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The ultimate beginner's guide to PC FANS
- Thread starter ScrubNinja
- Start date
vinnythebat
Member
i use to use a vantec tornado back in my overclocking days, i cant remember the specs but i know i still have it in storage ill try and get it later. it was a 92 mm im going to try and use it with a odorsock in a 1x2x2.5 cab.
In celebration of learning how to multi-quote
In celebration of learning how to multi-quote
They didn't have LEDs after all! BTW these are actually HUGE compared to the Aero. The Aero is like a Lamborghini compared to the XB Pro's Hummer. These also seem to whine a bit more when restricted. I pulled the silly chrome grill off the UFO and it works a bit better. I'm going to cut away all but 4 of the curled fins. Frankenfan!
No worries man. Maybe I was a bit harsh. Plenty of people are doing what you want to do so it's not impossible. I also live in a very hot climate and that influences my opinions. In fact I was shuffling all my bits around today and the current design I'm liking is actually pushing through a tiny tubular filter. But that is taking into consideration that it has a glass heat shield on it's own ventilation for the lights, and should need much reduced exhausting/filtering. Plus the non-axial fan just being better suited to it.
Yo vinny that would kick ass, man. That's a really good fan by the looks. The "bonus link" about the PC mufflers a few posts up uses a Tornado.
In celebration of learning how to multi-quote
They didn't have LEDs after all! BTW these are actually HUGE compared to the Aero. The Aero is like a Lamborghini compared to the XB Pro's Hummer. These also seem to whine a bit more when restricted. I pulled the silly chrome grill off the UFO and it works a bit better. I'm going to cut away all but 4 of the curled fins. Frankenfan!
No worries man. Maybe I was a bit harsh. Plenty of people are doing what you want to do so it's not impossible. I also live in a very hot climate and that influences my opinions. In fact I was shuffling all my bits around today and the current design I'm liking is actually pushing through a tiny tubular filter. But that is taking into consideration that it has a glass heat shield on it's own ventilation for the lights, and should need much reduced exhausting/filtering. Plus the non-axial fan just being better suited to it.
Yo vinny that would kick ass, man. That's a really good fan by the looks. The "bonus link" about the PC mufflers a few posts up uses a Tornado.
Strangely
Member
Better to pull if you only have one fan (err right Scrub?). But one pushing as well as pulling is good, means the fans aren't working as hard (or as loud).
I've done a small rough sketch to help illustrate what Scrub means with his carbon layer. But ImageShack is on a go slow... It really is the best way having pestered him for ages on it, and reading up. A scrubber that works less than 100% is essentially pointless. Smell is smell after all. Best of luck dude.
Hehehe, looks like you're progressing! 
Yup always better to pull. I just stumbled over the push/pull thing and it seems to work great for me! One fan pulling would be unable to cool properly on 12v I reckon, and I run on 9v with two fans. Considerably quieter and better cooling like that. A lot of people try a similar thing with intake fans but I fail to see how that can work, AND filter smell 100% as no case is truly airtight.
I'll try to take a photo of my first diy pc filter one day. It's the textbook example of doing everything wrong - however, strangely enough, that was a push/pull as well, also with some heavy mmh2o involved, and it worked! Most of the outdoor plants in my gallery went through that case in their early life. So there you go, sometimes you just have to say fudge it and see what happens.
Yup always better to pull. I just stumbled over the push/pull thing and it seems to work great for me! One fan pulling would be unable to cool properly on 12v I reckon, and I run on 9v with two fans. Considerably quieter and better cooling like that. A lot of people try a similar thing with intake fans but I fail to see how that can work, AND filter smell 100% as no case is truly airtight.I'll try to take a photo of my first diy pc filter one day. It's the textbook example of doing everything wrong - however, strangely enough, that was a push/pull as well, also with some heavy mmh2o involved, and it worked! Most of the outdoor plants in my gallery went through that case in their early life. So there you go, sometimes you just have to say fudge it and see what happens.
Cool cool. Well here's that silly thing I made. I'm quite embarrassed to show it, lol. I do it for the greater good!
I'm just gonna let the mistakes poke you in the eye instead of explaining them.
Pushing directly into it, I had a Blue LED Thermaltake, and pulling through it on the back of the case, I had two 80mm Sunons. Here is the case so you can put it to a picture (top left section, the filter was glued to the wall on the other side of the fan):
I'm just gonna let the mistakes poke you in the eye instead of explaining them.
