DOES SIZE MATTER? | Fan Showdown S4E6

[@mdocod]

The cheater recognizes an important factor... The maximum energy that can be extracted from that motor requires allowing the motor to spin at a decently high RPM. Bogging it down with a huge fan actually wastes potential. For a given voltage input to the motor, there's certainly going to be a "peak power" RPM that a fan design should be tuned to operate at. I suspect the designer may well have performed a power vs rpm characterization of the same little noctua hub motor before proceeding with the fan design. Furthermore, the fan blade, center hub, and stator design all look like something right out of a highly optimized cooling tower or underwater screw design.

[@MesaCoast]

Absolutely. You need to know the power curve of the motor and design accordingly to reach peak performance. In other applications, the design process is often done backwards where you design the output and then find a motor/gearbox combo that can run it; here everyone has the same motor, and whoever understands its capabilities best has a significant advantage

[@burninruber60]

I completely agree and I believe this test has shown time and time again. just because a fan is larger doesn't mean it will be better and in fact tend to spin slower. A good representation of this was the overdrive fan that even with the over driven gear set it still spun slower do to the increased resistance.

[@GrulbGL]

finally someone who actually proccess, thank you.

[@MrRadicalMoves]

100% The Cheater beater... while it had a good idea... fails to take into account that the fan motor just isn't gonna be able to spin it at fast. By a weird twist of fait, it probably would have done better with less blades.

[@SgtStinger]

@@MrRadicalMoves The Cheater Beater also fails in one more aspect, and that is that it tries to accelerate flow through a narrowing cone that is quite severe, and you can see in the smoke test that there is fan surge coming out of the edges of the fan. This is due to the fan design not being able to create enough pressure to accelerate the air flow through the forcing cone.

[@Artholos]

I love the drama that’s developed. Also playing your signature smoke test music beat quietly before transitioning over gets the blood pumping! OH YEAH BABY!

[@drew899]

*buildup to smoke test hype* “Did you know that this belt was made with magnets? It’s called a groove belt, you thought I was going to say ring didn’t you?” Skip ad Hype significantly lower

[@yeetsus5449]

I need to know what song that is so bad

[@drew899]

@@yeetsus5449 just look up “royalty free music”

[@JohnnieFruits]

@@yeetsus5449 Look Where That Got You - Mattie Maguire

[@Fs3i]

The journey across japan music?

[@BReal-10EC]

You need two different categories: Fans that are IN the fan housing like a normal fan, and fans that extend outside of the fan housing. It's not fair to compare the two directly.

[@Henrix1998]

There's not that many of those

[@nothxplsthx]

@Zeta Darus Consider the motorsport alternatives. In a homolgomated, or otherwise regulated league, you receive results that are more indiciatve of the realistic baseline. While Formula One test the absolute limits of engineering, both mechanical, and aerodynamic, leagues like group N are closer (albeit not accurate reflections of the abilities of the publicly available models) to real world results. It would be reasonable to divide the pool across, "best for a laboratory/open air test bench", and "best direct blade replacement to the a12x25". I don't know about you, but I would never consider installing a cheater fan in my case(as much as I respect the engineering, and the results), HOWEVER, if there was a drop in replacement for my fans that could increase performance or reduce noise, I would ABSOLUTELY buy a set.

[@witchdoctor6502]

true, although it is nice to see the difference between them. I'm more affraid that in some time everyone will be sending monster fans just to beat the cheater and regular ones will disappear

[@succa345]

He has a leaderboard. You can see which one is the fastest fan and which one is the fastest shrouded fan.

[@akunog3665]

@@witchdoctor6502 "I'm more affraid that in some time everyone will be sending monster fans just to beat the cheater and regular ones will disappear" So far there have been an endless stream of new, regular fans. The vast majority of the fans shown have been simple blade replacements.. I think your fear is irrational. Just my opinion though.

[@Deedz_Indeed]

would love to see how the A12x25 fan performs on the cheater housing.

