A Cooling Fan Solution

Recently I was talking to someone about a 3-D printed project I did for work. Michael, KI7LXY heard me talking about it and asked if I would like to take on a project for him. He has a Motorola CDM1250 radio that he uses as an AllStarLink simplex node at his house.

During the Wednesday night nets it can get overheated and shut down. He sent me pictures of a fan cooling rack that Yaesu makes and wondered if I could make something like that for his Motorola.
So after I picked up the radio from Michael I set to trying to come up with a design that would be simple yet effective. The shape of the rack isn’t hard, so we don’t need to reinvent the wheel.

I looked at where I needed to place the fan to make it most effective and then started thinking about how to make it all work together. I went on Amazon, of course, and found an 80mm 12 volt DC fan for the project. I bought a pack of two for $20.

Next up. I wanted a thermostat that would be normally open until the right temperature was reached. I figured 45 Celsius (114 Fahrenheit) would be a good place to start. I picked up a two-pack of thermostats for $5.99. Now all I needed was a single pole double throw switch and I could put it all together.

Once I had all the parts in hand I was able to design my
3-D print around them and the radio. As you can see in the pictures, we finally have a working cooling rack for the CDM1250.

I printed it with ABS plastic because it can take a great deal of heat without warping. The thermostat gets inserted into the cooling fins on the top with thermal paste. Up there the breeze coming off the fan won’t directly blow on the thermostat. It can be set to work with the thermostat and turn off and on automatically, or it can be turned on full time.

Thanks for reading, and 73.

Superstition ARC Repeaters

147.120 (+) 162.2 Hz (Analog Only)
449.600 (-) 100.0 Hz (Analog Only)
448.275 (-) 100.0 Hz (Fusion)
WB7TJD-R EchoLink
Allstar link 52987

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