MakerGear Forum

My only real grief with my M2 is the fan noise. I have it sitting on my computer desk which is part of our main open-plan living area of our house, so whenever doing prints the fans are noisy enough to be a nuisance.
It seems like the fans are the major cause too - the motors and movement noise when its running are noticeably quieter than the fans. No particular fan seems noisier than any other, so I assume its not that I just have a bad fan (though it is possible I have a bunch of bad fans).
What are my options at quietening this thing down? Are there any alternative 40mm fans I can get that are quieter ?
Bigger/quieter extruder fan, and then move the electronics/powersupply into something to keep them quiet ? (I don't need access to the SD slot)

I guess going the Ikea-cabinet enclosure route would work - but I'm put off by the decreased accessibility you get. The big thing I love about my M2 is that I can change the filament+spool, or wipe off the nozzle, or re-level the bed so easily - nothing is ever in the way.

At one point, before my dual extruder switch, I was running with a pair of Noctua 40mm fans. Extremely quiet.

One trick I use to help a little is to remove the lasercut fan grills. Having the blades that close to the grill form the basis of a chopper siren.
Here is a quick you tube video I found. http://youtu.be/QczRYEd6kfw
I used a pair of dikes to cut out the plastic for the power supply fan as well. It did help. Some of the other fan noise is the low frequency pwm modulation to set the fan speed. We can't do anything about that...

If you can keep your fingers out of the fan no grills will knock a couple of Db off of the fans.

chad

Thanks for the Noctua suggestion, and removing the fan grills.
I might have to do both, as withing my first few days of owning the M2 I managed to run the 50mm fan into a binder clip, which snapped part of the 40mm fan. So after re-arranging the bolts slightly, the grill is currently the only thing holding it all together. Though maybe if I'm bored I can swap with the one in the electronics case while I wait to order Noctua ones...

Be careful with Noctuas. They're designed for one thing only: to be stupid quiet. They sacrifice a lot of airflow for this.

i changed my 40mm fan in my elec enclosure and the new one is higher performance and louder. i found that mounting it up into the lid on my custom enclosure mad the fan really loud as previously mentioned. i made a spacer for the lid as an option to my electronics box i have on thingiverse. look up my custom box and download just the spacer file. no reason you cant use it on your extruder fan.