making fans hot swappable

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

The fans in my machine were hot swappable, before I removed the circuitry, and swapped out fans. Well, I was thinking about how to make them hot swappable again, or atleast modular, and I came up with this idea.

All from this page:

DB9 male solder connector
DB9 female solder connector
plastic 9-pin shell
(4) 3-pin cable extensions

cut the extensions, and solder one side to the female DB9, and the other side to the male DB9. Install the plastic shell on either the male or female, and then install the other in the case where the fans are going to be near. WHen you need to connect the fans, connect the DB9 female and male ends.

I can't take pictures of this, as my wife has the digital camera, and she is out of town. But I will take pictures as soon as I can. This is going to be a cool mod...

My only questionable aspect, is the rated voltage and amperage of the DB9 connectors... I'm sure it could handle some fans though.

EDIT: See the fan-module on the left, with the four fans?. It pulls out from the case, so that the fans can be replaced without turning off the entire machine. Since I swapped fans, I lost the hot-swappable functionality of this, as they are just plugged into extension cables now. I would install the DB9 onto the far side, so that the leads going to the fan controller plugged into the far side of this. Or possibly through the side or top. But mostly likely the far side.

 

[MX2]

I am sorry, forgive my ignorance, but I am failing to find the point behind hot swapping fans

 

[Cerb]

Why not just have a 3-pin connector securely mounted, or a set of them (header on a PCB?)? Attach it to a a small power plug (the floppy ones). Tada, easy hot-swap fans.

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Hmmm. I am not really able to describe it veyr well. My case has two hot-swap modules with four 92mm fans in each. Right now, they just have 3-pin cables passing through them, and it is an incredible pain in the ass if I have to remove that 4-fan bay. So I'm going to mod it so that it is hot swappable again. I will take pictures to better explain this when I have the digital camera back.

 

[Trippytiger]

Originally posted by: MX2times
I am sorry, forgive my ignorance, but I am failing to find the point behind hot swapping fans

From the pics, that looks like a fairly serious server case. In an application like that, it would be very handy to be able to replace a broken fan without having to turn off the machine.

 

[grimlykindo]

It would actually be a sweet feature, expecially on a server where there are a dozen fans to deal with.

:beer: Cheers to your idea - please post pics when you get a camera!

So aren't fan controllers like the Rheabus "hot-swappable" I have one, but have never tried. I think the problem is that hot-swapping fans can make your voltages fluctuate on your PS and corrupt your HD or other peripherals.

So do you runs that server 24/7? I'm guessing that you also use it for your PC as well?

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Originally posted by: grimlykindo
It would actually be a sweet feature, expecially on a server where there are a dozen fans to deal with.

:beer: Cheers to your idea - please post pics when you get a camera!

So aren't fan controllers like the Rheabus "hot-swappable" I have one, but have never tried. I think the problem is that hot-swapping fans can make your voltages fluctuate on your PS and corrupt your HD or other peripherals.

So do you runs that server 24/7? I'm guessing that you also use it for your PC as well?

Thanks. I will be taking pics on Tuesday when the wife gets back from the dog shows. She has the digital right now.

About the power fluctuations. I'm not too worried about it, because the hard drives and fans are on the secondary PSU, so I don't have to worry about main power being affected. And there is only one molex going to the fan controller, so not too much power is being turned on at once.

Fan controllers are mostly hot-swappable, more or less. But the fact that it is a major inconvenience to change out the cables in it, it wouldn't be ideal to disconnect them that way I don't think. I did consider it though.

Yes, this machine runs 24/7 (used to do SETI classic, but now I'm doing DPAD when I'm not using it, or my wife isn't playing Guild Wars). This is my computer at home... I do a lot of computer animation / rendering--or atleast I did before I got the 6800 GT installed. Now it's mostly for games, video editing, and image editing.

 

[grimlykindo]

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo

Originally posted by: grimlykindo
It would actually be a sweet feature, expecially on a server where there are a dozen fans to deal with.

:beer: Cheers to your idea - please post pics when you get a camera!

So aren't fan controllers like the Rheabus "hot-swappable" I have one, but have never tried. I think the problem is that hot-swapping fans can make your voltages fluctuate on your PS and corrupt your HD or other peripherals.

So do you runs that server 24/7? I'm guessing that you also use it for your PC as well?

Thanks. I will be taking pics on Tuesday when the wife gets back from the dog shows. She has the digital right now.

About the power fluctuations. I'm not too worried about it, because the hard drives and fans are on the secondary PSU, so I don't have to worry about main power being affected. And there is only one molex going to the fan controller, so not too much power is being turned on at once.

Fan controllers are mostly hot-swappable, more or less. But the fact that it is a major inconvenience to change out the cables in it, it wouldn't be ideal to disconnect them that way I don't think. I did consider it though.

Yes, this machine runs 24/7 (used to do SETI classic, but now I'm doing DPAD when I'm not using it, or my wife isn't playing Guild Wars). This is my computer at home... I do a lot of computer animation / rendering--or atleast I did before I got the 6800 GT installed. Now it's mostly for games, video editing, and image editing.

Cool, It must be nice to have all the room you want in your case. My P180 feels so cramped when I open it up - If I had a house and not a one bedroom apt I would probably have a huge server case of some sort for all of my junk.