Hey all,

I had an idea to silence my fans even more, I have a Fractal R3 and am using the fan clips for the front and bottom 120mm fans. The rear 120mm uses rubber fan screws and absorbs vibrations which I prefer, and it's not like my fans nor case is loud however this may be a cheap and simple mod to get that little bit of extra silence.

My question is if I could use generic 3M medical tape on to the insides of the fan mounts and the clips themselves to further reduce vibrations and fit the fans more securely to the case.

My main concern is if the 3M tape would last?

I'm thinking of using this Silicone tape;



In these clips on the R3 front (and bottom as well);



Thoughts?

Trying the tape is free. But I would say that the front mounting system is a noise generator waiting to happen. First you need fans that don't vibrate.

I'm using 4x Noctua S12Bs, my fans do not vibrate and my system is >30dB@1M. I used a Velleman DVM805 meter which right up to almost making contact with the case reads 30db.

This is to further dampen the fans.

I have no exact evidence of your particular situation but I have used common electrical tape to good advantage many times in my past. I suspect that the tape your talking about is quite stable. More importantly will the tape last long enough.....

Wrapping the tape around the perimeter of the fans before inserting them into the noise maker plastic cage is probably a good idea.

I had not thought about wrapping it around all objects, simply using the tape as dampening layer between the plastic. I'll test a single fan at 12v and see if it makes a difference, at 4.5v I doubt it would. But hey why not, it's cheap.

Well if there isn't any vibrational noise to dampen...

Without going all passive there's always something you can dampen

i use 3m double sided foam tape. works great for me.

dont rule out bluetac

In 5 years of supporting medical systems I've found all kinds of things stuck together with surgical tape. I've seen it used for tying cables together, holding equipment together (?!?), attaching cables to walls so that they can be run across ceilings to pendants and gantries, sticking notices up, rigging equipment up to xray tables, in some hospitals they even seem to think Micropore is able to be used for stuctural repairs...

Of course you can also tape ECG electrodes onto patients, tape eyes shut, tape all kinds of probes going into various bodily orifices etc. Generally that is only needed for <8hrs.

Seriously, the stuff holds well and I don't think you'll have any problems with it. It can leave a nasty residue though which you might need some alcohol to remove if ever you undue your mod.