Ok so someone has asked to explain a little more how I did the fans so here goes. The basic idea is to splice the 3 fan cables together and then extend using extra wire. You don't splice all 3 yellow wires though - cut 2 back and just pick one to extend. The final stage (not yet done) is to add a new fan plug onto the extended wire (or I guess splice the old end on). Anyway here goes....
Tools you will need. Pliers, wire stripper, spare fan wire (red, yellow, black - I use 24 guage), soldering iron and solder, lighter or heater attachment if you have a gas soldering iron.
Firstly place your fans on the rad to get an idea of positioning. Here is the 3 fan version with the fans lying on the rad.
Next cut the original fan wiring to size using pliers so all the wires meet at one side of the rad. I am afraid this picture is a litle further down the road but you get the idea.
Next we are gonna sleeve each individual fan wire before splicing them together. You need sleeving and heatshrink for this part available from most electronics stores. I always keep a variety of sleeving around - this the the 5mm variety from RS components (http://rswww.com/) in the uk (part 389-886). A really good selection of heat shrink can be found here in this rs part (394-8321). I also use this RS gas soldering iron 604-012 which comes with a nice blow torch attachment for the heat shrink.
Cut the sleeving shorter than the wires and cut off a bit of appropriate diameter heat shrink for both ends. When you cut the sleeving it is advisable to very slightly melt the ends to stop them fraying. Again a lighter or gas blow torch does well here.
Next heat the heatshrink to tidy up the sleeving ends. This picture shows the far end but its the same at both ends.
Repeat this process for all the fans - you will need varying lenghts of sleeving of course. This photo shows the ends being brought together on the 2 fan version but it is no different on the 3 fan version.
Next twist together the red wires, the black wires and cut back all but one of the yellow wires. You can 'tin' your twisted together wires at this point to stop them untwisting. See this good web solder guide on how to 'tin' a wire if you don't already know - its easy. I also put a very small piece of heatshrink over the twisted wires to provide extra strength - you can just about see it in the photo on the red wires. Again shrink with a lighter.
This next bit is probably the most tricky. You have to extend the wires. Cut 3 lengths of res, yellow and black wire (I got mine from maplin in the UK - think thats Radio Shack in the US) to about 50cm say. Twist and tin each end. At this point its good if you have one of those tools - I think its called a 'Helping Hands' to hold one or both of the wires for you as you need 2 hands to solder! Here is a photo of it in action.
Essentially place the 2 wires you are extending to they touch lengthways as in the photo then tin again. This will be enough to join them and you not it doesn't make the wire any wider meaning sleeving and heatshrink will fit over easily. Again see the guide. Once the wires are joined repeat the initial steps for sleeving the extended cable - you will need a long bit of sleeving which can be a pain to get over the wires but take your time and you will manage it. Tidy up the 'join' end with a little heat shrink.
Now finally you need to tidy up the join area. This is a little different for the 2 and 3 fan versions as the join is wider in the 3 fan case.
This is the 2 fan version. You can see I just pushed a wider diameter peice of heatshrink over the assemby and used it to diy up the join.
In the 3 fan case I used a wider peice of sleeving with heatshrink at one end to do the same job. I think it depends what you have around really.
Thats about it really - haven't included putting the fan plug back on yet as I need to cut everything to size first. Here are some photos though of the assemblies.
More later ....
Chris
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