vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

[ChaosLegionnaire]

ok so i recently "excavated" my ancient vantec spectrum fan card that i had "buried" years ago because one of the fans had failed. having recently "educated" myself on fan repair, revival and disassembly on this forum and around the web, i decided to take a crack at seeing if the seized fan can be fixed.

in the first pic, i noticed the fan copper coils on the left side fan that had seized were a darker color than the one on the right which is still working. does this mean the fan seized because the coils burned up? can i just fix it by recoiling a fresh piece of wire on all four sides again?

i also tested the circular magnets on the fan blades or rotors, the magnets are still good and strong, it had no problem attracting and holding onto a bunch of screws i threw at it. i also swapped the fan blades around. the side with the darkened coil still refuses to spin. so its ruled out its not the fan magnet. the problem lies with something on the fan pcb.

i probed the solder points where the power goes to the pcb as well in diode/continuity mode. no open or short was detected.

also, on the vantec website here, vantec says they use ball bearings for the fans. however from the pictures, i do not see any ball bearing ring in the tube of the fan. it looks just like a sleeve bearing fan instead. if that is true, really nice of vantec to bs in the specs. this shows why u cannot trust what manufacturers say. this also explains why this fan card has such a high failure rate from complaints around the web! please correct me if it is indeed a ball bearing fan.

[stj]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

sleeve bearings there.

does the bad one spin freely when you turn the blades with your finger?
if yes, check the copper coils with a meter.

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

yes the bad one spins freely. checked the coils and both the good and bad side read 21 in diode mode regardless of polarity of the leads. i cleaned the tube and shaft with IPA and reapplied sewing machine oil. just the bad side still refuses to spin. i tried spinning the blades of the bad side while power was applied to give it a "push" to start spinning but it wont spin. i think the fan control ic might be dead... no way to test the ic without desoldering all the led wires cuz the ic is covered under the plastic housing.

[stj]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

well it's probably on the board, either the ic or one of the other parts.
how big is this double-frame?
it looks very similar to the ones on an xbox360

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

well on the manufacturer site i linked, its 195 x 92 x 20 mm and uses 70x15 mm fans. so u can approximate how big it is. google images of the fan card in action.

anyway, i think im done with this. took me this long (at least a decade) to realise this is a horrible product. i think i did a good exposè on the manufacturer. bs specs calling a sleeve bearing fan a ball bearing. wonder how many ppl were fooled by this including me?! this has also revealed why this fan card often fails. because its a sleeve bearing! sleeve bearings aint gunna last long in the horizontal position in a tower case as a pci fan!

so as a warning to others against buying this fan card, im glad to post this "review". if u're thinking of getting a pci fan to provide additional cooling for your video card, u better get the titan pci slot fan instead. the titan may be a little fatter and takes up two slots but its waaay more flexible with the positioning of the fans and the fans are removable and u can mount your own fans of your choice. and of course, the titan is more expensive than the vantec but u get what you pay for. dont pay for cheap sheet, liars and cons like this vantec spectrum fan card.

there. hope thats enuff keywords for g00gle lol~

[momaka]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

Aww, come on, you got this far and didn't take out the circuit board to show us

Judging by the pictures, it looks like the PCB has a single IC for magnetic pickup + coil driver. Probably the same as my fans here:
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...4&d=1444698583

If that's the case and the IC isn't bad, then the coils are probably shorted on yours too.
I still haven't re-wound mine for either of the above fans to see if that will bring them back to life. But I will get to it eventually. I'm pretty sure it will be a time-consuming process, so probably only worthwhile trying as a learning experience or satisfying a curiosity.

[ben7]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

Looks to me like manufacturing variation.

I've seen magnet wire be that reddish color many times, even when new.

If it really did overheat, I would think the plastic bits of the coil former would melt and bubble, which doesn't appear to have happened here.

-Ben

[eccerr0r]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

Necro, since OP linked to it.

Usually these newer fans have seize protection in the IC and the windings won't overheat. As long as the heater on the heatsink didn't overheat it instead.

Scope out the IC pins to make sure power is being supplied to the coils (single sided PCB!), but usually I don't bother and throw out all fans that don't work when unseized and re-oiled.

[momaka]

Re: vantec spectrum fan card burnt coil?

but usually I don't bother and throw out all fans that don't work when unseized and re-oiled.

Collect them in a box and ship them to me! I won't mind paying the shipping for that.

Always short on fans here. Also, I've had no problems whatsoever with any of my rebuilt fans (sleeve bearing resurfaced, cleaned, and fan oiled) - even the crappy Tea Bao fans from Sun Pro PSUs and Rulian Science from Deer/L&C PSUs.