Rewiring Fans in 7V

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dbaldus

Gawd
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Jul 12, 2005
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I have 2 120mm Thermaltake Thunderblades rewired at 7 volts each currently connected to my PSU. I wired them in 7 V because with 5, the blue LED's don't seem to come on, and if you haven't noticed, these are ridiculously loud without rewiring. My computer doesn't seem to boot up if I link something onto the connector after the power has gone through the fan, so both of the fans are at the end of a chain. Is there any risk in doing this as far as hurting something in my system? I'm just wondering because I have an S12 430 on the way tomorrow and will be rewiring everything. I've noticed that the S12 has a couple fan-only connectors to hook the fans up to use 5 V only. How should I go about this? Am I risking damaging my system by rewiring my fans in any way?
 
I own several of those 120mm Thunderblades, and I love them @ 5v. The first thing I did was strip those blue LEDs off the outside, though, so I wouldn't know about any problems with the LEDs.

Your computer doesn't boot if you hook up something to your 7v modded fans?
Why are you trying to hook up things other than a fan to a 7v power source? How do you have them wired? Sounds like maybe you shorted something, or miswired.

If I were you, I'd power the fans off 5v, and not care about the LEDs. OR, if you have to, power the LEDs from a separate power source. If remember right, the LEDs have resistors built-in to the flexible circuitboard. The LEDs might run off of 12v, while you could run the fan off of 5v.

To answer your question, yes, you can fuck up your system if you don't wire your fans CORRECTLY. A 7v or 5v rewiring on your fans won't harm your system otherwise.

If you want, draw up a diagram in paint showing which color wires you have connected to where, and post it, or send it to me. I'll let you know if something doesn't look right.
 
those are probably 3.3v 3mm leds, and when wired up in series, like that, they run on 12v. meaning that running it at 7v is undervolting them. if you want them bright, wire them up to a 12v source
 
host them at www.imageshack.us then put
 
OK, here's the super EZ picture guide to mod your Thunderblade 120mm fan to run on 5v, while the LEDs remain full brightness. Also, I tested with my Flukemeter to make sure the LEDs usually get 12v -- and they do.

Thunderblade_Bright_LED_mod_mbarr.GIF
 
Thanks, sorry for being such a pain in the ass. It should have been easier than this :confused: Think I got it now.
 
Maybe not. Am I supposed to be doing anything that I can't just do with my hands or a molex remover? It seems to me that I'm just cutting the two wires coming from the hub to the LED ring and then that's about it. The red/black wires coming from the LED ring are already connected to the yellow/black power connectors already, so do I really need to "move them" so to speak? Either way, I'm confused and can't get it to work out for me. If you don't feel like elaborating any further, could you at least tell me how to just wire up the Thermaltakes in 5V so I can have quiet fans? That would be sufficient for now. Thanks again.
 
...and for anyone else reading, I noticed that, for some reason, rewiring the actual fan wires themselves to run at 5 volts causes the LED's to blink on and off (mostly off), but when I took a Y splitter and rewired the two male ends to give 5 volts each while leaving my fan wiring alone, the LED's worked fine, although a bit dimmer than usual as expected, and the fan spins at a nice, quiet speed.

Strange to me, but it definitely works that way and not the other. Plus it saves on cutting wires just in case you wanted them to be together again in the future for some reason.
 
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