# XFX HD4650 cooling mod!



## de.das.dude (Oct 1, 2010)

So i was kinda fed up with the stock cooling and had some time on my hands.
I decided on embarking on this time passing project.


materials used:-
0.5mm purple translucent plastic






80mm fan





some glue.

*DAY 1: Fabrication*

my plan was to create a blower type effect, without compromising the warranty of my product.
so i designed a plastic cover for the heatsink and keep a hole in it for the fan of the heatsink.

not satisfied with the simplicity, i decided to make a chimney on the fan hole and encase another powerful fan in it(the 80mm)





the diameter was 55 mm and its hard to get fans here in Kolkata to i had to cut a 80 mm(the commonly available size)

after taking out the fan blade portion (how to do that is given here) and cutting it to size this is what i got.





balancing test:-




good... good...

fitting test one... a tight fit




hmm a bit trimming left.


and what about balancing?? i was successful in perfectly balancing this fan! even better than the original way! thank God i was born with good fabrication skills!

*DAY 2: Mounting!*

now to fit the fan in the chimney
i placed it along with the frame on the chimney and marked the 3 legs of the fan. note that the frame legs have been left longer to coaz these into the holes on the plastic fabricated already.





you can see the holes in this pic \/





this is the final balance test










airflow test.
i do this test with the help of a smoking incense stick 





mounting done!













in action!





effectiveness:




stock was >70C on stock speeds! this is OC!!!!



more random pics










*if you happened to take a peek, do leave comments! any criticism will thanked and is heavily appreciated!*


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## de.das.dude (Oct 2, 2010)

edit!


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## Radical_Edward (Oct 2, 2010)

Good job, you should post some of those photos in the ghetto mod thread.


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## de.das.dude (Oct 2, 2010)

haha. sure!


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## Anarchy0110 (Oct 2, 2010)

Nice work dude


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## Magikherbs (Oct 4, 2010)

Maaan ! Thats freakin awesome !
Great minds think alike lol  .. Ive been rackin my THC soaked brain, tryin to think of what to do with the stock gts 250 HSF I have layin around !

Heres my spare Amd cpu fan venting my gpu...





p E A C e


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## de.das.dude (Oct 4, 2010)

ROFL!!! mt fan is doing the same thing! except it is cooling the chipset!!!!

we are the same....

OMG you might be my evil clone ??!!


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## Magikherbs (Oct 4, 2010)

de.das.dude said:


> ROFL!!! mt fan is doing the same thing! except it is cooling the chipset!!!!
> 
> we are the same....
> 
> OMG you might be my evil clone ??!!



I first set this up 2 months ago with my much hotter 9800gt. Its the same fan in both pics btw.
http://img.techpowerup.org/100920/P8210010353.jpg


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## mastrdrver (Oct 4, 2010)

What was it running before? I know mine doesn't get hot at all so.....

Anyway open up MSI Afterburner and do the ATI clock work around. I maxed out my 4650 with no problem.


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## Peter1986C (Oct 4, 2010)

De.das.dude, may I ask why you decided to cut off a part of the fan blades? Do you have a certain reason in mind for that?


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## de.das.dude (Oct 4, 2010)

yeah. you see, i figured out that getting the longer blades chopped into little ones, i could fit it right in the chimney(the size of stock fan).

previously without the plastic covering, all the stock fan was doing was picking up the hot air from the sides and circulating it, thereby decreasing the efficiency.

so i simply put a simple plastic cover with a circular hole in it over the heatsink.
then i thoight that if i could make a chimney and add another fan in it, the efficiency of the HS would increase even more. normally the 40mm fans are very slow, also they are hard to find over here.
so i took the fan of my old PSU and chopped its blades down. True this took some time and effort but it was worth it, as the fan is spinning even faster than before when it had long blades.


here is the temp readings:
stock clock, stock HSF:
max >72C

stock clock with plastic over HSF
max 66C

overclock to 650mhz, plastic chimney with fan over HSF
max = 62C

almost around 4C drop in each step.


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## de.das.dude (Oct 4, 2010)

mastrdrver said:


> What was it running before? I know mine doesn't get hot at all so.....
> 
> Anyway open up MSI Afterburner and do the ATI clock work around. I maxed out my 4650 with no problem.



my ambient gets to 40-43C in the summer, so mine gets pretty damn hot.


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## RejZoR (Oct 4, 2010)

How did you cut the fan blades? You have to be very precise not to throw it out of balance here.
It's a bit ghetto, but i'd buy a fan of such size (what's that, 50mm or 40mm?) and just cut the frame away.


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## de.das.dude (Oct 4, 2010)

its a 55mm. unavailable size.

i took measuring calipers (or dividers found in the geometry box)
i measured equal distances from the top and bottom of each blade. then connected these two with a straight line(i have a steady hand, thank God). then trimmed alond the blade with the help of a dremel using the reinforced cutting blade (reinforced with al2o3). i used this blade because you can be very precise due to its thinness.


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## Peter1986C (Oct 4, 2010)

de.das.dude said:


> yeah. you see, i figured out that getting the longer blades chopped into little ones, i could fit it right in the chimney(the size of stock fan).
> 
> previously without the plastic covering, all the stock fan was doing was picking up the hot air from the sides and circulating it, thereby decreasing the efficiency.
> 
> ...



Okay, so longer blades were no improvement compared to a smaller fan that could fit in that cover. I did not ralise that the 80mm fan would move the air in a wrong manner, actually. Cool to know that sometimes smaller fans are better.


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## Magikherbs (Oct 4, 2010)

Did you try the chimney idea before you cut the blades? Any copper in that heat sink ?
Ive had this other mod idea for a while. Its officially off the back burner lol.. just need some tools and sheet metal. WILL keep ya's posted.. 
I think its all about the blow hole !  .. you see.. 

I was not impressed much by my Zalman VF1000 ... at first. It came with my, now seemingly dead Asus 4850. Sure it kept the gpu cool.. but cpu and mobo temps went up b/c the flow of the EAH4850 made it so   After few hours, the 4850 died (the first time). 
Then, I tried the Zalman on my XFX 9800, expecting to see higher than norm temps... but nooo .. 

Stock XFX 9800gt idle = 56C = Cpu idle 38C 
EAH 4850 w/ Zalman idle = 37C = Cpu idle 42C !  
XFX 9800 w/ Zalman idle = 44C = Cpu idle 35C wooot!  






As you may have learned by now, each card/ component/ case will create it own flow. The stylish siding on the XFX card combined with the Zalman cooler, stopped most of the heat from simply spilling over and up to my cpu. Which dropped my cpu idle/load by 5-10C ! But there was still lots sneaking around the back, thus why I turned my spare cpu fan into a ram/NB cooler


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## de.das.dude (Oct 4, 2010)

Chevalr1c said:


> Okay, so longer blades were no improvement compared to a smaller fan that could fit in that cover. I did not ralise that the 80mm fan would move the air in a wrong manner, actually. Cool to know that sometimes smaller fans are better.



moving air in huge quantities dont matter, moving it wisely matters.


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