Preferred location of parts cooling fan.

[voodoo28]

What is the preferred location of the parts cooling fan? I noticed my printer starts printing from right to left...so does it make sense to put it on the right? Should the shroud wrap around the hotend?

[AbuMaia]

Many people put it out front where it won't run into anything, like the Z axis rods.

[voodoo28]

I can see that..but from an efficiency point of view is that the best place?

Many people put it out front where it won't run into anything, like the Z axis rods.

[MiniMadRyan]

I've placed mine, a radial fan on the right hand side of the extruder (where your wiring for the hot end most likely is). I then have a small duct that helps direct the flow to the tip and downwards onto the print. My reasoning for the location is that it keeps it out of the way of any frame or other components, and still allows me to run an auto bed levelling servo and probe on the other side of the extruder. I would also suggest using a radial fan over a standard one, as I find, a standard fan with a duct seems to lose a lot of its pressure, where as the radial fan can easily provide much more pressure.

[voodoo28]

Do you have a pic of this and maybe a link to the fan?

I've placed mine, a radial fan on the right hand side of the extruder (where your wiring for the hot end most likely is). I then have a small duct that helps direct the flow to the tip and downwards onto the print. My reasoning for the location is that it keeps it out of the way of any frame or other components, and still allows me to run an auto bed levelling servo and probe on the other side of the extruder. I would also suggest using a radial fan over a standard one, as I find, a standard fan with a duct seems to lose a lot of its pressure, where as the radial fan can easily provide much more pressure.

[MiniMadRyan]

This is about the best shot I have on hand, the fan came from DigiKey, and was based off of Printbu's build here: http://3dprintboard.com/showthread.p...ll=1#post26657

I've uploaded my design to YouMagine: https://www.youmagine.com/designs/ma...al-cooling-fan

[voodoo28]

Thanks for sharing!

This is about the best shot I have on hand, the fan came from DigiKey, and was based off of Printbu's build here: http://3dprintboard.com/showthread.p...ll=1#post26657

I've uploaded my design to YouMagine: https://www.youmagine.com/designs/ma...al-cooling-fan

[printbus]

MiniMadRyan beat me to providing a link to my blower scheme. The centrifugal blowers make great print coolers. I usually run mine between just 2% and 6% speed. About the only time I run the blower 100% is when I want to cool down the hot end or the print bed. Like MiniMadRyan was explaining, the normal axial fans don't deal well with backpressure due to the gap between the fan blades and the fan frame.

There are dozens of blowers out there, but the one mentioned in my build thread is unique in that it allowed the fan to mounted on the face of the blower opening. Most of them mount on one of the "flat" sides of the blower, and would have required more ducting for what I wanted. My to-do list includes building some hose adapters for the blower, relocating the blower to perhaps the power supply side of the frame, and running something like surgical-type latex hose to the x-carriage. Although the blower is already lighter than an axial fan and shroud, the remote mount would further minimize the print cooler weight on the x-carriage.

Unless you know the majority of your parts would always be oriented in some certain way, there's little advantage to one airflow direction over the other. I'll orient a part on the build plate to best suite the cooling airflow when I feel there's a need to worry about it.

I tend to print and move as fast as I think the printer can, and I'll admit that there are times the airflow exhausting out of the blower might be too focused. In printing a thinwall cube, for example, I have seen problems where corners suffer since the airflow doesn't remain at the corner long enough. Usually that's a sign that the press-fit duct is a bit misaligned on the blower. Although not necessarily for the i3/i3v, some people develop shrouds that provide a circle of airflow around the hot end as a way to provide a more even approach to print cooling.

[voodoo28]

Printbus, I just ordered one, I was thinking the same.. I would like to mount the fan off the back of the machine and have something like this coming over and under the frame(http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:7572)

MiniMadRyan beat me to providing a link to my blower scheme. The centrifugal blowers make great print coolers. I usually run mine between just 2% and 6% speed. About the only time I run the blower 100% is when I want to cool down the hot end or the print bed. Like MiniMadRyan was explaining, the normal axial fans don't deal well with backpressure due to the gap between the fan blades and the fan frame.

There are dozens of blowers out there, but the one mentioned in my build thread is unique in that it allowed the fan to mounted on the face of the blower opening. Most of them mount on one of the "flat" sides of the blower, and would have required more ducting for what I wanted. My to-do list includes building some hose adapters for the blower, relocating the blower to perhaps the power supply side of the frame, and running something like surgical-type latex hose to the x-carriage. Although the blower is already lighter than an axial fan and shroud, the remote mount would further minimize the print cooler weight on the x-carriage.

Unless you know the majority of your parts would always be oriented in some certain way, there's little advantage to one airflow direction over the other. I'll orient a part on the build plate to best suite the cooling airflow when I feel there's a need to worry about it.

I tend to print and move as fast as I think the printer can, and I'll admit that there are times the airflow exhausting out of the blower might be too focused. In printing a thinwall cube, for example, I have seen problems where corners suffer since the airflow doesn't remain at the corner long enough. Usually that's a sign that the press-fit duct is a bit misaligned on the blower. Although not necessarily for the i3/i3v, some people develop shrouds that provide a circle of airflow around the hot end as a way to provide a more even approach to print cooling.

[voodoo28]

Printbus, got my blower fan...it has four wires....i take you only use pos and neg..what the other two for?

MiniMadRyan beat me to providing a link to my blower scheme. The centrifugal blowers make great print coolers. I usually run mine between just 2% and 6% speed. About the only time I run the blower 100% is when I want to cool down the hot end or the print bed. Like MiniMadRyan was explaining, the normal axial fans don't deal well with backpressure due to the gap between the fan blades and the fan frame.

There are dozens of blowers out there, but the one mentioned in my build thread is unique in that it allowed the fan to mounted on the face of the blower opening. Most of them mount on one of the "flat" sides of the blower, and would have required more ducting for what I wanted. My to-do list includes building some hose adapters for the blower, relocating the blower to perhaps the power supply side of the frame, and running something like surgical-type latex hose to the x-carriage. Although the blower is already lighter than an axial fan and shroud, the remote mount would further minimize the print cooler weight on the x-carriage.

Unless you know the majority of your parts would always be oriented in some certain way, there's little advantage to one airflow direction over the other. I'll orient a part on the build plate to best suite the cooling airflow when I feel there's a need to worry about it.

I tend to print and move as fast as I think the printer can, and I'll admit that there are times the airflow exhausting out of the blower might be too focused. In printing a thinwall cube, for example, I have seen problems where corners suffer since the airflow doesn't remain at the corner long enough. Usually that's a sign that the press-fit duct is a bit misaligned on the blower. Although not necessarily for the i3/i3v, some people develop shrouds that provide a circle of airflow around the hot end as a way to provide a more even approach to print cooling.