brown bird

Is there a hotspot on your Motherboard that could use some extra cooling? I was thinking of purchasing a spot cooler, but came up with a simple solution and it didn’t cost me a penny. Everything I used was just lying around my house. Even if you don’t have a Lift Rod on hand you can purchase one at your local hardware store for under $2.00.

I noticed a pretty nice decrease in my case temps after doing this, around 5-7 degrees! Even my CPU temperature went down by about 4 degrees. I couldn’t believe the results; it even lowered my GPU temperature by about 5 degrees.

I included a picture for those of you who don’t know what a Lift Rod is:



You will need the following:
1 Lift Rod (from a drain assembly):



1 120mm Fan (any size will work):



1(2 optional) Standard Case Fan Screw(s)
1 Standoff Screw
1 1 Inch Screw (must be compatible with the Standoff Screw)
A Couple of Washers:



Step 1: Trimming the Lift Rod.
I cut exactly 3 inches off of the Lift Rod with a hacksaw so it would actually fit in my case:



Step 2: Attach the Lift Rod.
I attached the Lift Rod to the Fan with a Standard Case Fan Screw. Just line the top hole of the Lift Rod with the screw hole on the Fan, simple:



Step 3(optional): Adding additional support.
One Case Fan Screw seems to hold everything in place fine but if you want to add additional support you can actually drill another hole in the Lift Rod once you have the correct measurements, a zip tie also works.



Step 4: Final Steps.
Now just put the 1 Inch Screw and a few Washers through the hole where the Control Rod would normally go:



I added the Standoff Screw just to keep things in place, it would be screwed into the case first of course, you may also notice a nut in the picture, this was just used in place of a washer:



Step 5: Find the right place.
Now just find a Standoff Screw hole in your case and attach your homemade Spot Cooler and you're done!



I attached mine to the support beam(or whatever it's called) in my case so that it is suspended above my Motherboard. I also angled the fan downward so that it would blow on my RAM. The Lift Rod is easy to bend so you can adjust it if you desire.



Here is another pic of my setup. The air coming into my case is directed towards my RAM and flows under my Tuniq Tower and actually cools the mosfets next to my CPU. That is probably why I have seen such an awesome decrease in my temps!



I hope you enjoyed this simple mod of mine and maybe you guys will give it a try! Thanks for looking!

**UPDATE**
Here is a screen shot of my load temperatures with a 3.6 CPU overclock and 2 instances of Orthos running for over 10 hours. See attachment #1

**UPDATE**
I decided to add another one of these Spot Coolers to my case just to see what would happen.
It dropped all temps even lower, mostly affecting my GPU and Motherboard. I also noticed a 4 degree drop in my HDD temperature and MCP(not really sure what that is). See attachment #2

Attached Thumbnails

   

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vwgti

Great mod, but my zip ties did it quicker Yours is way cleaner though.

brown bird

Yeah, I tried zip ties before but I couldn't get the positions that I wanted. This mod only takes like 10 minutes and is kinda fun!

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s1rrah

+REP

For that photo illustration alone. Whether you made it or not.

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Hailscott

Cool mod! +rep

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h00chi3

Dude that is hot! +REPS!

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DuRoc

I like it +rep

brown bird

Here is a screen shot of my current temps. Not bad right? Amazing what a little well placed fan can do, maybe I'll add another, or would that be overkill? My temps were not that bad to begin with but they have dropped since adding this spot cooler!

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Hailscott

Load the computer and then check the temps. Then you can see if you want cooler load temps.

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legoman786

Sweet!! Rep+

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September 1, 2009 - Never forget.