Fan noise

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cafewalter

Fan noise

Post by cafewalter »

Proud owner of a brand-new VII, from the latest batch (arrived a couple days ago).

Only negative: The fan on this thing is LOUD. It distracts from conversation in the same room and is plainly audible from the next room.

I thought the new VIIs were supposed to be pre-quieted? Anybody know what's up with that?

Are the pictures from the fan-quieting mod still available on the forum somewhere? I see references to them but I haven't found any info on what to look for or what to change.
Niko

Re: Fan noise

Post by Niko »

cafewalter wrote:The fan on this thing is LOUD. It distracts from conversation in the same room and is plainly audible from the next room.

I thought the new VIIs were supposed to be pre-quieted? Anybody know what's up with that?
Something is wrong if the fan distracts from conversation, that sounds louder than the old S1's.
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

When it arrived, the pressure gage was barely visible through the hole in the front panel, so it seems possible that it took a couple of good bumps on the way across the continent.

But I'm not sure what to look at or try, in terms of silencing it again.
Niko

Post by Niko »

That sounds normal, the road bumps that is...
I didn't even have to look at your profile to know you live on the West Coast.
Don't worry about the gauge, just straighten it and attach the front panel after you tweak it here and there, should be no damage done just a minor annoyance.
As far as the fan goes, I'm a little concerned that something is rubbing up against it. You might want to open it up and look into it further. Take a look at the pictures on this website to guide you through until you get access to that silver colored metal that covers the fan, the little screws below the machine are for the fan itself (I believe). That area is to the lowest right of the machine, towards the back if you're facing the machine with the front panel off.
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

I'll open it up tonight and give it a look. Thanks.
BobG

Post by BobG »

I also live in the Seattle area and the pressure gauge getting knocked out of the hole is very common when shipping to the West Coast. You can easily take the front off and bend the gauge back to fit in the hole.

Your fan should not be that loud. My machine is 3 years old and was one of the first batches to have some of the improvements made to reduce vibration noise. It is still quiet, so in the shipment process it might have bent or pushed something in the fan area.

Check your machine out. If you bought it from Chris' Coffee, they offer terrific phone help to diagnose or troubleshoot any problems.

Bob G.
fxdxt

Post by fxdxt »

My fan was so silent that even putting my ears next to the machine I could hear nothing,
That is until my heating element went south. When I took it apart I found that my fan was not plugged in.
A very silent fan indeed.

Take your front cover off and remove the drain pan. To the right is a Chrome splash guard. One screw is holding it on.
The fan is just under the Triac board. Make sure it is mounted correctly.


Tom
Niko

Post by Niko »

The fan itself is pretty quiet, it's the position of it that makes the funny sound like a faint air raid siren. My Vivaldi is not that loud either but my Vivaldi II is nearly silent. They changed the position of the fan with the newer ones, I think they raised the fan up a little bit using a gasket or O-Rings of some sort, I have yet to open the machine to find out. One of these days, the next time I open the VI for anything - I might do the fan mod since it does make a significant difference. Most people don't care, I got used to it and I stopped thinking about it on my unit.

Tom!
Did you fix your machine? Anyways, did yours have the fan mod done to it? I think it happened with the 2nd batch of VII's. You might as well toss the spacers in there to make it quieter if LaSpaz didn't do it for you.
Last edited by Niko on Mon Apr 09, 2007 8:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

Hah! I was going to describe as sounding like an air raid siren a couple of miles away, but I thought maybe that would come across as hyperbole :-) That really is just what it sounds like, though.
Niko

Post by Niko »

Any luck, did you open it yet?
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

No, it probably won't be for a couple more hours. I'll report back.
MDL
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Post by MDL »

I received my machine from Chris on April 3 and I can tell you that it is very quiet. I think that I can hear the fan coming on periodically, but I have not opened it to insure that the fan is plugged in or to see how it is mounted.
fxdxt

Post by fxdxt »

Tom!
Did you fix your machine?
Yes I posted it back in the VII In Warranty Problems.
with some pics.

