18, 2006 3:15 pm

Here's the big fan running my #1 computer. The PSU and exhaust fans are disconnected. I hadn't realized I was getting a side window with the fan!

This is my view of my computer station. I had to take the pic from further back than I sit, but the angle on the computer is the same I see - and obviously, I can't see the left side of the computer or the new big fan. Also, any noise coming from the left side doesn't have a direct path to my ear.

At the moment, the best measure of the cooling in the system is the HDD suspended in the optical drive slot, which very reliably and predictably is 14C over ambient with that added opening you can see on the left edge of the bezel, low down. And it takes a couple of hours for that to stabilize - each time I adjust the fan controller!

And right now, I have to lean forward and put my left ear directly in front of the floppy before I can hear anything. That's cutting the distance to the big fan in half, which is a 12dBA margin if I remember my acoustics right. That's too big a margin; I like to adjust so that the computer just barely cannot be heard under the quietest conditions.

So my first looksee indicates the big fan either cools better than the two 120mm fans (exhaust and PSU) when barely inaudible, or if the cooling is adjusted to be the same (14C HD2 rise), then the noise level is considerably below audibility from my normal position in front of the computer. I said first looksee, remember.

At the moment, there are no damping materials of any kind on the side panel, except for rubber fan mounts (Jab-Tech open-ear mounts). I wanted to see how bad the vibration noise would be with the big fan. There's no vibration noise whatsoever, just whoosh.

I need to do lots more tweaking and some 3AM listening and all that is gonna take some time. And when I finish that, apply some damping (as all the other major parts of my computer have) and repeat the testing to see what the difference, if any, is.

At the moment, it looks like I didn't waste the purchase price of the big fan.

edit: added "slot" and the following boast:

The only working fan in my Ever Case ECE3505, which uses a Ninja to cool the CPU, is a small fan that's only used for point cooling on the system HDD. Here comes the boast: my Ninja is really passively cooled, since there's no cooling fan in the case! True statement. The cooling fan is outside the case!

Trip · Post by **Trip** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 9:00 am

Impressive!

What CPU and PSU are you using btw?

If the PSU fan is disabled, I suspect it would cool better with the PSU casing off since that only serves to channel air.

Too bad the ninja fins aren't in the same direction as the air.

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 11:56 am

Trip wrote:What CPU and PSU are you using btw?

If the PSU fan is disabled, I suspect it would cool better with the PSU casing off since that only serves to channel air.

Too bad the ninja fins aren't in the same direction as the air.

AMD Sempron64 2800+, Powerman 300W (Newegg ~ $24). The PSU fan is disabled. Prefer not to expose internal high voltages to clumsy fingers - mine! And the Ninja fins are in the same direction as the air, honest!

I haven't finished fiddling with this fan. I have a project going to delve into it a lot deeper. 2 - 4 weeks?

Trip · Post by **Trip** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 5:39 pm

Isn't the fan on top of this: http://img446.imageshack.us/img446/8523/sidedx0.jpg ?

That would blow down on top of the fin not across the fins.

That rear fan has the right direction, but you're not using it. You could build a duct from the big fan so that it blows in the right direction (say, duct it into the heatsink), but I doubt it would improve anything.

Something like zalman 9500 or Thermalright SI 120 might work better, but that's just a guess.

I look forward to seeing what else you create.

Sempron64 2800+ is wimpy! You need some real heat for the fan to cool.

qviri · Post by **qviri** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 5:59 pm

Trip wrote:Isn't the fan on top of this: http://img446.imageshack.us/img446/8523/sidedx0.jpg ?

That would blow down on top of the fin not across the fins.

That rear fan has the right direction, but you're not using it.

How do you suppose all the air that this mother of all fans will blow into the case will exit? Perhaps through the rear fan hole, among others?

narrasuj · Post by **narrasuj** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 6:15 pm

qviri wrote:How do you suppose all the air that this mother of all fans will blow into the case will exit? Perhaps through the rear fan hole, among others?

I agree with you, but I think a duct would still help. Otherwise, airflow might pass around the heatsink due to decreased resistance in that pathway. With a duct that tightly fits around the Ninja, I'd assume air would still exit using that pathway and provide better cooling for the Ninja.

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 10:04 pm

narrasuj wrote:
qviri wrote:How do you suppose all the air that this mother of all fans will blow into the case will exit? Perhaps through the rear fan hole, among others?
I agree with you, but I think a duct would still help. Otherwise, airflow might pass around the heatsink due to decreased resistance in that pathway. With a duct that tightly fits around the Ninja, I'd assume air would still exit using that pathway and provide better cooling for the Ninja.

The big 220mm fan pressurizes the entire case. The high pressure air looks where it can to find an outlet. The outlet is thru the hole for the (disabled) exhaust fan and the PSU with its disabled fan. And yes, there's a duct on the Ninja.

The 220mm fan does not blow specifically at anything. It just provides a positive pressure in the case. The airflow is determined by openings out of the case. The two openings are what I mentioned, so that's the direction the air flows, and the air flows correctly for the orientation of the Ninja fins. Honest.

Trip · Post by **Trip** » Sat Oct 14, 2006 4:15 pm

ohh... Very nice.

The PSU prob cools better with the cover on as you have it then.

I'm used to negative pressure cases

Since it's positive pressure, the case might cool better if you duct from the exhaust hole into one side of the heatsink so that air can only exit through the heatsink, through the PSU, or through the various cracks.

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Sat Oct 14, 2006 4:45 pm

Trip wrote:Since it's positive pressure, the case might cool better if you duct from the exhaust hole into one side of the heatsink so that air can only exit through the heatsink, through the PSU, or through the various cracks.

Yep, that's what I'm doing. Details of my 3M Micropore 3" tape duct were posted to this forum a while back (search "unobtainium"). That's 3" tape mind you; none of that cheap 1" or 2" tape!

Trip · Post by **Trip** » Sat Oct 14, 2006 5:48 pm

I like it

You ought to add all of your projects to one page so late comers can catch up

Maybe in the gallery section.

Felger Carbon · Post by **Felger Carbon** » Sun Nov 26, 2006 11:58 pm

It's been a few months, but you can now buy this big fan without getting a Thermaltake Armor side panel as part of the deal. Performance-pcs.com now carries it - with blue LEDs. Which can be cut off, of course.

Traith · Post by **Traith** » Mon Jul 30, 2007 5:30 am

I'm trying to source this fan now [I'm outside the US though] since it would appear to me that a casing like Lian-Li's V series [top, bottom, front and back sides are all mesh, only the side panels are solid] would like this setup. A single large fan blowing in, centered on the first PEG slot with the air exiting out the mesh areas of the casing.

The next best thing to leaving the side panel off and having a desktop fan blowing in ^ ^.