How easy is it to replace the T60 fan?

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thinkpac · #1 Post by **thinkpac** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 10:58 am

I got my T60 used on ebay about 18 months ago, and for the first ~15 months that I had it, I didn't hear any noise from it. But the last few months, I've been hearing a buzzing noise from the back left corner. Sometimes the noise is faint enough that I have to put my ear right next to the corner to hear it, other times I can easily hear it from a few feet away. I take it the noise is coming from the fan.

How easy it is to replace the fan? The only time I've tried to replace a CPU fan/heatsink was in a desktop computer about 5 years ago, and it didn't go very well. I applied too much pressure trying to remove the heatsink and I ended up destroying the CPU.

#2 Post by **Harryc** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 11:04 am

It's pretty easy. You need to remove the palm rest, keyboard, keyboard bezel, and then the fan/heatsink. Get some Arctic Silver thermal compound form Radio Shack and a new fan before you take the machine apart. There are hundreds of threads here that discuss this process and where to get fans, etc.
http://www.google.com/search?q=t60+fan+ ... 3Alang_1en
You'll need to download the maintenance manual also. Oh, I would advise against listening to those who might recommend Thinkpad Fan Control to eliminate the noise. This is a band-aid approach and will not fix the noise long term.

kaede · #3 Post by **kaede** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 12:01 pm

i would say its quite an easy task to do. just make sure u remove all the screw. and remember which screw for which hole. u might misplace it most of the time. good luck on it

nb: a lil bit search on youtube will help u alot

animefans · #4 Post by **animefans** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 3:52 pm

Same problem except its a t60p

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3Im8o3f ... ata_player

Sent from my SGH-T959 using Tapatalk

thinkpac · #5 Post by **thinkpac** » Tue Jan 04, 2011 8:47 pm

Harryc wrote:It's pretty easy. You need to remove the palm rest, keyboard, keyboard bezel, and then the fan/heatsink. Get some Arctic Silver thermal compound form Radio Shack and a new fan before you take the machine apart. There are hundreds of threads here that discuss this process and where to get fans, etc.
http://www.google.com/search?q=t60+fan+ ... 3Alang_1en
You'll need to download the maintenance manual also. Oh, I would advise against listening to those who might recommend Thinkpad Fan Control to eliminate the noise. This is a band-aid approach and will not fix the noise long term.

Would it be OK to use a thermal pad instead of Arctic Silver? I know I have some 5 year old thermal pads tucked away somewhere.

Also, it seems like there's 4 different fan types:
41V9931 (for Intel graphics and Core Duo cpu)
41W6406 (for Intel graphics and Core 2 Duo cpu)
41V9932 (for ATI graphics and Core Duo cpu)
41W0467 (for ATI graphics and Core 2 Duo cpu)

Since my T60 has ATI graphics and a T2500 Core Duo cpu, the 41V9932 is the one I need... although I've read the 41W0467 should work just as well (or maybe even better since it has bigger pipes) and would allow me to upgrade to a Core 2 Duo in the future. But then the Hardware Maintenance Manual has a matrix where it says the 41W0467 is not compatible with certain structure frames, keyboard bezels, and LCD hinges. Guess I'll have to go with the 41V9932 just to be safe.

Thanks for mentioning TPFanControl. I just installed it and have it running in BIOS mode. It's nice to see the temperatures of everything, and it'll let me know if I've applied the thermal pad or paste correctly.

#6 Post by **Harryc** » Tue Jan 04, 2011 9:07 pm

thinkpac wrote: Would it be OK to use a thermal pad instead of Arctic Silver? I know I have some 5 year old thermal pads tucked away somewhere.

No, pads will not be adequate to cool a CPU. The new fan/heatsink should come with brand new thermal pads for the ATI GPU.

dr_st · #7 Post by **dr_st** » Wed Jan 05, 2011 2:18 am

As Harryc said, a new fan from IBM/Lenovo will come with pads for GPU/northbridge and pre-applied thermal paste dots for the CPU. You don't have to get any other thermal paste before using it. However it is said that the AS5 compound is better in conducting heat than the stock thermal paste used on the heatsink, and it is probably true. Hence the recommendation.

What you absolutely cannot do is use a pad instead. It's not even a matter of it being good/not good enough. It won't fit physically because the heatsink is designed in a ways that sits much closer to the CPU than to the GPU.

Muse · #8 Post by **Muse** » Wed Jan 05, 2011 1:18 pm

kaede wrote:i would say its quite an easy task to do. just make sure u remove all the screw. and remember which screw for which hole. u might misplace it most of the time. good luck on it

nb: a lil bit search on youtube will help u alot

When I did it I had 4-5 containers (jar lids), each with a little piece of paper in it (marked for instance "bezel") that received the tiny screws from a particular component.

Very very helpful are these Lenovo sites with short videos describing the removal and replacement of each component:

T60: http://www.lenovoservicetraining.com/io ... index.html

T61: http://www.lenovoservicetraining.com/io ... index.html

For parts removal and replacement, click on FRU Removals/Replacements, then the part you want to remove or replace, e.g. palmrest, keyboard, bezel, CPU, heatsink/fan, etc.