[@CameronHarris1986]

This needs to happen. And maybe the cheater housing with some of the other top fans! (The ones without housing.)

[@gagaronpew4382]

@@CameronHarris1986 yeah, i wonder how much of it is the housing and how much the actual fan...

[@Deedz_Indeed]

@@gagaronpew4382 this is exactly what I want to know.

[@Deedz_Indeed]

@@Zdoc9 Memento Mori I miss that channel. I also love that this profile pic connects the community together.

[@J.P.__]

This. We need to test this.

[@sepg5084]

The cheater's shroud and fan design is just very well designed. The cheater beater seems to have some backflow, plus its shroud's overall shape does not look efficient with the way that the big opening shrinks down towards the fan chassis.

[@onehourleft]

How to Optimize a Propeller or Fan Design | SimScale Webinar kzbin.info/www/bejne/jGjYioKId5ZkbM0

[@Chuckiele]

And most importantly its way too heavy.

[@SDY_Studios]

I think to increase the attack angle of the fan blades and keep the number of blades so we can take the nozzle of Cheater Beater and make a bigger attack angle. ( my thinking is, bigger attack angle = better flow but is more drag) so whoever wants to do that try to fine equality of flow/drag

[@practicalguy973]

Its possible the cheater beater has too much mass for the 120mm motor. Smaller fins might be better with such a massive fan.

[@MrCybergladiator]

Excellent work! THis is my favourite series on youtube. I'd love to see the cheater "housing" with the A12x25 fan blades, just to see how much the "housing" and bell mouth improve the flow! Keep up the good work! Looking forward to your next Vid!

[@SwervingLemon]

See, that's real scientific inquiry. That's not what Major Hardware is about. I don't have the time to start my own fan-test channel, but will gladly submit designs and pledge to subscribe to anyone who does and tests using all the data that's important.

[@eagames456]

Why are you replying to many comments with just "channel bad, creator bad"? Legitimately curious, what's the point?

[@jaymiddleton772]

Well that sort of answered my question pre-emptively: Do you run any particular fan, even the base Noctua fan, at regular intervals to make sure the hub is putting out a reasonably consistent amount of power etc. Running The Cheater again and seeing the same high results really answers the question though.

[@GeorgeJFW]

I think we are looking at this the wrong way. Instead of trying to beat the cheater we should try to improve it. For instance I have always wondered how foaming tpu would perform as a fan. It’s popular with the model airplane community because it’s lighter then pla. Let’s be honest the real limitations we are hitting are due to the limited torque output of that little motor, a few grams of savings could make a big difference. 🤷‍♂️ great video as always

[@Qwarzz]

maybe LW-PLA rather than TPU... the foaming TPU is really soft and might not be that good for this purpose. But yeah! lighter material should equal more rpm shouldn't it? So print the fan part of cheater in LW-PLA and see if it gets even better results? :)

[@802Garage]

Oh hey there! Good points. I always think once we find the best of the best we gotta keep tweaking it!

[@warpedweirdo]

All else being equal, lighter weight improves *acceleration*, not top speed. A lighter fan should spin up faster but the heavier fan will still reach the same revs.

[@GeorgeJFW]

@@warpedweirdo that would be something to to test it sounds logical I would like to see it worked out!

[@GeorgeJFW]

@@802Garage dude we watch all the same channels! I swear to god I see you in the comments of every other video I watch lol 😂 🍻

[@EnderMalcolm]

Free Idea: A convergent-divergent fan housing, to try and implement the same idea as a rocket nozzle. It would be interesting to see if the cheater beater would perform better with optimized print settings. It seems to wobble a little, and that's wasted energy. The 'puffs' at the front are a stall condition, similar to what happens inside a jet engine when the pressure inside is greater than the pressure entering the front. The combustion effectively 'backfires' through the compressor and fan, which is notably not good for bearings and other things. I feel the same is happening here. If the housing were taller, it would allow a smoother transition of the airflow, and should increase performance.