Pushing directly into it, I had a Blue LED Thermaltake, and pulling through it on the back of the case, I had two 80mm Sunons. Here is the case so you can put it to a picture (top left section, the filter was glued to the wall on the other side of the fan):
Strangely
Member
haha looks ok to me. But that's not saying much I guess eh! I'll play ball, are the holes a bit restrictive? Better off with some sort of mesh with more air flow? Do I get a silver star for effort?
Ooh ImageShack is playing ball again. Here's the rough idea diagram for CloudNine to help illustrate Scrubs flat filter in a micro grow.
Ooh ImageShack is playing ball again. Here's the rough idea diagram for CloudNine to help illustrate Scrubs flat filter in a micro grow.
Nice, that's the way. So far I've only used the design in large rubbermaids 60 litres or so but it works very well. I can't even build a large tubular type easily because all the god damn pipe expander things in shops here have the pipes off centre, over to one side. So annoying.
Anyway, I wanted to say - in a micro grow like Strangely has so artistically presented, I'd use little pieces of angle or just wood, or even something temporary, and create a set of rails for another flat piece of whatever. If you've seen someone levelling off a cement house block, or sidewalk, you'll know what I mean. So you just drag it over and the carbon is all at the exact same depth. I should get paid for this stuff!
Yeah about the filter, the CD spindle thing I used is about 120mm round so we can see there's quite a blockage to the 120mm flow. None of the side holes are making any difference because it's solid wall on the outside. Even the stylish filter foam is blocking the flow.
Anyway, I wanted to say - in a micro grow like Strangely has so artistically presented, I'd use little pieces of angle or just wood, or even something temporary, and create a set of rails for another flat piece of whatever. If you've seen someone levelling off a cement house block, or sidewalk, you'll know what I mean. So you just drag it over and the carbon is all at the exact same depth. I should get paid for this stuff!
Yeah about the filter, the CD spindle thing I used is about 120mm round so we can see there's quite a blockage to the 120mm flow. None of the side holes are making any difference because it's solid wall on the outside. Even the stylish filter foam is blocking the flow.
Hi ninja,
Sorry for hijaking your thread...can you have a look over here pls..
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=135291
Thank you very much
Sorry for hijaking your thread...can you have a look over here pls..
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=135291
Thank you very much
Can someone point me to where I can find an AC fan speed control?
I went to the thrift store today, and found a great fan. The thing is it's WAY to loud. I can hear it running in my closet with closet door and bedroom door shut. Jet engine would be an understatement for this thing. No clue as to model or anything since it's got no stickers or anything. Very thick blades, and heavily angled blades makes it perfect for pulling through a filter. I set it down on the bed, and it didn't bog down one bit.
Can a normal pc fan speed controller safely be used with a ac fan?
I went to the thrift store today, and found a great fan. The thing is it's WAY to loud. I can hear it running in my closet with closet door and bedroom door shut. Jet engine would be an understatement for this thing. No clue as to model or anything since it's got no stickers or anything. Very thick blades, and heavily angled blades makes it perfect for pulling through a filter. I set it down on the bed, and it didn't bog down one bit.
Can a normal pc fan speed controller safely be used with a ac fan?
No probs SVK I left a reply just now. It will be a kickass case for sure.
Cloudnine: Nice. I bought a generic AC fan speed control from an online hydro store, cheap and it's worked on the 3 AC fans I've tried, but depending on the fan, they can introduce a buzzing noise and it gets louder the slower you go. On my most kickin' ass fan, a 150mm centrifugal, it barely makes a difference to the sound, and doesn't have any buzz. On something weaker like a 150mm axial inline, it makes a huge difference to speed and it buzzes so much on slow speed that it almost overrides any silence created by slowing it in the first place.
With my centrifugal, with the speed control, I had to go to great lengths to quiten it and I still didn't succeed. I ended up buying a westaflex mixflo which is similar to the S&Ps and I was very happy after that. You may want to look at enclosing the fan in a cooler box, or wooden box packed full of insulation, etc. Insulated ducting and a DIY muffler will help a lot too. If you're in a closet, I would totally recommend a mixed flow fan. It's easy street with those.
