Fans in old 1U equipment

[Uranium-235]

my dad gave me a little oil pen with some air condition fan oil he put in there from a 20 year old container. Works great, no mess

[momaka]

[quotc_hegge]Re-lubed fans don't usually last longer than a couple of weeks before they get noisy again.[/quote]
That's because most people just do it the lazy way - remove plug and add lubricant. This is indeed only a temporary fix. What you really need to do is fully take the fan apart if you actually want it to work right in the long term. And by take apart, I mean take off the retaining/locking washer from the shaft and then remove the the blade assembly (the rotor).

For dual ball bearing fans, just soak the bearings in oil and let them absorb it. That's it.

For fans with a sleeve bearing (and also fans with a single ball-bearing), there's more that needs to be done - the shaft and the bearing must be cleaned thoroughly.
Normally what I do is I wipe the shaft with alcohol using a small piece of paper towel. Then I rip that piece of paper towel into small pieces and insert them into the sleeve bearing after which I use a small screw driver to push them out. After this, I put the fan blade assembly back in the housing and move it in and out while also applying side pressure on it in different directions. The rubbing of the shaft and sleeve bearing is what does all of the cleaning. After this, I take out the blade assembly out again, and clean the shaft and bearing with alcohol one more time. If the fan blades are still hard to turn or make grinding noises, repeat above procedures until they turn freely. Finally, add oil or lithium grease (DO NOT use regular grease for this) and assemble the fan again.

By the way, I just fixed 2 fans like this a few days ago. First one was a 120mm cheap Raidmax fan that was almost completely stuck. The other was a noisy (heavy grinding) 60mm single ball bearing fan (ball bearing on the front, sleeve bearing on the back) from one of those all-in-one kiosk computers (the ones with a touch screen). Both fans run whisper quiet now.

[c_hegge]

It can also be that the shaft (or bearings) wears down. If this happens, no amount of oil will put back the worn steel or brass.

[b700029]

Originally Posted by c_hegge

It can also be that the shaft (or bearings) wears down. If this happens, no amount of oil will put back the worn steel or brass.

Fans usually won't wear their bearings to that extent, because with just a little dryness they'll seize. Different from something like an engine where there's a huge amount of power that can grind away the metal really quickly.

Originally Posted by shovenose

I could have got them for about $1 each, lubed the fans,
and had some REALLY NICE 10/100 switches.

With any luck they might end up here: http://badcaps.net/forum/showthread.php?t=6356