[@ayuchanayuko]

*_Stall warning_* *_Stall warning_* _bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep_ *Ace Combat and Project Wingman PTSD intensfies*

[@Bluemaxx83]

I feel that the stators that were behind the blades introduced an obstruction to the air flow rather than help to guide it. I also think that a smaller number of blades here may have helped as they were very wide and could have been interfering with eachother.

[@umi3017]

How do you need divergent housing when moving air like .... less than 0.1 mach....

[@francisschweitzer8431]

@@Bluemaxx83 I think he’s somewhat good on the size of the blade in relationship to the diameter. It is the surface area of the blade that moves the air… having said that …there’s a fine line separating Just Right vs. Too Much. The BIGGER the fan = the slower it will spin. Bigger meaning overall mass of which diameter will mostly dictate. I noticed his blades were FAT ..or PhAt.. lol. I would like to see them thinner across the mean chord and SMOOTH….. the printing process left noticeably raised ridges and that will cause a loss of Laminar Air Flow … the ridges on the blades create turbulence before it ever gets started pumping any air… A INCREASE in the cone behind the blade will give the air time to run… in a straight line and adding a Expansion Chamber at the opposite end will give the faster moving air a place to expand… and SUCKING everything with it. This is why the “CHEATER is working so good. #1 REDUCED ROTATIONAL MASS ( Weight Watchers for blades )

[@OperationDarkside]

I like the rocket nozzle idea, but I believe the static pressure would need to be much higher. Depending on the throat-exit-ration you imagined. I would proposae more compressor stages and having the stator end before the converging part.

[@Arahknid]

Watching the smoke with the bat fan made me think that it would be really cool to see a video of just that and you adjusting the lighting like maybe with a flashlight and the speed of the video to see how clearly you can see each slice in the smoke

[@TlalocTemporal]

Having a strobe light that runs at the same frequency as the fan would be really cool to see, like an oscilloscope for fans. I wonder if that RPM meter could be hooked up to an arduino?

[@kristmadsen]

Was the cheater ever tested with the stock a12 fan blade? I want to see that.

[@ArgonautCaptain]

I would like to see this as well

[@novatopaz9880]

Or any other fans, for that matter. Is the fan blade just that good, or is it the housing that does all the heavy lifting?

[@GeneralPoison]

This!

[@MeesDeppe_Official]

Now i’m really curious what only the shroud does and how much of the cheaters performance is in the actual fan

[@akunog3665]

@@MeesDeppe_Official It's not apples to apples though. The cheater blade was designed with the shrouds in mind. It could be a synergy type thing where the shroud and blades have to work together to get the performance. I want to see the test, I'm just not sure it would separate the performance of the blades from the performance of the shrouds. I guess we could run the cheater blades without the shroud too to see if there is any synergy effects. For instance if the cheater blade without shroud is worse than the a12x25 blade without shroud, but the cheater wins when they both have the shroud this would pretty clearly show the synergy effect.

[@joetincher7049]

Please never stop doing the sound test. Love hearing how each one produces different pitches & such

[@jttech44]

There are many, many well designed fans in this series that fail for the same reason: Mass. There's simply too much material used, which limits the blade speed to the point where they are no longer efficient. The cheater beater is a great example of this, and I suspect that, even the cheater itself could be improved by simply removing unnecessary material.

[@MeesDeppe_Official]

I’m not sure about that, when a heavy blade spins up it takes longer but it also carries more momentum. I do think that thinner blades do move air better and less weight might spin faster as it puts less load on the motor. But yeah that’s all speculation

[@kelvin1316]

I've looked a few of these and thought the same; the blades often look good but sometimes way to chonky.

[@jttech44]

@@MeesDeppe_Official Remember, heavy is a problem because it puts additional load on the bearings of the motor, and thinner airfoils tend to be better in general, provided they're designed properly because they can offer less drag. Additionally, these fans are all using planar gcode, so, they could very likely see some significant improvements in strength, and therefore weight, by providing nonplanar gcode with the use of support material, and that's exotic enough that it'd probably get printed too.

