Preventative Maintenance

[Mayo Pardo]

Just three words of warning from my own personal experience: DUST IS FLAMMABLE!

When using the canned air designed to blow dust out of computers, make sure your computer is shut off.
This should probably apply to laser cooling fans as well.

I made the mistaken assumption that it would clean up my wife's computer better if the fan was running.
Little did I know that when years of dust became airborne inside the power supply, it would ignite and shoot a flame out the back of the computer that was 2 feet long! Thankfully it only fried the power supply and didn't catch anything else on fire in the house.

I normally would use shop air from the compressor, but this was before we were married and the computer was at her apartment so all she had was the canned air. I didn't read the can label but it's possible the propellant was flammable as well.

[Ed Maloney]

Good tip. I did use compressed air to blow out the fans, but they were out of the laser and on my deck table.

[Bob Richardson]

A couple of tips.

Don't bother looking for "computer" filters you will end up paying more for whatever you buy. I purchase Duck Brand Replacement Air Conditioning filter. You can find a 24" x15" filter for about it for about $5 or $6. You can cut it to whatever shape/size you need and it's washable.

Be careful when using compressed air on any fan. These fans have a designed speed range that you can easily exceed when you blast them with the stream from a can of air or an air line. if you over rev the fan you can damage or greatly reduce the life of the bearings in the fan. I stick a broken zip tie into the fan while I'm spraying to keep the blades from spinning. Just remember to remove anything before you turn the equipment back on.

I stopped buying compressed air after I found the Metro Vacuum ED500 DataVac Electric Duster. Don't be confused by the name. This is not a vacuum. It blows air like a can of compressed air. Check it out. It's a little expensive up front but you never have to buy a can of air again. Unlike cans of compressed air this thing will put out a constant stream of air as long as you need it. No more switching between cans when the first one gets cold and doesn't work as well anymore.

[Dan Hintz]

Anyone think that I should clean out the fans?

Attachment 315609

I thought Dan would be the first one to respond to my post. Guess he's on vacation! :-)

Not vacation... just 60-70 hour weeks


And clean up that [insert machine name here]!

[Ernie Balch]

My rabbit laser that worked perfectly when installed developed an exhaust problem. I found that it had screens with quarter inch mesh holes in the exhaust connection and the blower box. After a few months both were completely closed off with condensed acrylic smoke residue. It was amazing to see the plastic coating that completely closed up the quarter inch holes. The lack of flow caused smoke to escape into the shop. I removed both of the screens and also had to scrape the squirrel cage fan blade by blade. Looking further for exhaust leaks I found an electronics cooling fan that was mounted such that it blew outwards instead of in toward the electronics. This pulled smoke over the electronics and blew it out into the room. It was not a noticeable problem until the exhaust was restricted.

[Bert Kemp]

My rabbit laser that worked perfectly when installed developed an exhaust problem. I found that it had screens with quarter inch mesh holes in the exhaust connection and the blower box. After a few months both were completely closed off with condensed acrylic smoke residue. It was amazing to see the plastic coating that completely closed up the quarter inch holes. The lack of flow caused smoke to escape into the shop. I removed both of the screens and also had to scrape the squirrel cage fan blade by blade. Looking further for exhaust leaks I found an electronics cooling fan that was mounted such that it blew outwards instead of in toward the electronics. This pulled smoke over the electronics and blew it out into the room. It was not a noticeable problem until the exhaust was restricted.

Ernie My fan is mounted the same way , I think its suppose to be that way to draw air over the electronics and smoke out of that area. I could be wrong but I'm going to check with Ray when I get time.

[John Bion]

Regarding filter material: I get it from online aquarium supliers.

My rabbit laser that worked perfectly when installed developed an exhaust problem. I found that it had screens with quarter inch mesh holes in the exhaust connection and the blower box. After a few months both were completely closed off with condensed acrylic smoke residue. It was amazing to see the plastic coating that completely closed up the quarter inch holes. The lack of flow caused smoke to escape into the shop. I removed both of the screens and also had to scrape the squirrel cage fan blade by blade. Looking further for exhaust leaks I found an electronics cooling fan that was mounted such that it blew outwards instead of in toward the electronics. This pulled smoke over the electronics and blew it out into the room. It was not a noticeable problem until the exhaust was restricted.

I had the same problem with my Chinese fans, this time caused by MDF, nothing a pair of tin snips did not solve I do have to monthly strip the fans and brush the insides down though, they clog up pretty quickly.

[Tim Bateson]

Seems Epilog is listening. Here is the filter on my Fusion M2.
M2_Filter_w.jpg

[Keith Winter]

That's wild Mayo. I worked in a computer store for years and we shot every single computer that came in with canned air never a fire even if it did happen to be on. That's crazy you had a fire. Less likely the dust, more likely you had the can upside down or at an angle, and the propellant shot out into the power supply shorting it out then the spark traveled up the propellant. Cheaper canned air does when it's not straight up and down all the time, only use the ones marked for electronics, they still do it, but much less.