I'm thinking of putting an 80mm fan in my Overture case to try and help route some air out and wanted to know if there is some material I can use to mount the fan using an existing pci slot. I never took any electronics classes so I don't know anything about circuit board but could I just get some from Radio Shack, cut it to fit a pci slot and put it in without hurting the mb?
If this would work the only other issue would be to make sure the circuit board didn't come out of the pci slot due to the weight of the fan.
Empty PCI slot & circuit board
Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee
-
Ralf Hutter
- SPCR Reviewer
- Posts: 8636
- Joined: Sat Nov 23, 2002 6:33 am
- Location: Sunny SoCal
Yes, this is perfectly acceptable, and as a matter of fact there's a tutorial on how to do this posted *somewhere* on the internet and unfortunately I can't find it amongst my 42 trillion bookmarks.
Short version: Buy a big enough piece of PCB from Ratshack, trace the shape of a full-size PCI card onto it, including the part that goes into the PCI slot itself. Cut out the shape in the PCB, locate the position of your 80mm (or whatever size) fan, drill the 4 mounting holes and cut out the 80mm hole. If you pull the metal slot cover off of an old dead PCI card you can drill a set of holes on your new card and bolt the slot cover onto your new card so you can screw it down securely.
Short version: Buy a big enough piece of PCB from Ratshack, trace the shape of a full-size PCI card onto it, including the part that goes into the PCI slot itself. Cut out the shape in the PCB, locate the position of your 80mm (or whatever size) fan, drill the 4 mounting holes and cut out the 80mm hole. If you pull the metal slot cover off of an old dead PCI card you can drill a set of holes on your new card and bolt the slot cover onto your new card so you can screw it down securely.
I know exactly the tutorial Ralf's talking about...but I can't find it either.
You could also use an extra PCI slot cover to mount the fan to. Just bend the screw-end back, and drill a couple of holes along its length to mount the fan to. Somewhere here on SPCR there's a pic of what I'm talking about.
You could also use an extra PCI slot cover to mount the fan to. Just bend the screw-end back, and drill a couple of holes along its length to mount the fan to. Somewhere here on SPCR there's a pic of what I'm talking about.
i'm sorry
but i am not understanding what u want to do?
like u want to buy a non working PCI card, then lets say u put it in the bottom of of ur mobo in an empty PCI slot. then u want to put an 80mm exhaust fan on top of it?
would this help alot?
btw i have always wondered, do those side fans help when u put it as exhaust? the ones with some see through windows have
like this one CASE
thx
~RaNDoM
but i am not understanding what u want to do?
like u want to buy a non working PCI card, then lets say u put it in the bottom of of ur mobo in an empty PCI slot. then u want to put an 80mm exhaust fan on top of it?
would this help alot?
btw i have always wondered, do those side fans help when u put it as exhaust? the ones with some see through windows have
like this one CASE
thx
~RaNDoM
This situation is very unique. I'm trying to cool an Antec Overture which is a desktop / HTPC case. I have moved my pci cards so that they are to either side. This leaves a gap of 3 empty pci slots in the middle of the mb. I took the pci slot covers off so I could let some heat escape.
Using some twist ties I hung an 80mm fan near the back of my sound card as a test and found it helped exhaust the heat. The key is that I had the fan pointing out towards the back of the case. I tried to find a more stable way to hang the fan but nothing seemed to work. I thought if I cut some circuit board it it could hold the fan for me. The board would have to be very low and very long. I'd probably have to use some bolts or brackets to secure it to the board.
I don't think it will work but at least now I know I can buy the board.
Using some twist ties I hung an 80mm fan near the back of my sound card as a test and found it helped exhaust the heat. The key is that I had the fan pointing out towards the back of the case. I tried to find a more stable way to hang the fan but nothing seemed to work. I thought if I cut some circuit board it it could hold the fan for me. The board would have to be very low and very long. I'd probably have to use some bolts or brackets to secure it to the board.
I don't think it will work but at least now I know I can buy the board.
Don't know if this will give you any ideas or not.
Good luck
http://www.moddin.net/article.asp?ArticleID=12
Good luck
http://www.moddin.net/article.asp?ArticleID=12
-
Gooserider
- Posts: 587
- Joined: Fri Aug 01, 2003 10:45 pm
- Location: North Billerica, MA, USA
- Contact:
Dumb comment, but as a cautionary note that you (hopefully) won't need - make sure there are no circuit traces on the part of the PC board that you are going to be sticking in the slot!