Tom
Niko

Post by Niko »

I just saw them Tom.
Great shots.
Hopefully your machine will be trouble free for the next few years at least.
MDL wrote:I received my machine from Chris on April 3 and I can tell you that it is very quiet. I think that I can hear the fan coming on periodically, but I have not opened it to insure that the fan is plugged in or to see how it is mounted.
Precisely. This is exactly how a Vivaldi II fan should sound. I wish I had the audio equipment to make a comparison of the two machines in a recording.
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

Niko wrote:Any luck, did you open it yet?
Opened it up and played around some. The fan is mounted directly to the metal bottom plate, no spacers or shock absorbers. I pulled it out and confirmed that it's audible, but fairly quiet, in free air; the whine is coming partly from the restricted airflow caused by the pattern of holes in the metal bottom, and partly from vibration transmitted through the bottom plate.

I tried a makeshift isolation mount, but if anything it made the problem worse; no surprise, I probably increased the amount of vibration and didn't isolate it well enough. May try again with a better shockmount, or I may try mounting it in a different position.

The irony here is that the only reason this fan has to be there is that the triac heat sinking is inadequate. If they got a higher-rated triac, or an SSR, and mounted it directly to the metal base instead of on the PCB, it probably wouldn't need a fan at all. As an EE, it's tempting to pull that triac PCB out and fix the design...

But anyway, I'm going to order a couple of other fans and see if, for instance, I can fit a bigger, higher-volume one in with a dropping resistor to slow it down a little, to get the same CFM but quieter. There's space enough for a few different possibilities.
Niko

Post by Niko »

Interesssting...
Keep us posted on what you come up with.
Strange how your machine didn't get the quiet mod done to the fan, maybe it got to be too much to add another step in the assembly line.
I'll be following your steps closely since I've got a machine with a noisy fan also. I was thinking of a different fan myself a while back but of course I was waiting to see if anyone else was going to try it first.
One guy used thick double-sided tape (the foam one) to pad the fan mounts so it would cut down on the vibration and change the sound, I think this is the post you were looking for. This got lost on the crash of X-Mas Eve at the end of last year when the forum crashed.
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

Niko wrote:Keep us posted on what you come up with.
I tried replacing the fan, with a spare sent courtesy of Chris'. No luck; in fact the replacement was noisier.

So, I ordered an assortment of fans from Jameco Electronics: both some fans in the same physical size, voltage, and current rating, and also some larger fans. After experimentation, what I ended up with was a 2.4"x2.4"x0.4" fan (Jameco part # 1585418), mounted on the underside of the bottom plate with a makeshift shockmount constructed from slices of soft silicon rubber tubing. The shockmount keeps it about 0.2" away from the bottom plate.

Because the fan had a higher current rating than the original, I needed to add a 100 ohm 1W series resistor to limit the current. This also had the effect of reducing the fan speed and thus the noise even further. However, since the fan was rated for higher airflow than the original, it still ends up putting out about the same amount of air.

The net result is sufficiently close to silence. I can tell when it turns on, with my ear right next to the underside of the machine; but from a few feet away it is inaudible. (Previously I could hear the whine of the fan from two rooms away and it was loud enough to be distracting from one room away.)

Hopefully I'm still getting enough airflow through there to keep the triac cool. If the triac blows, maybe that'll be my excuse to replace it with an adequately rated SSR, like La Spaziale should have done in the first place :|
Niko

Post by Niko »

That's very puzzling indeed.
The fan on my original S1 is annoying; the one on my VII is very quiet. I've learned to not mind the 1st one and the 2nd one wouldn't bother you either - and what I meant by that is that I, like you, am very sensitive to sounds like that.
I'm glad to hear that it's working out for you, the air flow is the only thing that I'm concerned about for your triac since the fan isn't revving as high. It sounds like it should be enough, just keep your ear to the ground and you'll be fine.
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

Niko wrote:That's very puzzling indeed.
The fan on my original S1 is annoying; the one on my VII is very quiet.
Is the one on your VII adapted in some way, e.g., shock-mounted or mounted away from the base plate?

The difference in loudness between the two La Spaziale fans (the original and the replacement from Chris') was significant; you might have just gotten a "good one", I suppose. But both of them whined noticeably more in the restricted airflow situation of being mounted against the base plate (sucking air through the holes in the bottom) as opposed to being in free air.
Niko

Post by Niko »

Maybe you're right, I got a good one and no 2 fans are alike...maybe?
Chris did tell me that with the 2nd set of VII's they made an adjustment to the spacing between the bottom of the fan and the frame. They used some kind of spacers to raise the fan slightly to change the sound. Yours must have been a doozy or something out of this world when it makes the noise you described, I believe you 100%. I have a video card in one of my computers that whined and whirred to no end until it suddenly got quiet because it died, I was so glad this happened becasue it forced me to replace it with something silent. I don't use my old S1 as much as the VII, so it hasn't reached that annoyance level yet - once it starts to bother me again I might look into doing the silencing mod. One thing to note also is that Chas did this mod and he reported no "huge" improvement, this just proves that not many of these fans sound alike.
Jesse

Post by Jesse »

I am so pleased to read this thread--my fan is making me crazy too. It is worth noting that I am an audio snot and understand that my ears seem to be overly-sensitive, the air-raid siren fan has been making me bats as well.

