I’ve been running an 8600 as a server for.. MANY years. So for these many years straight it’s been operating 24 hours a day without rest or even very much attention. A few months ago it started making more noise than usual but it wasn’t too bad, as it was in a closet. This last week, it began making loud, horrible, and finally unstoppable noise that pierced through walls, air, and my sanity. Inspecting the machine led me to believe one or both of the fans needed oil or cleaning or something. I also knew I didn’t have time to pry everything open and mess with the innards for a couple days. I was nearly hitting a deadline on a project until today so I had to just try to ignore it until this evening, when finally I was able to dig around inside it.
So I spun the fan mounted on the door and all it made was a very slight hissing sound.. well, must be the one in the power supply. Partially opening this dangerous little box, I slipped the fan out far enough to clean the blades (which like the rest of the machine was completely filthy with fine dust) and then give it a spin. That was definitely it.
After struggling with the half open power supply for a while, I realized I needed to just fully disconnect it and take the U shaped casing piece all the way off. So now that I could mess with it easier with only two hands, I tried to get into the fan. I saw pretty quick by looking into the space between the mounting and blade-cap that there wasn’t simply a spindle right there that I could oil.
I searched the net for maintenance instructions on that type of fan (a Sensflow) and found nothing. I searched for anything on how to open it, take it apart, oil it, anything.. I found nothing.
I figured the fan was toast anyway, so if I break it trying to fix it.. at least I’d have tried to fix it. There was always the other fan, and since we’ve had a high and low temp of 33 and 20 degrees out here in Seattle – I wasn’t too worried about the machine overheating before I could get a new fan. So I tried pulling it apart. I tried prying it off but it didn’t feel like it would give.. so I kept inspecting the damn thing for another way in..
There was a sticker on the other side, so I pushed at the middle of it.. and it revealed a divot of some kind, maybe a screw. So I peeled back the sticker and found a spindle, overflowing with a red powder.
Hmm..
I searched the net for any instances of powder based lubricants.. red or otherwise. I found nothing… The only thing slightly helpful I found during this whole operation was the Wikipedia listing for Computer Fans. This fan before me most likely had a sleeve type bearing.. and the article said that those kind were prone to eventually drying out… and this thing was most certainly as dry as one could get.
I dropped some oil in and let it work into the rest of the bearing. I gave it a few spins.. it got quieter and quieter – and I was very relieved. I sealed up the sticker and put my computer back together. I hooked it up back into it’s closet home and powered it up.
Whisper quiet… Fixorated.
So if your computer fan starts making horrible squeaking, whining, moaning sounds – try peeling back that sticker and see if it needs some nice fresh oil.
Either that or it’s possessed.. in which case you must then chop off the computer’s faceplate and drive a stake through its motherboard while chanting “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida” and emptying your thoughts of all things Cool Whip.