As a side note, it might be easier to purchase (or find someone that has) a cheap / dead PCI card that you could carve up to make your fan mount. Just be sure to cleanly cut all the traces as close to the slot as possible to minimize the chance of shorts.
Gooserider
As a side note, it might be easier to purchase (or find someone that has) a cheap / dead PCI card that you could carve up to make your fan mount. Just be sure to cleanly cut all the traces as close to the slot as possible to minimize the chance of shorts.
Gooserider
-
silvervarg
- Posts: 1283
- Joined: Wed Sep 03, 2003 1:35 am
- Location: Sweden, Linkoping
Two bent PCI-slot brackets should work fine for the mounting of that fan. I would recommend that you point the fan so it blows on your AGP card at an angle so the air will bounce on the AGP and then out through the holes.
Another option that I tried in an old chassi was to buy a 92mm PCI-slot fan. It works like a blower fan, so it only takes one PCI slot. However it turned out that the fan in that arrangement was total crap from a noise point of view compared to my good fans.
Just thought I should tell so you don't have to do the same misstake...
Btw, this was before I joined SPCR.
Another option that I tried in an old chassi was to buy a 92mm PCI-slot fan. It works like a blower fan, so it only takes one PCI slot. However it turned out that the fan in that arrangement was total crap from a noise point of view compared to my good fans.
Just thought I should tell so you don't have to do the same misstake...
Btw, this was before I joined SPCR.
-
Gooserider
- Posts: 587
- Joined: Fri Aug 01, 2003 10:45 pm
- Location: North Billerica, MA, USA
- Contact:
I just revisited an item that I bought over 10 years ago to aid in cooling my first PC, a 386 DX-20 
It was a slot cooler type item sort of like some of the coolers used on the hot video cards, but not associated with a card.
It was a plastic box approx the height of an ISA PC card and about as wide as the slot blank it was mounted on. The slot blank had a grill cut into it. the length of the box could be adjusted with a friction fit telescope action between the halves of the box. On the edge of the box was a plastic tab that would fit into an ISA slot to hold it steady. Mounted on one side of the box were a couple of 40mm Sunon fans, I forget the model off hand, but they are quite quiet. Power was supplied by a 4 wire pass through plug with 12 volt taps for the two fans wired in parallel. Originally the fans were mounted to suck air in and blow it out the grill in the slot blank, however I flipped the fans over so that now it sucks into the grill and blows out.
The amount of air that this gizmo moves is probably on the order of under 10 CFM, but it could be just enough to add some supplemental cooling to a system without adding noticeable noise. I grabbed it because my I discovered that my CPU HSF fan (on a P-200) had died. Since my PSU fan has either also died or is thermal controlled so it doesn't come on much, I decided I wanted a bit of extra airflow to ensure that nothing got TO hot in the case. It seems to help quite a bit.
I have no idea if it, or a similiar product is still available. The store I bought it at is long out of business, and the part doesn't seem to have any brand info on it. But it was a nice idea and might be worth recreating for other apps today.
Gooserider
It was a slot cooler type item sort of like some of the coolers used on the hot video cards, but not associated with a card.It was a plastic box approx the height of an ISA PC card and about as wide as the slot blank it was mounted on. The slot blank had a grill cut into it. the length of the box could be adjusted with a friction fit telescope action between the halves of the box. On the edge of the box was a plastic tab that would fit into an ISA slot to hold it steady. Mounted on one side of the box were a couple of 40mm Sunon fans, I forget the model off hand, but they are quite quiet. Power was supplied by a 4 wire pass through plug with 12 volt taps for the two fans wired in parallel. Originally the fans were mounted to suck air in and blow it out the grill in the slot blank, however I flipped the fans over so that now it sucks into the grill and blows out.
The amount of air that this gizmo moves is probably on the order of under 10 CFM, but it could be just enough to add some supplemental cooling to a system without adding noticeable noise. I grabbed it because my I discovered that my CPU HSF fan (on a P-200) had died. Since my PSU fan has either also died or is thermal controlled so it doesn't come on much, I decided I wanted a bit of extra airflow to ensure that nothing got TO hot in the case. It seems to help quite a bit.
I have no idea if it, or a similiar product is still available. The store I bought it at is long out of business, and the part doesn't seem to have any brand info on it. But it was a nice idea and might be worth recreating for other apps today.
Gooserider