Happily, since I am typically asleep while it is warming up, the problem is largely minimized.

When I looked at my fan, I noticed that it was mounted perilously close to the perforated metal bottom and figured that the position was the source of the noise: vibration and lack of draw sucking the fan head against the metal grate.

Thus, recalling my experience making my home theater PC (largely) silent. I pulled out the 1/8" foam weather stripping tape and built up a small stack framing the fan which reduced the noise markedly.

Now I am off to find a similar fan
cafewalter

Post by cafewalter »

Jesse wrote:It is worth noting that I am an audio snot
Yes, me too.

Modified as I described, it's silent enough that I have to listen hard to hear it; mainly what I hear is the sound of the water boiling. If I stick my hand under the bottom of the machine I can feel the air flow, though.

I'd like to find time to put a thermocouple on the triac, to see if the fan is doing its job sufficiently. If I manage to get to that, I'll post the results.
Jesse

Post by Jesse »

I'd like to find time to put a thermocouple on the triac, to see if the fan is doing its job sufficiently. If I manage to get to that, I'll post the results.
I was just thinking the same thing. I have a dual probe tc and the goal is to have one on the traic and another in the handle (somehow). I have a couple of old heatsinks around, and I was going to see if any of them might be useful for dissipating heat from the triac as well.

I have an array of fans I am switching back and forth across my desk right now, and I am messing with voltages to find a pitch I can stand. The best so far is an tubaxial bearing fan by the German company, Papst, made in Hungary. Nice low pitch and at 7.5 v it's damn near silent while putting out a goodly amount of air. I pulled it out of a fancy old DLP projector that finally died.

Will post my findings when I have some.
-Jesse
Jesse

Post by Jesse »

OK, so I didn't hook up the tc tonight, but I did open up the Viv and swap out the fan with the Papst 512 I mentioned above.

Am I happy? You better believe it. I now have a silent (save for the noise from the uninsulated boiler :-) espresso machine.

I shot a couple of pix of the process for amusement.

Image
Note that the fan is directly on the steel (this is a series II machine from Feb 07), and that the fan is slightly pinched to one side.
Image
The new fan is 50mm vs the old one at something closer to 40mm. Both are 12 volt, 1 watt, .08 amp fans. The old one produces 7 CFM of flow at 27 db whereas the new one moves 11.8 CFM at 30 db. Interestingly, to my ears both outside of the machine and in, the Papst fan is rediculously quieter. These db ratings are clearly nominal measurements.
Image
No doudt the foam helps quell the noise. To test my little fan swap inside the machine, I flipped it on and waited till the group was heated... I heard the slightest flick and my hand could feel the draw. How delightful. I am giddy.

Thanks to all for inspiring me to swap out the fans!

Other news of note, while trying to figure out how to get the old fan off, I noticed that its mounting nuts were totally thrashed and one was cross-threaded something bad. Took a pic, below. Only had two screws holding it on (which is a good thing in this case).
-Jesse

Image
[/img]
jonniewishbone

Post by jonniewishbone »

Is this noisy fan thing a problem on all the Spaz II's??
Jon
Niko

Post by Niko »

jonniewishbone wrote:Is this noisy fan thing a problem on all the Spaz II's??
Jon
"NO".
Mine is nearly silent.

This problem (if you want to call it one) does exist on all original S1's, sounds like some of the VII's got affected with it. I thought LaSpaz modified the 2nd batch of them to silence the fan, apparently maybe they just tried it out on a bunch and stopped because it wasn't worth it to them (?), just a guess on my part, who knows...
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ScottW
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Post by ScottW »

jonniewishbone wrote:Is this noisy fan thing a problem on all the Spaz II's?? Jon
Like Niko -- mine is nearly silent. I can hear it if I am standing next to the machine, but a few steps away and its gone. No explanation, its really wierd that there is so much difference being reported between machines.

