Raspberry Pi Low Cost Cooling Fan

Hello eveybody

This is a very simple and easy to make cooling fan for the Raspberry PI. You will need more time to find the materials that make it. Lets start

We will need:

1. A Raspberry Pi (I used my model B)
2. Glue (I used a cyanoacrylate glue from Holland Super strong glue)
3. A small screw
4. An adjustable arm from a servo motor Servo arm
5. A screwdriver
6. A fan from an old pc graphic card

It is better to screw the arm to the fan and not glue it. We want to give an angle and if we want to replace the fan if it dies we can do it much easier.

Also you have to choose which side you will screw the arm. I chose to blow air to the core of my Pi.

Add some glue to the top of the lan connector and press the arm for a couple of minutes Adjust the angle of the arm in order to be above your core.

It's time to give some power to the fan.

*My fan is a 12V but it will work with 5V at a lower speed.

If you use the Raspberry Pi model b rev.2 you must connect:

1. The red cable of the fan to GPIO pin 4 - 5V
2. The black cable of the fan to GPIO pin 6 - GND

Thats it we've done it. Start your Raspberry Pi and you will see the fan working.

Lets see now if the fan is doing its job.

Open a terminal at type vcgencmd measure_temp and your core temperature will appear.

I made some simple measurements.

1. I started with a full update and upgrade and after they finished the temperature was at 41.5 then i put the fan in power. In five minutes the core's temperature was at 29.3
2. I started Minecraft and with scratch i tried to built a couple of blocks for about 15 minutes. The temperature during the 15 minutes was below 39.0

In conclusion this is a simple, cheap and easy to make cooling system for your Raspberry Pi.

Have fun.