Fans in old 1U equipment

[shovenose]

I felt a bit bad about it, but at work we scrapped about 4 Netgear 10/100 24-port rackmount switches... why? the fans were either stopped completely or made loud grinding noises and only spun at like 5 RPM

Anyway, this evening my uncle gave me a server rack for my closet and a Linksys EFAH24 hub.
Beside the fact that I have no screws to attach my server to the rack I'm pretty happy about it...
Anyway, on the hub, the fan is bad it won't go at all, then after a few minutes it'll make a terrible noise and start spinning
Thing is, the primary capacitor is quite bulged (probably because of the fan failure) but since the thing still works I'm ignoring it!

Now, why oh why do these fans always die?

[ratdude747]

Originally Posted by shovenose

I felt a bit bad about it, but at work we scrapped about 4 Netgear 10/100 24-port rackmount switches... why? the fans were either stopped completely or made loud grinding noises and only spun at like 5 RPM

Anyway, this evening my uncle gave me a server rack for my closet and a Linksys EFAH24 hub.
Beside the fact that I have no screws to attach my server to the rack I'm pretty happy about it...
Anyway, on the hub, the fan is bad it won't go at all, then after a few minutes it'll make a terrible noise and start spinning
Thing is, the primary capacitor is quite bulged (probably because of the fan failure) but since the thing still works I'm ignoring it!

Now, why oh why do these fans always die?

high RPMs + long time = dried lube= failed fans.

better fix that bulged cap if you want it to last... it works for now... but probably not for too awful long...

[c_hegge]

What brand is the fan? If it's a cheap off-brand then that would explain it

[shovenose]

The fans in the Netgears and also my Linksys are all Sunon

[Th3_uN1Qu3]

Sunon makes good fans. However, those are high RPM fans so it's obvious they'll catch more dust and fail faster than slower, quieter ones.

[c_hegge]

Their ball and Maglev bearing models are good, but their sleeve bearing fans are pure junk IMO. I often see 80mm and 92mm models with locked bearings after 3-4 years of occasional use running at low speeds.

[kc8adu]

i replace the 40mm ball bearing ones every few years in a common brand of cnc box.
the psu is the size of a pack of ciggaretes.fan stops psu go boom!
none go more than 3 years.they warn you by hissing.if it stops hissing it locked up.bring it in now!

[lti]

Sunon fans always made more noise and vibration than any other brand of fans. I have a 50mm Sunon fan that sounds like the bearings were never lubricated. Also, the Maglev fans still use ball or "Vapo" bearings and aren't any better than Sunon's other fans. However, the DR-Maglev fans aren't bad. I have one in a power supply, and it produces a normal level of noise and vibration. I don't know how long it will last.

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by lti

it produces a normal level of noise and vibration.

If this is something to get exicted about, I'd infer that Sunon sucks

[smason]

Originally Posted by shovenose

Thing is, the primary capacitor is quite bulged (probably because of the fan failure) but since the thing still works I'm ignoring it!

Wow, really? After all your time here at Badcaps, you're willing to leave a bad cap in a device that you're using?

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by smason

Wow, really? After all your time here at Badcaps, you're willing to leave a bad cap in a device that you're using?

Actually I unplugged the hub and am not using it at the moment; if I ever do use it for anything serious I will order a new capacitor. Thing is, it's a short stumpy one so all the ones I've rescued from old PSUs wouldn't fit...

[mathog]

Originally Posted by shovenose

I felt a bit bad about it, but at work we scrapped about 4 Netgear 10/100 24-port rackmount switches... why? the fans were either stopped completely or made loud grinding noises and only spun at like 5 RPM

Are you kidding??? Replacement fans cost on the order of $10 each,, the replacement switches are going to be a lot more than that. Admittedly I have seen some peculiar fans in rack mounted network equipment. However most of the time it is just a standard 2 or 3 pin fan connector powering a 40mm fan. Did they at least open the units to see what kind of fans they were before junking them?

[NxB]

Its a company they always buy new.

