Hello every one,

my fight with noise is over. I found real source of noise

solution is very, very simple.

my English is too poor for explain i just write what do for total 0 noise from fan, no more change speed after 5 sec and again, again, again… NO MORE!!!

just keep drill and do hole (my have 2,2mm), that all, you can put come oil and stick

almost all t4x fans have bug with magnetic bearing, too long axle, stick with chassis fan do noise, that’s all,

when you do hole, axle go down about 0,8mm and magnetic bearing start work. noise source is between chassis and axle. When step engine w working, axle go up, down, up, down about 0,1mm and this doing mechanical sound. You can check this. Open your think pad, turn on fan on maximum rpm and just unplug fan plug, fan still be rotated but without mechanical noise.

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g79/a ... 36-duy.jpg
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g79/adasch/fanmod.png


now i don’t hear my fan.

i do it in my 3 thinkpad's, work in 100%

maybe some rewrite this in clear english

edit2:
in this post i show sample how do better contact between fan CPU and GPU

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?p=424699#424699 [PICS*]


cheers

Mod edit - we don't allow inline pictures without a warning in the subject line. Please read the forum rules. .img tags removed.

Thanks for your post. Are you simply removing the contact area between the axle and the fan chassis? Do you also add oil, and if so how much?

Can you(or anyone) please add more pictures and explain in a more simple way? tnx

yes, no contact, no noise. I use one drop oil 5w40 shell and cover hole by plastic sticker

cheers

no problem.

litle manual and explain what is wrong

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g79/adasch/fanmod.png

cheers

So you have to make a hole to downside - center of a fan, like shown on picture below?

http://shrani.si/f/2/11p/4mAnytn1/oldth ... anback.jpg

Can you tell me how did you make that hole?

yes, under sponge is rivet. Get battery drill, and do hole in center about 2,2mm (diameter)

cheers

hmmm... i'm not absolutely sure thats the explanation
because the noise in my T41 is not a friction noise... is more like an aerodinamic noise, made by the air travelling trough the ducts and between the fins of the radiator...
and your solution improves exactly this - by lowering the position of the fan as compared to the rest of the duct, thus obtaining a more liniar airflow...

however - if i could get a hold of a spare fan - i'll try to drill that hole... i'm not risking spoiling my perfectly good fan...

and to improve your solution - provided this is the cause - i have to check - but i think it might be simpler to extract the rotor with the shaft and "shorten" it with a dremmel...

hi, in my case open fan chassis is very hard.

ofcourse, on speed 7 i hear wind noise, but no rotor noise. On speed 1 i hear my hdd

not my test but this same problem with fan

http://lophiomys.gmxhome.de/r51_1829EHG ... 01_20s.mp3

after my modification

http://lophiomys.gmxhome.de/r51_1829EHG ... 10_20s.mp3

i get sond from this site

http://lophiomys.gmxhome.de/Thinkpad_R5 ... Noise.html

if you don't have problem with sound like in first link, you don't need modification

cheers

wow... i didn't notice that kind of noise in my T41... (actually TR451) - only the "wind" ... not as in your first link anyways...

btw - i have the "short fan" - and compared to my wife's T43's fan it is noticeably more silent (but the T43 is known to be louder than the rest of the T4x)

and a little offtopic - since your link is about R5x actually... when opening the donor R51 for the Frankenpadding operation - i've noticed the quality of build in the R5x fan is considerably lower, it is not a known brand, and very poor built... and finshed...
he only good thing is that it is larger, but wouldn't fit in the T41 chassis - so i kept the original T4x short fan...

later edit:
finishing work tonight... for the past 4 hours, working in CAD software, on adaptive speed, around 47-50 degrees, fan rarely kicking in, i couldn't hear anything resembling the metallic noise, only a faint healthy wind noise... so T41 fan is ok
on the other hand from my wife's T43 (working in the same room with me) i can hear (sitting at one meter apart) - the fan running almost continuously, sometimes with the whining noise described by you...
but it's a machine from the job, i cannot open it in order to investigate/fix the problem...

Tried this on a T43, seems like the solution worked.

The fan is running but no noise, or the oscillatory noises any more. Smooth constant sound. There is no whining sound any more.

During the initial days of T43, lot of discussion went on regarding, the cooling of north bridge, embedded controller version etc. Seems like the fan had some physical engineering problems also. A T42 long fan in a T43 without any modification does not produce much sound either.

Hi, I also tried this solution with a T43 fan for which my 'oiling' technique can not be used since the motor piece looks like soldered to the copper part of the fan. I can also confirm it works.

You might be able to get a spare fan (for around €20) from one of the IBM online shops (you might have to order from a different country if they don't ship to a private address): http://lenovo.com/think/support/site.ws ... 50319.html

Very interesting! I think I may give this a shot. My T41p is pretty quiet to begin with, and the noise sounds like it is just air, but perhaps this can completely silence it. Thanks for the research!

Confirmed! Thanks, AdaSch! With the hole in a T43p long fan you can still hear a little whiny noise that changes every 5 seconds but it is much much quieter -- the draft of the air is louder (the draft sound might have increased a little bit but I'm not sure about that).

AdaSch,

Thank you for this information. We shall try to add it to thinkwiki.org!

Hello every one!

if i need maximum quiet (night) i run tpfancontrol with settings

"Level=40 0 // Level=140 0
Level=45 1 // Level=150 1
Level=75 3 // Level=170 3
Level=80 6 // Level=177 6
Level=85 128 // Level=185 128"

on level 1 fan is very quiet

cheers

Hi,

just to report that I applied the "drill" solution + oil drop on my T40 noisy fan but didn't solve the problem.
It is still noisy although a completely different noise



I never used a fan control device, is tpfancontrol good and worth using?