...Scott
gsuser

Post by gsuser »

Without any doubt, I have the most silent one. In fact, I'm still looking for a fan in my S1 :shock: There are holes and place to put one, but it is empty :lol:
I bought it two weeks ago after reading this interresting forum, 220V 2500 Watts, SN 253475, built in 2006.
It has the single manometer, the plastic shield over the vacuum breaker valve, but old boiler temperature sensor, and the new motor mounts.
I hope this model is supposed to work without fan, and that someone didn't simply forget to put one :lol:
jonniewishbone

Post by jonniewishbone »

Maybe that is how they fixed the problem... just not put it in!! :lol:
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ScottW
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Post by ScottW »

gsuser wrote:I hope this model is supposed to work without fan, and that someone didn't simply forget to put one :lol:
I would guess that the efficiency provided by 220v lowers the amount of heat generated and a fan simply isn't needed. But that's just a guess!
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chas
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Post by chas »

Yes, that's true. The voltage drop across the triac will not be much different when operating at 220V vs. 115V but the current will only be 1/2 as much so the power dissipation in the triace will be nearly half as well.
Chas
LM GS/3 & LaSpaziale Dream v 1.25 (US 120V)
Mazzer Kony E, Customized Rocky
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Niko

Post by Niko »

It would be nice to have the 220v version available in the States as well then since we get the dedicated breaker and 20A outlets put in, might as well get a 220v outlet instead.
I wonder if the 220 version warms up faster?
gsuser

Post by gsuser »

I think you are right, the power dissipation in the triac must be lower with 220V. I took my screwdriver again (my wife begins to look at me with weird eyes :roll: ) and checked the radiator, it was nearly cold...
For the warmup, it takes approximatively 6mn to lit the 85
Niko

Post by Niko »

How long for a full warmup to 95 and the steam boiler up to its full capacity?
Weska

Post by Weska »

Hah! I've been thinking that my "fan" is far too silent to match what others are finding. I was thinking of going inside to see whether the fan had not been connected one of these days. I'd been feeling underneath and imagining that I felt a weak draft...thinking of putting a flame next to it to see if there is a draft...

Of course, the 220v version that I have probably doesn't have a fan at all.

(Still, I might have to confirm that when I get into tinkering mood.)
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Post by chas »

My V2 fan is slightly louder than my former S1 fan. I can hear either one from the next room. I think it's the frequency that's more aggravating that the volume. I did the sticky foam pad under the fan trick on the V2. At first it seemed to be slightly quieter than the S1 but it has since gotten louder again. I am guessing that the fairly thin foam layer eventually compressed and removed the effectiveness of the "fix".

The other day I Googled 40mm fans and found one that runs about 75% as fast as the standard Sunon fan. It also is rated at 1/2 the dBA of the Sunon. Since the dB scale is logarithmic that should mean at least 1/4 the noise level of the Sunon. When it arrives and I get it installed, I'll let you know how that works out.

The website at which I bought this new fan also carries several Sunon 40mm fans. It noted that while the Sunon fans move more air than others in their class, they are also the loudest.
Chas
LM GS/3 & LaSpaziale Dream v 1.25 (US 120V)
Mazzer Kony E, Customized Rocky
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gsuser

Post by gsuser »

How long for a full warmup to 95 and the steam boiler up to its full capacity?
I took my stopwatch this morning :D
5 mn 15 s to 95 and 15 mn for the boiler to get geady.
Niko

Post by Niko »

It's about the same here.
4 minutes to 95 and 13 minutes for a full warmup to the steam boiler also.
Sometimes it takes a little longer (maybe 20 seconds or so), depends on the incoming water temp.
algrilli

Post by algrilli »

My 3-week old, formerly-silent Vivaldi started turning into a 1960s police siren for me too, but I fixed it using a modification of Chas
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Post by chas »

Glad to hear you figured it out. Your mod to the mod makes perfect sense, though I am surprised that you didn't get the same level of quiet just from the original mod.