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by mathog

Are you kidding??? Replacement fans cost on the order of $10 each,, the replacement switches are going to be a lot more than that. Admittedly I have seen some peculiar fans in rack mounted network equipment. However most of the time it is just a standard 2 or 3 pin fan connector powering a 40mm fan. Did they at least open the units to see what kind of fans they were before junking them?

I opened them, inspected them, tested them for power on, cleaned them, set them aside a week while contemplating ending up with them, then tossed them while cleaning the next Saturday.
But I can't end up with EVERYTHING, and the guy who puts stuff on eBay didn't want to deal with them.
And yes they were standard 40mm Sunon fans.

[momaka]

Once you do it a few times, it takes under 10 minutes to take apart, clean, lube, and put back together a fan like that. And by clean, I mean brand-new-looking type of clean. Get to it already!

Lubed sleeve bearing fans last about 1 to 2 years for me, depending on their size. Never had problem with ball bearing fans and I've seen only a few get stuck from too much dust.

A bulged cap on the primary of a PSU can make a lot of things go wrong in the PSU - don't use it like that until you get it replaced. Like kc8adu noted, the PSUs will usually go bang if this is ignored. I've worked on one like that myself. Everything inside it was cooked. The plastic cap on the top of the primary capacitor turned into dust when I touched it - it was that cooked.

[shovenose]

Well FUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !

I'm really pissed off right now.
Why? Because I made the "seized" fan in that Linksys switch as good as new with a drop of some random oil from the bathroom.

OMG now I am SO PISSED that we scrapped all those Netgear switches
I could have got them for about $1 each, lubed the fans,
and had some REALLY NICE 10/100 switches.
But no, I just throw them in the box and now they're a goner.

Man I act so STUPID sometimes

But honestly, I couldn't do that with everything because I ran out of space months ago and now my room is piles of PSUs and computers, etc.

I try to make up for the fact that I miss having my dad around by buying all sorts of random crap (laptops, tablets, etc.) and look where it got me... nowhere...

Sorry I'm a bit over-obsessed about some stupid worthless old networking equipment but I had a lousy day.


but I still feel bad about those switches

[c_hegge]

Re-lubed fans don't usually last longer than a couple of weeks before they get noisy again.

[ratdude747]

Originally Posted by c_hegge

Re-lubed fans don't usually last longer than a couple of weeks before they get noisy again.

depends on how you go about it.

I recently re-did a fan by popping the rubber plug/bung and slowly packing the fan with white lithium grease... for slow fans (in this case, a PWM 90mm), it works great.

for faster fans, I hear a drop of ATF via an oil can works well... having an oil can filled with ATF is good anyway; atf is cheap and is a good general purpose lube... I use it as chain lube (beats spray crap), bike gear lube (for 3 speed internal hubs), cutting oil, and generic lube.

if you use tri-flo (too thin), sewing machine oil (also too thin), or god forbid wd40 (which is a water displacer, NOT a lubricant per se), yeah, the fan will return with noise. also don't be a noob and use vegtable oil like I did once... what a gooey mess.

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by ratdude747

depends on how you go about it.

I recently re-did a fan by popping the rubber plug/bung and slowly packing the fan with white lithium grease... for slow fans (in this case, a PWM 90mm), it works great.

for faster fans, I hear a drop of ATF via an oil can works well... having an oil can filled with ATF is good anyway; atf is cheap and is a good general purpose lube... I use it as chain lube (beats spray crap), bike gear lube (for 3 speed internal hubs), cutting oil, and generic lube.

if you use tri-flo (too thin), sewing machine oil (also too thin), or god forbid wd40 (which is a water displacer, NOT a lubricant per se), yeah, the fan will return with noise. also don't be a noob and use vegtable oil like I did once... what a gooey mess.

i used rancid olive oil once... quite a mess...

nah i have no idea what kind of oil it was lol

[shovenose]

Well I'm using it in a non-critical part of my network and am going to see how long it lasts. Since I couldn't put the label back on I'm just leaving it open, which may or may not be a problem given that the fan is sideways.
Oh well, we'll see, eh?