beware the air compressor

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flynlr

2[H]4U
Joined
Apr 22, 2005
Messages
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a few weeks ago I decided to try out my new Air Compressor from Harbor Freight to blow the dust outa my rig. ,, wooooooops when I hit the video card , the fan exploded. into pieces , I guess 120PSi not compatible with this part .
blowfan.jpg
. so having learned my lesson .

I went to the Zalman cooler and decided on the H60 For the CPU
watercool.jpg



no more Blow Jobs for my PC
 
Be very carefull when using an air compressor to clean your PC..Can do alot more damage than that..80 psi is still high even..Stay away from the electronics about a foot or more..Get close with that much pressure and things can get damaged..Have seen 2 MB's die from people doing this..It really doesn't take much air pressure to move dust..
 
Wow I just hit my 6970 with 100psi the othere day and it was fine. But im using a large ruber air tool. Were you using a spot air tool? Where it has a very tiny outlet? Thats alot of damage.
 
Ouch. i used my Paintball 45cu 4500 psi compressed air tank, but the out put is lowered to 250psi. I normally use it at a distance to the dust out of the case, i use the standard air can for the close up work. Thanks OP, reminds me to be careful.
 
Wow, thanks for the heads up OP. Think ill still with can next time i clean my gpu.
 
I use a sandblaster gun minus the sand on a 200psi tank. Works like a charm.
 
You also do not want to allow fans to spin while cleaning with any compressed air. You need to hold the fans still, and then blow them out. Failure to do so can cause the fan to spin faster than normally intended which kills the bearings. Especially the sleeve bearing types.
 
Dan_D said:
You also do not want to allow fans to spin while cleaning with any compressed air. You need to hold the fans still, and then blow them out. Failure to do so can cause the fan to spin faster than normally intended which kills the bearings. Especially the sleeve bearing types.
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True that, I learned this the hard way a while back. Killed a tiny fan on my southbridge heatsink.
 
Dan_D said:
You also do not want to allow fans to spin while cleaning with any compressed air. You need to hold the fans still, and then blow them out. Failure to do so can cause the fan to spin faster than normally intended which kills the bearings. Especially the sleeve bearing types.
Click to expand...

Yup I usually hold them to keep it from spinning. But I do love to throttle the old hardware before I shitcan it. FWEEEE FWEEEEEEEEEEE!!!! :D
 
Korben Dallas said:
True that, I learned this the hard way a while back. Killed a tiny fan on my southbridge heatsink.
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Those little south bridge fans were the worst. I've actually had them come flying off the heat sink at me back in the day. I too learned somethings the hard way. :)
 
well i guess too late for me. Just now reading this. I just bought a Lian Li case w/ skt 754 mobo, memory and psu. The person i'm working with had his compressor at home since we were working on a lawn mower. Blowed out the case, hsf, psu, vid card. Got home took out everything, fired up fine. But next time I will be more careful of using high compressed air.
 
Hah. Just bought this Metrovac air compressor and blew out my computer today. I didn't even think to hold the fans still. Fortunately doesn't seem to be any damage done. Next time I will be much more careful after reading these cautionary tales. Speaking of, however, a couple of my case fans are hitting their end of life stage and getting noisy. Need to start shopping for some good long life replacement as the ones going bad are in the most inconvenient possible locations in my case.
 
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Yeah be careful with fans, they are very delicate. Even if you didn't bust one, you can still put them off balance which would suck if you spent a lot of $ on a bunch of silent fans.
 
Isn't there also an issue that air compressors don't dehumidify the air? Someone was telling me that, not sure if it's legit though. Either way - ouch!
 
They do suck the moisture out of the air. If you have an oil less compressor you need to make sure you drain it every time or the water that builds up in the tank will rust it out. Also if there is alot of moisture in the air the compressor will start shooting it out with the compressed air. Why its a good idea to run an inline filter/water/oil catch.
 
BTW that fan really got messed the eff up too, not just a spun bearing or some minor damage, that thing is right shredded lol
 
I did this with a 6600LE I had lying around for shits. I originally intended to clean the dust off and then once I realized how fast it was spinning I kind of wanted to see how fast it would go on 120 psi... It didn't explode, but I'm pretty sure the bearings are shot
 
I have been using the same walmart air mattress inflater to clean machines for over 10 years! Talk about value!

I like them because they don't spin the fans past recommended RPM's and they work really really well!
 
lol....imagine pushing that much air through an entire case....bet it would stay nice and cool....

Thats pretty awesome, though only cause it didnt happen to me. I'd be pissed if it happened to me.
 
Buy a huge bag of plastic straws at the grocery store for 50 cents and stick them into your fans for cleaning. The straws keep everything from spinning and won't hurt anything.

Air filter/water catchers for a compressor are only $12 at Home Depot.
 
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Makeroflostsouls said:
They do suck the moisture out of the air. If you have an oil less compressor you need to make sure you drain it every time or the water that builds up in the tank will rust it out. Also if there is alot of moisture in the air the compressor will start shooting it out with the compressed air. Why its a good idea to run an inline filter/water/oil catch.
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This! And really no more than 40psi. is required for pressure.
 
Dan_D said:
You also do not want to allow fans to spin while cleaning with any compressed air. You need to hold the fans still, and then blow them out. Failure to do so can cause the fan to spin faster than normally intended which kills the bearings. Especially the sleeve bearing types.
Click to expand...

I bought some $1 80mm fans from newegg a while back and I had the bright idea of holding one of them out the window while I go down the freeway. The fins all exploded off the rotor and I think I had 3 cuts from the plastic fins flying off.
 
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