There is one obvious conclusion..... wait for it.... my nuts must be bigger than yours.... :dontknow:
Chas
LM GS/3 & LaSpaziale Dream v 1.25 (US 120V)
Mazzer Kony E, Customized Rocky
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Niko

Post by Niko »

:shock: :lol:
algrilli

Post by algrilli »

I was surprised as well, Chas. But now I know it's simply about isolating the fan and minimizing vibration. And, uh, I guess I was just able to do more with less.. :wink:
sdoublelatte

Re: Fan noise

Post by sdoublelatte »

I just purchased a vivaldi II (February 2009) from chris coffee and this "faint air raid siren" noise occurred while the steam boiler is getting heated. The description of faint air raid siren described in this forum is very accurate. I thought, eh, I'll get used to it. But I checked out this awesome forum, and lo and behold, a fan mod. Replace the two bolts that attach the fan to the chassis with slightly longer bolts and place two nuts on each bolt, one under the chassis like the previous nut and the other between the fan and the chassis. This will raise the fan about 1/8" off of the chassis.
I can't thank you guys enough for this awesome advice. It totally works. Air raid siren is gone!:-).
Hopefully someday I'll figure something out that is helpful to others with this beautiful espresso machine.

Richard
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chas
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Re: Fan noise

Post by chas »

No one with new VII's has mentioned this in so long that I was beginning to think LaSpaz had changed something.
Chas
LM GS/3 & LaSpaziale Dream v 1.25 (US 120V)
Mazzer Kony E, Customized Rocky
Hottop P/B
JohnB

Re: Fan noise

Post by JohnB »

I thought the fan noise was fixed on all the V2s ages ago?? The fan in my 12/07 model is so quiet I have trouble even hearing it.
rick.monroe

Re: Fan noise

Post by rick.monroe »

Hi. I just posted in the Day 1 Problems area - with the same complaint: My machine is afflicted with the air-raid fan, too. April 2009, so the problem is baaaack.

So, as I asked in the day 1 problems area: what's the consensus on the fix - or are there multiple causes?

Weather stripping looks easy.
For those in the US, I found the Pabst fan here:
http://www.galco.com/scripts/cgiip.exe/ ... m=512F-EBM
JohnB

Re: Fan noise

Post by JohnB »

rick.monroe wrote:Hi. I just posted in the Day 1 Problems area - with the same complaint: My machine is afflicted with the air-raid fan, too. April 2009, so the problem is baaaack.

So, as I asked in the day 1 problems area: what's the consensus on the fix - or are there multiple causes?

Weather stripping looks easy.
For those in the US, I found the Pabst fan here:
http://www.galco.com/scripts/cgiip.exe/ ... m=512F-EBM
Contact CC or whoever you bought it from about a warranty fix as it should not be noisy. Maybe the factory made some change on the latest machines that affects the fan??
rick.monroe

Re: Fan noise

Post by rick.monroe »

Jesse,

When you replaced the original fan with the Pabst, did you just make a sticky, weatherstripping gasket and press it in place? Or did you bolt it in?
rick.monroe

Re: Fan noise

Post by rick.monroe »

Today I decided to fiddle with the fan - and had some luck. The fan is now quiet enough that I can get on with my life. ;-)

I've uploaded a photo that shows how the fan was mounted orginally. I turned the machine on its side and tried to loosen the nuts from the bottom. They were so tight that the screws rotated with them. The heat sink sticks out over the screws, and there is not enough room for an offset screwdriver (at least not the one that I have). so I had to grip the screw with some needle-nose pliers and then loosen the nut. That worked ok on the near screw, but I could not get to the far screw.

So - after a slight detour in which I tried to remove the right side panel, failed, and then dropped a thumbscrew not once, but twice - I found out something useful. I tried rotating the fan, which is now held by only one (very tight) screw, hoping to find a position where it was quieter. And I lucked out. Rotated only a mm or two from the original placement, the sound level decreased quite a lot. In fact, I can just barely hear it now, after the machine is all buttoned up again.

So, the urgency for a fix is now gone, and I can concentrate on trying to make good espresso.

Thanks for your help. I hope this cheap-and-cheerful fix will helps somebody else.
Attachments
fan as originally mounted. I ended up removing the near screw, and rotating the fan very slightly. Noise greatly diminished.
fan as originally mounted. I ended up removing the near screw, and rotating the fan very slightly. Noise greatly diminished.
fan.jpg (29.59 KiB) Viewed 30863 times
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chas
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Re: Fan noise

Post by chas »

I think they change fan suppliers from time to time and some are prone to make the noise than others. The issue is that the S1 was designed as a 220V machine which does not require a fan. In 110 V models, they just stick a fan over what is intended to be a convection ventilation grate. It was never designed for a fan. So there is a lot of air blockage. If you've ever stood right in front of a large window fan you've heard the noise level increase greatly. The same thing happens with this fan.

So moving the fan to a better position over the grate makes sense as does lifting it up away from the grate a small distance.
Chas
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