Laptop Cooler Remake

I have a Targus laptop cooler plus usb.  it worked great for my old PC, but it was useless when i got my Macbook pro for college. instead of getting a new one, since mine still worked, i decided to open it up and make it work for me.

 i found after pulling the fans out that they actually ran FASTER when they had some space, and the intention was to move air TO HELP the mac keep itself cool.  I also had a mountain dew box i was about to recycle, so decided to use the box as a new case for the usb hub/power switch.


i had started this project before i decided to do it as an instructable...

The first step was to take some rough measurements of the two PCB boards.  I am at college and did this in like twenty minutes total, so it is not perfect.  Then i started creating a net, one piece at a time.  I created the top, bottom, and two short sides first as they were unaltered when i put them on.  The front and back had to have holes for different connections.

This was a pain in the butt because i had to make the different ports for the usb, the computer connection, the fan power out, and the AC in.  i forgot the fan output when i attached the back panel so had to try to do it after i had attached the back, and didnt want to remove the back to do it.  the front i tried to just cut the hole for the port, but just cut out a slot, which when i marked, i marked too small a slot and kept having to adjust them to fit.



sorry about the double use of the pics... this is where they belong...

I then back fed the fan output wire since it was permanent to the fans, but not to the board.  then fed the two boards in, and realized i should have fed the wire connecting the two boards out the back, and back in. it would have worked better, and put less stress on the connectors. but too late now.


this pic is hard to take b/c i needed both hands to do it...  i had to stick the wire in, connect it to the board, and then stick the board in while pulling the extra wire back out.

the original fan thing was junk. i took another peice of card board and then layed the fans on it and marked through it then around the fans.  i cut it out, and made slots for the wires.  i took this piece and put it on another one.  then attached the two pieces around the fans.  then i took a square and a scrap which i made so it would slot into the null space between fans to hold them.  cut the base of the "fingers" and split one tab to one side, and the other to the other.  these tow tabs were attached to the base.
i put two strips of tape across the "fingers" to secure the fans.  and now it is easier to adjust to the laptop positioning, and may actually add a spacer so i don't push the laptop into the fans (again) and a "cage" on the other side to keep the wires out of the fans (again...)