Put a fan inside your passively cooled wifi router!

[Maskot]

Requirements:

1. Wifi Router
2. USB Port on the Wifi Router
3. Enough space inside for a fan

4. Soldering Skills

5. Thin Fan
6. some sort of fan connector, you probably have one lying around.
6. Hot Glue Gun

In this Tutorial, I will be using a Linksys E3000
 

Step 1. Disassemble your Wifi Router.  WARNING: This will void the warranty.

 

Step 2. Find the USB Port on the back, depending on how it's facing, the ground and positive wire should be soldered to the left most and right most pins.

 

 

Step 3. Hot glue the ends of the wires and hot glue the extra wire into place on the case of the wifi router to make sure they don't flop around inside.

 

Step 4. Hot glue the fan onto the other side of the case, make sure it doesn't obstruct anything when checking placement.

 

Step 5. Connect the fan to the connector, make sure it works before putting it back together, snap the case closed and put the screws back in, then you're done.

[megadarkwood]

Honestly, if I was opening my router I would just cut a hole in both sides and putting a 120mm fan in it. But nice guide anyways.

[Hans Christian | Teri]

...but why?

[Samdb]

Why did you glue the contacts to the PCB?

[nightlitezzz]

Mine is pretty warm to the touch, this might be a good idea..

[Maskot]

Why did you glue the contacts to the PCB?

I soldered them, then for reassurance, since hot glue isn't conductive, I hot glued them.

[piplupgao]

lol my router literally overheated yesterday but I was using my Xbox (I know right) and its right next to it soooo yea

[alpenwasser]

Hehe, using the USB to power the fan is quite clever actually. Nice idea IMO.

[YellowDragon]

Why did you glue the contacts to the PCB?

Its actually pretty common in smaller electronics and smaller gauges of wires as soldering isn't always secure, alot of non modular powersupplys have it done to the internals to prevent a wire from coming lose.

[Wferr]

Its actually pretty common in smaller electronics and smaller gauges of wires as soldering isn't always secure, alot of non modular powersupplys have it done to the internals to prevent a wire from coming lose.

I do that on most all of my projects it helps alot to keep it sturdy especially with 24awg wire

Edit: weeew 100 posts

[Assassin]

i would rather make a hole in my desk put a fan and then put router on top of it. in this way i wont at least void the warranty of my router.

[Ninety1Nine]

Good idea, but for people that don't want to void their warranty.

 

USB Laptop cooler.

 

Don't know what it is? Look it up.

[Maskot]

Good idea, but for people that don't want to void their warranty.

 

USB Laptop cooler.

 

Don't know what it is? Look it up.

I wanted a more internal fix, but a laptop cooler will do the same thing, and the warranty was already over on my router anyways.

[TheSLSAMG]

That's a good idea, since my router is hotter than my toaster.

[sof006]

...but why?

because routers these days get very hot. Perfect example is the Virgin media super hub in the UK. It literally cooks itself to death. My friend owns one and the amount of times its overheated is silly. 

[ygohome]

I can see the value in this.  It is a good idea.

 

We have a wifi router (linksys wrt610n) in our attic above the game room.  It gets very hot up there in summer.  

 

It quit one day while my nephew and I were playing xbox and we lost our wifi connection to the attic router.

 

Climbing up to the attic I discovered the router was very hot.   Turns out the AC adapter/wall-wart is what died.  The router was still good.  Anyway, point is, I guess I shouldn't keep routers in the stagnant heat of the attic.  What I really need to do is run the cat6 down into the wall and then connect the router inside the air conditioned game room.

[Maskot]

To be honest I'd rather not do this and smash the router with a hammer instead. Then build a build nice small PC to run pfSense... much better and more powerful router than anything you are going to buy unless you start spending above £500...

Or, build your own actual router with a second hand business oriented cisco wireless card with the tutorial Wendell and Logan made.

[xAdam]

This is tempting, my gadget corner gets pretty how nowadays with a pc and router behind a TV!

[sof006]

My router actually gets hot but doesn't loose connection unless im wireless. The wireless antenna must get hot and give up when they get too hot and chuck everyone off. To fix the issue I need to physically unplug or power off the router.

[Hans Christian | Teri]

because routers these days get very hot. Perfect example is the Virgin media super hub in the UK. It literally cooks itself to death. My friend owns one and the amount of times its overheated is silly. 

 

So... What you could also do is buy a good router to begin with.

[Maskot]

So... What you could also do is buy a good router to begin with.

I have one of the better routers, I think it was around $300 on release, but I bought it for just over $100.  It still ran ridiculously hot, it never crashed, it was just always hot and it worried me, so I put a fan inside of it, now instead of being able to cook an egg on it, it's just warm to the touch.

[The Syndicate]

I did something like this with my old D-Link router.

Surprising results. My router never gave me problems ever again.

Only my modem.

[sof006]

So... What you could also do is buy a good router to begin with.

No. You cant just "buy a good router" because even good routers overheat. Also just putting it out there, you can't avoid overheating as you NEED to use the router supplied by the ISP over here. The settings on the router are locked to the router. Also ISPs can detect if you aren't using their equipment. Especially Sky broadband.

[Hans Christian | Teri]

No. You cant just "buy a good router" because even good routers overheat. Also just putting it out there, you can't avoid overheating as you NEED to use the router supplied by the ISP over here. The settings on the router are locked to the router. Also ISPs can detect if you aren't using their equipment. Especially Sky broadband.

 

That's funny... I've been using my Apple AirPort Extreme for more than a year now and I have never been anywhere near problems with it, that goes for both heat related and non-heat related problems. So yes you can just buy a good router and run that. Let the hate commence.

[Wferr]

That's funny... I've been using my Apple AirPort Extreme for more than a year now and I have never been anywhere near problems with it, that goes for both heat related and non-heat related problems. So yes you can just buy a good router and run that. Let the hate commence.

Ill hate on you if its a older version of the airport and not one of the latest models like the tower one or the tiny one.