Cloudnine: Nice. I bought a generic AC fan speed control from an online hydro store, cheap and it's worked on the 3 AC fans I've tried, but depending on the fan, they can introduce a buzzing noise and it gets louder the slower you go. On my most kickin' ass fan, a 150mm centrifugal, it barely makes a difference to the sound, and doesn't have any buzz. On something weaker like a 150mm axial inline, it makes a huge difference to speed and it buzzes so much on slow speed that it almost overrides any silence created by slowing it in the first place.
With my centrifugal, with the speed control, I had to go to great lengths to quiten it and I still didn't succeed. I ended up buying a westaflex mixflo which is similar to the S&Ps and I was very happy after that. You may want to look at enclosing the fan in a cooler box, or wooden box packed full of insulation, etc. Insulated ducting and a DIY muffler will help a lot too. If you're in a closet, I would totally recommend a mixed flow fan. It's easy street with those.
First of let me say thank u scrubb for puting in the time and effort to educate me/us and also thanks to everybody else for contributing, ive learned alot.
i have a question, im not going to run a carbon filter, i have other odor methods, do u think in a room with 3 68watt clfs would need more then one outake and one intake fan and be ok temp wise without the filter impairing it ? the box is 3ft tall, 3ft wide, 2ft deep. i guess what im asking is what power fan would i be looking for.as u guys seem to need more powerful ones and im into it also being as quiet as can be, i plan on a back ground fan blowing to mask what might be left of the sound but i just dont want it to challenge my patsy, appriciate it mates. cheers.
i have a question, im not going to run a carbon filter, i have other odor methods, do u think in a room with 3 68watt clfs would need more then one outake and one intake fan and be ok temp wise without the filter impairing it ? the box is 3ft tall, 3ft wide, 2ft deep. i guess what im asking is what power fan would i be looking for.as u guys seem to need more powerful ones and im into it also being as quiet as can be, i plan on a back ground fan blowing to mask what might be left of the sound but i just dont want it to challenge my patsy, appriciate it mates. cheers.
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My pleasure, Lev. I wish you luck with your project, sounds cool.
First of all, 200 watts in a cab that large, with no carbon scrubber, should be pretty straightforward. I do get asked a lot about fans after making this thread and 95% of the time, I recommend the Thermaltake Smart Case Fan II - the speed dial and decent all round specs make it the perfect fan for most micro grows IMO. Including yours. At full speed, it's probably going to be too loud, at minimum speed it's close enough to silent, and still pumping a decent amount. So I'd say somewhere just over halfway on the dial is you, and you can still turn it up to eleven when a freak heatwave hits for a week.
I've never used active intakes but if you feel that's the way to go and are familiar with them, then I think 2 x thermaltakes (one exhaust, one intake) will knock this over no problem whatsoever, and quiet enough that an external fan or whatever will drown it out very well. You will still need fan/s to blow on the bulbs themselves, but certainly, the exhaust shouldn't be a big deal.
The thermaltake is .48 amps at full speed and blows approx 100 to 120cfm. For your interests you would be mostly looking at a fan with high amperage, high CFM rating, and low noise. Pressure rating is not so important but it doesn't hurt as even without a carbon filter, there'll still be some small restriction. If you find a fan with those specs similar to the thermaltake but no speed control, you can just undervolt them. But the speed dial is a big HUGE selling point for me. The fan can be tuned exactly as loud as your needs allow.
Best spot for exhaust fan would probably be right in the centre top of the roof, if possible.
First of all, 200 watts in a cab that large, with no carbon scrubber, should be pretty straightforward. I do get asked a lot about fans after making this thread and 95% of the time, I recommend the Thermaltake Smart Case Fan II - the speed dial and decent all round specs make it the perfect fan for most micro grows IMO. Including yours. At full speed, it's probably going to be too loud, at minimum speed it's close enough to silent, and still pumping a decent amount. So I'd say somewhere just over halfway on the dial is you, and you can still turn it up to eleven when a freak heatwave hits for a week.
I've never used active intakes but if you feel that's the way to go and are familiar with them, then I think 2 x thermaltakes (one exhaust, one intake) will knock this over no problem whatsoever, and quiet enough that an external fan or whatever will drown it out very well. You will still need fan/s to blow on the bulbs themselves, but certainly, the exhaust shouldn't be a big deal.
