Modding New Fan Bracket (56k be warned)

[Phat Ass]

This has now been finished over the last 3 days but only half the pics are up atm, so the rest will be added later

I have had a case kicking around for amonths and not decided what to do with it, along with another case that was donated to me by a mate ive decided on what im going to do with it (Log will be started soon of that)

Sadly the only heatsink i have is an old Coolermaster one with a 7000rpm 60mm fan on it, as such, its horrendously loud (45dB).

Eventually decided to put an 80mm fan on it, or even better 2. One over the CPU heatsink and one over the NB heatsink generally pushing air over the board. So a deign was made by getting 2 fans and a sheet of aluminium. normally i design more accuartely than that and this shows a bit, but nm.

I had a piece of alu which was already cut up a bit from an attempted mod which was abandoned cos it went wrong This was exactly the right width so it was used.

Didnt think to take any pics before i started, first one is after i cut the holes for the fans and sorted the finish on the alu.



This when it was bent into shape was going to leave huge areas of sheet metal which would impeade air flow, so a wodden template was attached to the alu and the plan drawn on. Drilling loads of holes around the edges of the area to be cut out made life easier than using a jigsaw that would have torn the metal appart.





When the wood is removed the alu looks like this:



After about another couple of hours work with files and a 15year old pseudo dremel its not as air restricting.



The holes in the top of the bracket had to be cut and enlarged a few times, and a few slips lated, the nice finish was covered in marks

Not too noticable once its all been shaped properly and had the fan attached but still annoying.



Most annoying was that i had noting to fix the fans inpace with, so had to use food ties. Will be sorted soon.

The Fan mate sits on a shelf and got stuck on with doublesided foam tape.

At the moment the bracket has to sit on the heatsink to support its self as the alu is only 1.5mm thick. This will be remedied by some brackets somewhere.





At least it works and looks reasonable, even if its got lots of marks on it.

More to follow once the pics are uploaded

[Drastik]

nice work buddy

[Madyeti]

pretty cool looking! Great job man! ~Davy

[JazzXP]

Looks good, but watch out, it looks like that heat sink isn't on properly.

[Drastik]

eek i just noticed it now that u said someting.

[Phat Ass]

More pics sorted.

Toady managed to get some brackets made to add to the main unit to increase the strength and stop it resting its full weight on the heatsink and bending.



Used some of the 2 part glue that comes with the Zalman Northbridge heatsink (mine used screws) and left 'em for 20minutes to set.



Managed to get some 30mm M3 bolts to attach the fans to the bracket today and with the strength adding pieces almost invisible the bracket still looks decent.



Decided that the black fan edges looked a bit naff, so started to wrap them in more alu. had to drill a hole for the power cables for the fans, didnt plan on having the fans wrapped, so didnt leave the cables long enough to hide them without adding more cable on now (which i dont have), nor did i make the bracket wide enough to house them in totally.



Sanded the wrap with the same 400 then 600 grit wet and dry as th main bracket and manged no to ruin it this time. Used some more of the Zalman glue to hold the ends together behind the Fanmate shelf and clamped it for about ahlf an hour while i wrote the previous post



2 Pics left to upload and post of the finished unit done and inplace. Will post them soon.

[Phat Ass]

Originally posted by JazzXP
Looks good, but watch out, it looks like that heat sink isn't on properly.

The processor isnt on yet and the HS isnt attched so isnt a problem

[xen0morph]

looks nice, just watch it dosen't fowl on anything while mounting (too tired to spell)

[Phat Ass]

Eventually finsihed it and got it seated on the mobo tray, the final pics:

[zackerouac]

niiiiiiiiice

[wywywywy]

Very nice :D
What do you use to bend?

[hydrogen18]

cool
nice fab work...

[Phat Ass]

Thanks for the positive responses

Originally posted by wywywywy
Very nice
What do you use to bend?

2 pieces of wood and the bench, clamp one piece on top of the piece on the bench
use the other piece to bend it over uniformly

job done.

[wywywywy]

Originally posted by Phat Ass
2 pieces of wood and the bench, clamp one piece on top of the piece on the bench
use the other piece to bend it over uniformly

Very good idea Why couldn't I think of that. Now let me try some tomorrow!

[bee2643]

looks good...now, what do you call it

[Phat Ass]

God knows, "Temperary Dual Fan Bracket for New Project" should do it

Seems a bit daft in retrospect, spening >20hrs on somthing thats not even a permanant thing in the case. nm

[Cowinacape]

Excellent work on that bracket guy! Turned out mighty fine if I do say so myself!

[Da_BaCoN]

looks pretty nice. are we gonna be seeing version two with some led fans in it??

[Phat Ass]

always a possibility but that would be done once everythig else is done as this is just a stop gap solution to a temperary problem (a load ass fan). an LED version would also require the purchasing of LED fans, this cost me <£5 for the main unit.

The 8 bolts were £0.59 for 4 (£1.18)
The thin alu was £2.99 for a 2'x2' sheet
The thick alu was found down the back of the table saw (£0)
The glue was kinda free as i got it with the northbridge sink but didnt need it so was spare
The fans were free from dads work (cut off old 486 psu units being thrown out)

Total cost to me, £4.17p

The only expensive thing was the Fan Mate, £9.99. Even then this was purchased along with other bits and pieces i got in exchage for a psu from Maplin Electronics (it was erm, underpowered (yes that'll do)) Although it was purchased for this project (got the Northbridge, a round floppy cable and summat else i cant remember for a fiver)

Even with this expense it was <£15. adding 2x LED fans would be about £13 for each fan, so it'd almost treble the cost. admitedly i wasnt thinking about the cost when i did it (my sanity is worth too much to me), any money i have kicking about from now of will be for the next project (Project Plain Lazy) which had kind of started but not really, (preliminary work done(ish)) So expect a log starting in the next week or so (maybe tonight if i can tear myself from modding/revision).

If you see me about in #bit-tech i should be somewere near the pc, if not, pm me and i'll get back to you with any questions anyone has

[Murdoc]

where did you get the alu from?
Murdoc