Thanks
Alex

AdaSch, I just signed up to say thank you for this posting. I just bought a second hand T43P, searched for pulsing fan noise, and immediately found this post and went in and drilled out the hole. You were absolutely right, the noise is much quieter now, more like airflow than the mechanical whine I heard previously. What is going on is the axle is spinning while pressed against the bottom of the fan holder, and the bottom of the fan holder is pressed against the copper backplate on the bottom of the laptop, resonating and creating a lot of noise. One can easily test to see if this is the case with their laptops by removing the keyboard and pressing on the top of the fan lightly. If it does not move at all, then the axle is pressing against the bottom plate. After drilling, my axle re-centered on the magnetic bearing and when pushed on from the top has about 1/4-1.2 mm vertical displacement.

Another thing I did was push the fan mount plate up about 1 mm so that it no longer dropped below the rest of the heatsink assembly. This further decouples the vibrations of the heatsink assembly from the bottom copper baseplate. The only issue with doing this is that if the baseplate was meant to be actively cooled by the air flowing by underneath then this will decrease that.

Thanks admin for having this forum to help support these aging but very good machines

Great,

I am curious how many people made the modification and has a peaceful environment, their beloved machines

tray use tpfancontrol with speed 1
amazing how much can be quietly thinkpad


cheers

Hi folks,

I did the modification and use TPfancontrol, unfortunately it partially worked, it reduced the noise but not at the same extent you seem to achieve.
It lasted a couple of weeks, till this morning, I switched my ThinkPad on and got a Fan error at boot, then it self switched off.
I tried two more times, same error, eventually, another attempt and it booted on.
However, I noticed that the fan is occasionally increasing its noise level a lot, with a metallic sound.

I guess I have to change it, what do you think?

Just disassembled it and have it in my hands, it is a short fan and P/N is: 91P8393

I wonder if I should buy the same, given that I have planned to change my HDD to WD2500BEVE.

Please, give me your comments, I will appreciate them

Thank you!
Alex

I read your Feb 19 post too. Considering the noise you heard, considering you drilled the relief hole (and I assume got the chips out and re-oiled the bearing), considering you now have a failure to start because of fan error at boot, YES, I'd buy a new fan!

BTW, some guys get around the fan error temporarily by spinning up the fan manually (by air or by finger spin) then applying power (turn the TP on). If you manually get the fan spinning it will likely spin-up to speed when power is applied.

Second, it really doesn't matter in this instance of wether the HDD is upgraded now or later. The HDD upgrade is completely unrelated to the fan issue.

Lastly, when you install a new fan, it should last a lot longer if you use TPfancontrol (although I prefer NHC - Notebook Hardware Control). The reason is, the fan should turn on much less often (with proper settings).

Hi,

thank you for your comments
In addition to use TPfancontrol or NHC, I am seriously considering going through the undervolting process, I think it will highly contribute to reduce the fan use anyhow.

Now, I am looking for a good supplier, I also need a new battery pack P/N 08K8198, here in EU they cost a fortune, it is convenient for me to buy in the US and get them shipped here, believe it or not

Regards
Alex

Howdy,

My T43 has severed me well the past few years, although recently the fan has been making troubling noises. I'm curious about this attempt at improving the fan. I suppose I'd just like more details. So a hole drilled in the center bottom of the fan, a drop of lube, and a sticker is all that needs to be done? Is the gpu thermal pad removed and replaced with thermal grease or another pad? Thanks for the info,

Ryan

@Ryan,
if it's only recently that your fan started making noise, then
I'd suspect dirt inside or aging of the ball bearing or axle.
In this case a new replacement fan would be the solution.

@loph

It's always made noise, however recently I've noticed it as being louder. I've disassembled the keyboard/palm rest area and cleaned out all of the dust bunnies and had a desire to completely take out the fan assembly to clean it thoroughly, but didn't want to interfere with the pads/thermal grease over the cpu and gpu.

I agree that the recent increase in noise is probably indicative of it needing to be replaced soon, but I was hoping to have it last until windows 7 is released so anything to prolong the usefulness would be grand.

Ryan

It totally worked out fine for me. Now all i hear is the air blown out:)


@AdaSch
Thanks man. If you see this, can you tell me what happened with your CPU when you applied the Liquid Pro on it. Did you put some on the GPU too?Or anything else there?
Thanks!

with cpu i don't see any problems. All work, AS5 is very good too

liquid pro on gpu is too risky (possible shortcut!) Profile your radiator and use arctic silver5. Original gpu pad is tragic idea. I never understand why lenovo do it.


cheers

I suggest you follow this advice with extreme caution. I went ahead and destroyed a perfectly good, if noisy, short fan assembly. There is no magnetic bearing to speak of, just a brass tube where the fan spindle goes. after drilling the hole, the spidle fell down too deep and the fan blades started to hit the casing. Result = new fan, cost me some money

BTW, the better idea is to get a longfan assy with the 0.4 ampere fan (blue sticker on bottom) (shortfan is 0.2 amp). It covers the GPU, but it is also better because the fan itself is less thick. I tried to repair a burnt-out long fan with the electronics from the ruined shortfan, and it just doesn't fit vertically. A thinner fan means less resonance noise coming through the bottom, which is, as the orginal poster says, the real source of noise