Electronic cooling components.

Could not find a specific area in the forums to post this, so, i guess it will go here.  Ive had cooling issues when I have installed components such as amps that are stacked and/or hidden, as well as CPUs that are installed in tight non-breatheable enclosures in a vehicle.  These "Heat" intensive components are intended to be in open areas to breathe.  Well, ive used little old school sissy computer fans before, drilled holes in a panel for the components to get air, but still caused issues.  Sure, they draw a little bit of current, but for some serious amp cooling...i have had to take other measures.  Here it is.  Snag your girlfriend/wife/or someone you dont know's hair dryer!!!  WTF you ask?!  Check out the blades on these babies, they were made to move air!!!  Take the hair dryer apart, when you find the motor/fan assembly, cut the wiring free to remove it.  There will be four diodes (rect-bridge), remove them.  These diodes convert AC to DC...uh, for those "out of the know", hair dryers use DC motors.  So, its time to make these things work, hope you know your DC circuitry...Good Luck.

Extra idea, ive also cut a portion of the output barrel, without the heating element, for an exit tube when I had room..Why?  It has an integrated screen located about 1/16-3/8 inch back from the exit, and its rounded, therefore you can fabricate an exit port in your enclosure that has a screen.....that prevents kids, like mine ,from being creative little sh*ts and poking large things into the fan, IF  you make it visible as so.

My big issue that conspired the idea:  I built a non-visible amplifier containment enclosure for 7 kicker amplifiers.  They were easy to access, but it was requested they be visually non-existent.  All 7 amps were mounted face to back with only 1/16 inch clearance from ANY side.  I fabricated 2 large holes on each end of the amplifier enclosure.  These holes were staggered, top on one end, bottom on the other, that way cool air would have to actually cross all of the amps to exit the enclosure.  I installed both fans on one end, the holes in the other end were the exhaust (the fans suck air into the enclosure-so they are never exposed to the amp's heat)...  Now, the latest detail was that I found some bi-metallic switches from other retired appliances that were rated at 125 degrees, which are mounted in the middle of two of the center amplifiers for worse case senario.  Even though they are wired to switches hidden in a console for personal control, the fans are now temperature controlled.  Since this elaborate brain-racking, these amps have NEVER had to go into protect mode because of the heat!!!

Well, if you ever have this type of cooling issue in any way hope you have found it useful to your advantage, so, there you have it.

JD