Noctua IndustrialPPC 2000-pwm burned

[Latezen]

Hey, 

So last night i exited bios and when my system restarted i heard pop and all my fans stopped working, and right after my room filled with burning smell from something electronic. After bit of disassembly i found out one of my 5 noctuas smells really bad and this is the outcome i found when i broke it open today.



Out of my 5 IPPC noctuas i had 3 of them are now broken and 2 survived which is really weird. And this one i have pictured is the only one that smells/burned visibly. i did not open the other 2.
Recently i did add Arctic Case Fan Hub to my system and all the Noctuas were connected to that hub so not sure if it had something to do with this outcome. 
These fans are now over 8years old and used in gaming computer with relatively low rpms.

What do you guys think happened and has this happened to anyone else?

[Origami Cactus]

Noctua industrial fans come in all sorts of voltages. It is possible you had 5v fans, that you connected to a 12v hub, burning them out that way.

It is impossible to tell if you don't give the exact info that is on the back of the fan hub. (model number, voltage, power draw, PWM/DC etc etc)

[Latezen]

1 minute ago, Origami Cactus said:

Noctua industrial fans come in all sorts of voltages. It is possible you had 5v fans, that you connected to a 12v hub, burning them out that way.

It is impossible to tell if you don't give the exact info that is on the back of the fan hub. (model number, voltage, power draw, PWM/DC etc etc)

Good point but im not that crazy to connect 5v fans to 12v system when i have had them for 8+ years.

[Origami Cactus]

Just now, Latezen said:

Good point but im not that crazy to connect 5v fans to 12v system when i have had them for 8+ years.

Missed the 8 year part, my bad. I would recommend getting off this forum and straight to Noctua's support, they will send you new fans for free most likely, even if out of warranty, and you will get closure on what happened.

My best guess would be that the oil that lubricated the bearings finally ran out, and so it was rubbing metal on metal, kinda bad. But if it was a bearing problem, you should have heard it making noise before bursting into flames.

I don't think it was the motor, as it should use a brushless motor.

[Latezen]

Just now, Origami Cactus said:

Missed the 8 year part, my bad. I would recommend getting off this forum and straight to Noctua's support, they will send you new fans for free most likely, even if out of warranty, and you will get closure on what happened.

My best guess would be that the oil that lubricated the bearings finally ran out, and so it was rubbing metal on metal, kinda bad. But if it was a bearing problem, you should have heard it making noise before bursting into flames.

I don't think it was the motor, as it should use a brushless motor.

Fans were still very quiet before this happened and spin freely now that they are removed from the system.
I did contact the support, intrested to see what they think/say.

[VIVO-US]

8 minutes ago, Latezen said:

Good point but im not that crazy to connect 5v fans to 12v system when i have had them for 8+ years.

Maybe it has a built-in warranty sensor that tells the chip to explode when it's well past Noctua's 6-year warranty period.

 

The Arctic fan hub works on the same voltage as the fans, so it shouldn't have been a voltage problem.  Looking closely at the connectors, is it possible a few of the fans were plugged in upside down?  Looking at the design of the hub, I think it is possible to do that with some wiggling.

[Latezen]

Just now, VIVO-US said:

Maybe it has a built-in warranty sensor that tells the chip to explode when it's well past Noctua's 6-year warranty period.

 

The Arctic fan hub works on the same voltage as the fans, so it shouldn't have been a voltage problem.  Looking closely at the connectors, is it possible a few of the fans were plugged in upside down?  Looking at the design of the hub, I think it is possible to do that with some wiggling.

I have had the arctic hub for few weeks and they worked fine before this incident. I could see that but not in this case since the fans wouldnt spin at all if you plug it in upside down. 

That warranty sensor is mostly the case 

[freeagent]

How many fans did you have plugged into the hub? How is the hub powered, by Molex or Sata?

 

I have a Molex hub, and if I plug more than 3x  NF-A14 iPPC 3000 PWM into it revs start to drop. I am wondering if you maybe over loaded the hub.

[Latezen]

2 hours ago, freeagent said:

How many fans did you have plugged into the hub? How is the hub powered, by Molex or Sata?

 

I have a Molex hub, and if I plug more than 3x  NF-A14 iPPC 3000 PWM into it revs start to drop. I am wondering if you maybe over loaded the hub.

I had 5 fans connected to it and the hub uses Sata power, i didnt notice any rev dropping while it was in use. Fans spun up to max rpms fine and also they could hold 350-450rpm easily, or even lower. I dont think it was the hub but also i will not be using it with ippc fans again when the replacement fans arrive.