[Novalug] Case Fan Questions

Ed James edjames@greenbelt.com
Sun Aug 5 11:52:48 EDT 2007


Jay,

    First question.  Do your fans use sleeve bearings or ball bearings?
Sleeved fans tend to be cheaper, but wear out faster.  Ball bearing
fans cost more, but outlive the price difference.

    FYI - may not work for all situations...I adopted a throw-away 'puter
with a noisy power supply fan.  I used compressed air to blow out as
much crud from the fan as possible, then re-lubed it with oil designed
for a sewing machine (do NOT use WD-40 type stuff).  Works fine and
quiet now.  I sorta do this with cheap desk fans (designed to cool
people) once a year - clean the fan's shaft and relube it.  10 buck
fans last a lot longer that way.

Ed James

Quoting Jay Hart <jhart@kevla.org>
> ...
> Comment #1: My two little Mini-ITX cases are losing fans (40mm case   
> fans) left
> and right. There are two 40mm fans per case, and when one goes bad, I replace
> the pair. Average length of time between failures (when one of the pair goes
> bad) is 2-3 months.  I find this unexceptable.




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