Raspberry Pi Ice Tower Cooler Secondary Fan Duct

thingiverse

These are simple little ducts designed to add a secondary fan to the Raspberry Pi 4 with the Ice Tower Cooler, the original version not the low profile one. These ducts share some similarities but are distinct from the ones that go inside my Mini Desktop Case. The purpose of this second fan is to blow air between the bottom of the Ice Tower heatsink and the Pi's PCB, cooling other items on the PCB and further cooling the heatsink by blowing air past the heat pipes. In my testing, these extra fans can be beneficial for 3-5 degrees depending on the fan and the quality of the fan attached to the heatsink. https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4249203 To print this model, rotate it 45 degrees counterclockwise on the X axis, position the discharge port flat on the build plate. You may want a raft for bed adhesion. It requires a small amount of support under part of the discharge port. Cura will behave as if you need support through the inside up to the top of the flange where the fan screws on. However, in my experience, those inside supports fail more often than they succeed and can be cleaned up with a file in a few seconds. I simply put them on a raft and use support from the build plate. Do these improve the Pi's cooling? In my testing, yes, they do, but not as effectively as the case since much of the air spills out around the sides near the discharge port rather than traveling across the whole PCB. Each one takes about an hour to print (at .28mm layer height, stock Cura settings on my Ender 3). These attach to the Pi and the Ice Tower with the stock Ice Tower screws. I recommend orienting the screws and standoffs so that the screws go down from the top (see the pictures). This has been a fun project for me, developing and experimenting with different funnels and fans. I follow Chris' testing regiment. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxBaEiQHzLU Between writing the script and doing the math in LibreOffice Calc spreadsheet, crimping dupont connectors on different fans, scientifically testing different orientations and fan sizes, this has turned into a very fun, very educational, time-consuming little project. For $100, I could see it taking up a lot of time for a 12-year-old kid stuck at home every day. For practical applications, a Pi that is cooled this well doesn't have a lot of use. The Ice Tower is enough. But it's fun to play with sometimes.