• Welcome to Overclockers Forums! Join us to reply in threads, receive reduced ads, and to customize your site experience!

Painting GT AP-15s

Overclockers is supported by our readers. When you click a link to make a purchase, we may earn a commission. Learn More.

skorpien

Member
Joined
May 9, 2011
Location
Alberta, Canada
I just wanted to get some opinions on an idea I have.

I'm working on an orange and green PC build (acrylic, so everything is visible) and I have 6 Gentle Typhoon AP-15 fans I'm planning on using on my rads. I'd prefer if the fans matched the rest of the build (instead of the grey color they are now) and got to thinking about painting the blades.

I'd remove them from the housing and paint them using light coats of fluorescent spray paint (http://www.homedepot.ca/product/rust-oleum-fluorescent-green-312g-aerosol/980047 and http://www.homedepot.ca/product/rust-oleum-fluorescent-orange-312g-aerosol/980057). Hopefully this won't throw off the balance on the blades. What do you all think?

My other option would be to find fans that are already uv orange and uv green in color, but finding those hasn't been the easiest. Not to mention their performance won't be near what I'll get with the GTs. Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!
 
You have to be very careful with painting because of the balance. In fact, I dont think its recommended to do so.
 
That's what I was afraid of...

I've heard of vinyl dyes. Would those work in my situation?

Or am I better to stick with the stock AP-15s and possibly find other fans that are already colored?

Speaking of which, would anybody have any recommendations for UV orange and green fans? I saw that A.C. Ryan used to make some fans (Blackfire), but they've discontinued them and I haven't found any being sold anywhere.
 
ive seen alot of people paint their fans as long as you do nice even very light coats it should be fine, specially if you already have the fans.
google it plenty of people have done it.
 
That's the problem. I've heard conflicting reports of it being okay and those of it possibly causing vibration and early death of the fans.

I've poured through countless threads and how-to's. I'm pretty sure I can do it, the problem is should I take the risk of ruining such expensive fans...
 
Spray painting them shouldn't be an issue.
Light coats and make sure its even :)

It would take a drip on a blade or something to noticeably change the balance.
 
Alright, I'm gonna try it. Light, even coats... (man I hope I don't mess up...)

Thanks for all the input :) Much appreciated!
 
Alright, I'm gonna try it. Light, even coats... (man I hope I don't mess up...)

Thanks for all the input :) Much appreciated!

Well, if you take the blades out, lay them on news paper and when you spray, do it from a distance, just do it until you can't see under the paint :D
 
That's the plan :) Thanks again for the help.

One final question. The spray paints I linked to (Rust-Oleum Fluorescents), there's no reason they shouldn't work is there?
 
make sure you tape up the shaft and magnet n stuff that is inside :D
 
Will do, thanks :)

I'm going to try it on one fan to begin with, and if it works I'll do the rest. Much easier on the pocket book to replace one fan instead of six :p I'll hopefully have results and possibly pics after the weekend. Thanks again for all the help guys!
 
So, had a bit of a cop out moment... I decided against painting the fan blades, but instead I'll be painting the housing.

The PCB and motor are held in place by a twist-lock and spring mechanism (not glued down) and are so easy to remove (you literally just twist it off) that I figured I'd paint the housing instead of the blades. This way, I'll get the colour I want without comprimising the functionality of the fan.

They're away getting painted today so I'll have pics and results soon.
 
Pics update. Here are the fans and what they look like now that the housing's been painted. (The pictures with the flash turned out better and they're closer to what the fans will look like with UV lighting.)

FansFull.jpg

FansNoFlash.jpg

FansGreen.jpg

FansOrange.jpg
 
That looks great! Nice job!

Just as some perspective of how precise fan blades are: the balance of RC aircraft propellers are commonly fine tuned by putting a bit of paint on the offending fan blade. Makes a huge difference. I think full sized aircraft do something similar, I should ask the maintenance guys next time I get a chance.
 
Haha! Thanks :) It turned out better than I expected. Especially under UV lights... Man, do those suckers glow!

I'm glad I went this route. At 15 bucks a pop, I was really worried about ruining their performance. I'm sure a lot of engineering went into making them as good as they are and I wouldn't want to fudge that up, which I'm sure I would have if I'd painted the blades.

Another question I have that's sort of off topic (hope that's okay); I ended up having to use the fans in pull rather than push as I'd hoped. The screws I bought (30mm M3) were too short to go through both the acrylic of my case and the fans (I have a Mountain Mods U2 UFO full acrylic). It shouldn't affect the performance of the radiators too much, should it? I'm using two MCR320-QP rads.
 
Yeah, I do know about those longer screws but finding them in black to match everything else is tough to do locally. Hmm...

I'm pretty over-radded anyway as is, so if there's any decrease in performance from having them as pull I don't think it'll matter much. I'll build it this way and if I don't decide to change it as I'm building I may rearrange things when it's time for the annual teardown.

PS - I'm using two loops (I know, I know), one for the CPU (Core i7 2600K) and one for GPU (single 7950 full cover block). Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but a 360 rad for each should be plenty, regardless of push or pull, right?
 
Back