The thermaltake is .48 amps at full speed and blows approx 100 to 120cfm. For your interests you would be mostly looking at a fan with high amperage, high CFM rating, and low noise. Pressure rating is not so important but it doesn't hurt as even without a carbon filter, there'll still be some small restriction. If you find a fan with those specs similar to the thermaltake but no speed control, you can just undervolt them. But the speed dial is a big HUGE selling point for me. The fan can be tuned exactly as loud as your needs allow.
Best spot for exhaust fan would probably be right in the centre top of the roof, if possible.
Well, here's my take on it: I've never used an intake fan and normally I wouldn't encourage them cos most people have filters , a non-air-tight box, and they haven't used any kind of formula to determine the strength of their intake fan needed. And besides, if they did do that right and got a fan that pushes in less than is leaving through the filter, then what on earth is the point of having it in the first place, ya know? So that's how I look at them normally.
But if you don't have a filter then none of that really matters. I would kind of stare at your box for a bit, look at the intakes, the exhausts, and think about if there will be a lot of elbows or aquarium foam, or whatever else for light blocking. I'm sure you would've had some experience with cabs and just kind of sense if you think it's a restrictive environment. Usually there will be some restriction like I said.
So if you feel that could be an issue, having the intake fan and exhaust fan "in line" (both helping each other in a chain, sort of) will give you some extra pressure to deal with that. It'll still push the same CFMs as one fan, but the thermaltake gives you like 120cfms anyway (at max) which is more than the average pc fan to begin with.
If you feel like it's very unrestricted, and free flow, which it should be, you could by all means have two exhaust fans side by side, and no intake fans. This will give you double the potential CFMs with the pressure of only one fan (lucky we don't need much and the thermaltake is well rated for pressure anyway!). Personally I think this is the best idea for sure, as long it's a free flowing cab. I know this is probably confusing, all these ways you can do it, but it shows the versatility of the fan. Like I said, for you the cfm rating is important, and this side-by-side setup will give you max CFM with least fan noise, for a 2 fan setup. By the way by side-by-side, I actually mean space them out evenly on the roof, so they draw the air more evenly out of the cab.
And a small note that the above is based on theory only, I've not used two fans side-by-side in the strict sense I outlined. But here is a page from one of my bigger fans manual to illustrate:
Otherwise it's discussed in the air flow threads in the first post. Rock on.
But if you don't have a filter then none of that really matters. I would kind of stare at your box for a bit, look at the intakes, the exhausts, and think about if there will be a lot of elbows or aquarium foam, or whatever else for light blocking. I'm sure you would've had some experience with cabs and just kind of sense if you think it's a restrictive environment. Usually there will be some restriction like I said.
So if you feel that could be an issue, having the intake fan and exhaust fan "in line" (both helping each other in a chain, sort of) will give you some extra pressure to deal with that. It'll still push the same CFMs as one fan, but the thermaltake gives you like 120cfms anyway (at max) which is more than the average pc fan to begin with.
If you feel like it's very unrestricted, and free flow, which it should be, you could by all means have two exhaust fans side by side, and no intake fans. This will give you double the potential CFMs with the pressure of only one fan (lucky we don't need much and the thermaltake is well rated for pressure anyway!). Personally I think this is the best idea for sure, as long it's a free flowing cab. I know this is probably confusing, all these ways you can do it, but it shows the versatility of the fan. Like I said, for you the cfm rating is important, and this side-by-side setup will give you max CFM with least fan noise, for a 2 fan setup. By the way by side-by-side, I actually mean space them out evenly on the roof, so they draw the air more evenly out of the cab.
And a small note that the above is based on theory only, I've not used two fans side-by-side in the strict sense I outlined.
But here is a page from one of my bigger fans manual to illustrate:Otherwise it's discussed in the air flow threads in the first post. Rock on.
Yeah you never know, one may do it. Having a patsy and no carbon filter makes it pretty simple. A Smart Fan II on full speed is a fair bit louder than any desktop I've encountered, but not impossible to work with. I have one on full speed for circulation inside a wooden cab and you can barely hear it.
Does anyone have any thoughts on using a 92mm fan hooked up to an 80mm adapter? Would the extra strength of a 92mm generally make up for the 80mm outlet? Or would I be better off with an 80mm fan?
It's for a glass heatshield section in a PC. Thnx.
It's for a glass heatshield section in a PC. Thnx.
Huggie bear
Active member
I would say that the air volume traveling through the bottle neck would create some back pressure but still be an advantage. Altho I am sure you could find a rival 80MM fan that have the RPM's and CFM to match the 92 in the first place.
