5870 fan totally broken

D

dopee123

[H]ard|Gawd
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May 19, 2006
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So I woke up today and my PC was shut off after being on for about 3 months straight. I powered it back on and noticed how quiet it was. So i put my hand under the GPU fan and found NO air being moved. The fan was off and didn't spin, no fan clicks to show it was even attempting to spin up. I went into afterburner and it showed the fan rpm as normal, however the temperature climbed to 90C before I shut down the computer.

I removed the gpu and tried to manually spin the fan and it seems hard to turn the fan like it's stuck on something or could be the bearing fell out since it's very difficult to rotate the fan. Has anyone ever seen this happen to their stock 5870 or any other reference cooler radeon? I wonder if I can fix it on my own to avoid having to contact Visiontek for a RMA.
 
Handle it delicately from here on out through your debugging processing. See if any little pieces fall out. The bearing didn't fall out. A single ball bearing I guess could have. More than likely for having sat for 3 months stationary, some oil/dust has turned into sludge. A drop of bearing oil perhaps? Maybe blow it out w/ compressed air (can or compressor). Bottom line, it's seem totally salvageable. :D
 
cmadki4 said:
Handle it delicately from here on out through your debugging processing. See if any little pieces fall out. The bearing didn't fall out. A single ball bearing I guess could have. More than likely for having sat for 3 months stationary, some oil/dust has turned into sludge. A drop of bearing oil perhaps? Maybe blow it out w/ compressed air (can or compressor). Bottom line, it's seem totally salvageable. :D
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^^^^^ Agree..GPU fan's and alot of PSU fan's go out sometime's but mostly all they need is a fresh coat of oil! Happend to about 4 PSU'S i owned but not a video card yet. if it still doesn't work get a aftermarket 1 from newegg.com or where ever is cheapest.
 
Tried compressed air right into the fan and that didn't help. How would I go about reoiling the fan?
 
Seems like I have to remove the heatsink shroud to re-oil the fan, thus voiding the warranty. Sigh, time to RMA I guess. I really dislike visionteks policy of sending recertified cards as replacements.
 
The original fan design (blower style) for the 5870's is fucking garbage. I've RMA'd 3 cards because of shoddy fans. Another one started to play up the other day so I ripped it apart and filled the sucker up with sewing machine oil, seems to fix the problem.

It looks to me like the porous metal used for the bushing which houses the bearings is pretty poor quality as such it leaks and spins off its lubricant supply much quicker than the average fan leaving it bone dry, noisy, vibrating and eventually the thing stops. On a standard fan you can just top up the oil well under the sticker however in the case of blower fans this isn't as easy because instead of finding the well where you normally would you instead find the base of the brass rod running up the middle of the fan. What you can do however if squirt the oil in between the PCB used for the fan controller and the motor (sewing machine oil is mineral based and non conductive). You can also squirt some oil between the area were the metal of the bushing meets the plastic, it will work its way down into the sleeve pretty quickly.
 
Very helpful post, thank you. Do I need to remove the fan to find those spots to spray oil into? I'm looking at my card and can't visualize the spots to spray oil into.
 
dopee123 said:
Very helpful post, thank you. Do I need to remove the fan to find those spots to spray oil into? I'm looking at my card and can't visualize the spots to spray oil into.
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Yep you will need to take the cooler off the card then unscrew the fan from the base of the heat sink to get at it properly (there will be 3 small screws holding it on to the base). Don't use a spray lubricant use something with a dropper (sewing machine oil is great), WD-40 is a no no as it won't really serve as a long term solution and could make things worse down the track. Once the oil is applied try to work the fan a little (gently) until you can get it spinning with your finger again. Once you hook everything back up the fan might buzz for a few moments while the new oil works it's way around but things should smooth out fairly quickly.

Unfortunately at this point if the oil doesn't solve the problem you might be in a bit of a jam, after market cooling may be the only choice.
 
How about a spray silicone oil? I have two reference blowers and worry about them.
 
The best option is to RMA and get a new card if that's possible. If not you'll need to fix it or replace the fan. What's happened is the lubricant has dried out, overheated, then oxidized the remaining oil resulting in a gummy varnish that's seizing the fan motor.

It's salvagable, kor's advice will work okay, a quicker way is to use a solvent like naptha (bbq lighter fluid) or mineral spirits to dissolve and flush out the gummed up bearing. I bet goo gone would work great as well and most folks have some of that sitting around.

I don't recommend acetone, laquer thinner, or goof-off as they contain some very strong solvents that may damage the fan's plastic bits. Just fill up the bearing well with solvent and turn it by hand until it loosens up a bit, then flush it out with fresh solvent, repeat and then blot that out with a q tip or paper towel and let dry for a bit. Add a good lightweight synthetic oil and you're good to go for a few years.

edit: Silicone would be fine if you've already flushed the old lubricant out of the bearing. Silicone isn't miscible with petroleum or normal synthetic oils so you can't rely on it to break down the old gummy lubricant, the solvents in most silicone sprays may work but I can't say I've tried it. No idea how long it would last either, I haven't been tempted to try it as I haven't seen any evidence that silicone oils are a better lubricant than a quality synthetic/petroleum based product.
 
Yoda4561 said:
The best option is to RMA and get a new card if that's possible. If not you'll need to fix it or replace the fan. What's happened is the lubricant has dried out, overheated, then oxidized the remaining oil resulting in a gummy varnish that's seizing the fan motor.

It's salvagable, kor's advice will work okay, a quicker way is to use a solvent like naptha (bbq lighter fluid) or mineral spirits to dissolve and flush out the gummed up bearing. I bet goo gone would work great as well and most folks have some of that sitting around.

I don't recommend acetone, laquer thinner, or goof-off as they contain some very strong solvents that may damage the fan's plastic bits. Just fill up the bearing well with solvent and turn it by hand until it loosens up a bit, then flush it out with fresh solvent, repeat and then blot that out with a q tip or paper towel and let dry for a bit. Add a good lightweight synthetic oil and you're good to go for a few years.

edit: Silicone would be fine if you've already flushed the old lubricant out of the bearing. Silicone isn't miscible with petroleum or normal synthetic oils so you can't rely on it to break down the old gummy lubricant, the solvents in most silicone sprays may work but I can't say I've tried it. No idea how long it would last either, I haven't been tempted to try it as I haven't seen any evidence that silicone oils are a better lubricant than a quality synthetic/petroleum based product.
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Petroleum based products will dissolve certain rubbers and plastics, hence why I was thinking about silicone oil as it's also readily available and cheap in auto and model stores (used for RC car motors and shocks).
 
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