You might also be interested in the following, which could help you to save your current fan or extend its (and future fans') life/lives:

(from my T6x specific help data)
Thread AND site on T6x fans, repair, lubrication and etc.
--------------------------------------------------------------
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 62#p609162 = T60 T61 fan lubrication - illustrated guide by msb0b inside

http://www.msb0b.com/home/thinkpadt60fanrepair

JML · #9 Post by **JML** » Fri Jan 07, 2011 3:34 pm

I just replaced the fan in my 4-year-old T60 (model 2613-CTO). It was getting noisy over the past several months, and yesterday I had a Lenovo helicopter (the noise and vibration were off the charts, and it sounded as if the fan was ready to seize up). My fan is the 41W0467.

This is the first time I've done something like this on a laptop, and it was easy. The Lenovo manual and videos were excellent. I had prepared a dozen or so small ziplock bags, using a Sharpie to write down the part they went with, the number for each step, and the length/# of screws). All you really need is a quality miniature screwdriver and a good flat tweezers or microplier to help remove connectors and wires.

But there were some small differences between my machine and the manual. My T60 had two screws installed to hold down the wireless antenna, not 3. I did find a small nick in the insulation of the wire that was clipped to the fan's heatsink, and so I added a single layer of electrical tape to that section of the wire before reinserting it back into the copper clip.

Of more importance to note, however, is that the original fan had been installed by Lenovo with three thermal pads (no paste). One pad was thicker than the others (the bottom one, closest to the palm rest). The replacement, which I got in less than 24 hours from ThermalFX, came with three pads (but one wasn't as thick as that original in the location I mentioned). The fan came cleaned, lubed, and ready to go.

I cleaned off the residue from the old pads with 91% isopropyl alcohol and cotton swabs, used canned air afterwards, and reused the thicker old pad in place of that thinner new pad (it came off clean and intact).

The machine has never been this quiet since I unboxed it.

But, as has been noted elsewhere, I'm very surprised at the engineering of the heat sink (thin copper, with the processors not all in the same plane, and no effort made to compensate for the processor heights or location by bends in the heat pipe or by additional metal). Very disappointing.

Thanks for the tips in this thread and others!

redleaderone · #10 Post by **redleaderone** » Sun Jan 09, 2011 5:53 pm

JML wrote:
The machine has never been this quiet since I unboxed it.

HHmm.. Even when the old fan was new, any chance the fan had a faint high pitched whine most of the time, with like a pulse every 5 seconds? Did this go away with the new fan too?

Mine still does that and it appears to be a fairly common issue - I'm trying to figure out if replacing the fan will fix that.

Thanks!

JML · #11 Post by **JML** » Tue Jan 11, 2011 8:27 pm

It wasn't high-pitched. Something of a pulsing, sound, yes. This laptop is 3.5 years old, and the fan was noisy from the start. In the last six months, it got even noisier. And it wasn't just speed-related. The sound was what you would expect from an unlubricated or poorly-made bearing.

This is my fifth ThinkPad. I had a 560, a 770, and two T-series machines before this one. And until I replaced the fan, it was the noisiest by far. Now it's at least as quiet as any of the others.

thinkpac · #12 Post by **thinkpac** » Thu Apr 21, 2011 1:56 am

I am finally getting around to doing this, and I have a few more questions:

1) What if I want to replace just the fan, while keeping the heatsink? When I take the heatsink out, will the thermal pads for the GPU be ruined and need to be replaced? I have some old thermal pads somewhere that I could use, but then I don't know if the thickness would matter...

2) I was reading the instructions here - http://www.msb0b.com/home/thinkpadt60fanrepair, and it mentions that there is some foil tape that you need to cut to separate the fan from the heatsink. When I put everything back together, can I use any old type of tape?

3) Does anyone have any idea as to whether this is a decent fan?
http://cgi.ebay.com/New-CPU-Fan-IBM-Len ... 35b1044a82

crashnburn · #13 Post by **crashnburn** » Mon May 02, 2011 12:22 pm

If the fan is still working, can it be completely cleaned without having to remove the Fan & Heatsink mechanism. The thing is I do not have access to Thermal grease & tools at the time.. and I believe the grease is required if you remove the fan.

Can someone please suggest on the best ways to use 'suction' & 'blow' & in what directions with a Compressed air can and / or vacum cleaner for my T61.

sioseeker · #14 Post by **sioseeker** » Thu May 12, 2011 7:50 pm

My T60 that I also use a print server and runs 7x24 started making scratching noises. Immediately I replaced the disk drive with one of those new Hybrid 500GB 7200 with on board 4GB memory. Fantastic disk capability but still had the scratchy noise! Turned out to be the fan. I downloaded the Lenovo (HMM) Hardware Mtce Manual, printed out the relevant pages for "how to remove fan" and then disassembled the fan itself. Cleaned out all the dust with a tooth brush and vacuum cleaner and put a single drop of light machine oil on the fan rotor spindle. No more noise. Took about an hour. Not difficult.

I also made a note of the FRU of the fan and heatsink asembly should I ever need to purchase a new one so I can order it without having the T60 in bits while it is being delivered. In my case it was a 41V9932.

I also made notes on the HMM as to where the short and longs screws came from. There are a few varieties.

The Lenovo HMM is pretty good but I found it wasn't an exact replica of the T60.

I'm sure this is probably not an approved method of fixing the noise as I guess the oil will eventually gunk up with dust but its good for now.