[@storminmormin14]

@@jttech44 You need to know a lot about your printer when using non-planar G-code otherwise you’ll have a crash. I still also don’t see how that helps you avoid needing lots of support material.

[@MeesDeppe_Official]

@@jttech44 It's not that much added weight though, so i'd be interested to see if a difference in mass between two of the same fans would make a difference. What ís important is the shape, a thick blade that doesnt flow nicely does indeed impact performance. if you look at airplane wings for example they're actually rather thick in the middle, same with older aircraft propellers. but then again i'm not an expert :)

[@galen__]

I liked the extra smoke test footage and comments on what was observed, that was quite interesting. I’m now wondering how expensive an entry level 2400 FPS camera is to build 😅

[@Henrix1998]

Do you mean 240?

[@andionn5575]

I think the back part of the cheater fan is the deciding factor in it's performance. It reduces the turbulence after the motor. None of the other designs do that.

[@SwervingLemon]

Which is why I suspect that the rankings would be substantially different if they were all pushing air through a radiator or heatsink. None of these are really being tested under load.

[@topordrop2402]

I'd love to see a parallel competition making the fan design more scientific by reducing the number of variables to one or two per challenge. e.g. 5 designs per episodes where the design is constant but variables such as blade pitch, hub design, airfoil choice, sweep angle, trailing edge shape, tip design etc are changed one by one., and the base design for the subsequent episodes is updated with the winner. Eventually we will have a crowdsourced ultimate fan design from your community.

[@clorophil1310]

That Batfan did significantly better than I was expecting!

[@francisschweitzer8431]

@CheaterBeater. …. Your convergence cone is too short. the back of the blades are Stalling. On a Turbine engine we call that “ Compressor Stall” where the air backs up under compression and Burps out of the inlet…as noted on this smoke test… the reverse puffing. Kill the scallops on the trailing edge…. Stretch that cone out and think more GE high Bypass

[@BGTech1]

I like the way you think!

[@samppabiist7547]

Damn you sound smart i actually have no idea what you said can you take a look at my comment if that made anysense i dont really know anything about this so i would like to hear your opinion:)

[@christopherdecorte1599]

Exactly what I was thinking using auxiliary inlet/outlet at bottom

[@D3M3NT3Dstrang3r]

Flow dynamics of the Cone looked really nice. It looks to be a very performant fan for one that fits the chassis properly. It appeared to be using it's surface area efficiently.

[@blahorgaslisk7763]

I understand the idea behind the Cone, it's just that physics doesn't work that way. Just because the smoke is drawn in towards the center doesn't mean that the rest of the fan blades are any less efficient. In fan designs the hub is a necessary evil that you really would want to make as small as possible to maximize the fan blade area. There were even some fans made using a design where the motor was not placed in the hub but in the rim. These were called something like tip magnetic drive fans, and all that the hub was used for was housing the bearings. These were however expensive, complex and made it necessary for the rim to be thicker which cut into the area available for the fan blades. So it's been a few years since I saw one or heard about any developments. Where there are improvements to be made is mostly in the shape and number of the fan blades. Aerodynamics is pretty complex and as shown there's not one simple shape that is best. In these tests it's pretty obvious that there are compromises in all of them. These are either in dimension, sound or a combination of both. The Noctua fan has a lot lower noise than just about every other fan design tested, and yet it's near the top. The Cheater is pushing a lot more air, but doing it at the cost of being physically much larger and a lot louder. The Cheater Beater is interesting in that while it pushes less air than the Cheater it is still pushing more air than the Noctua and at pretty much the same noise level. It doesn't beat the Noctua by much, but it's notable that so far it's the one fan that manages to match or beat it in both categories. And the trade off this time is it's immense size.

[@AdamWebb1982]

the problem with the cheater "beater" is that its too big and also has too many blades. Static pressure should be good on that one though?

[@sorukowolf3222]

Yeah, the blade design on the beater is better suited to static pressure. I think higher angle and some gaps between the blades would have made a big difference. Maybe the designer anticipated a higher rpm and more resistance from the 120mm opening

[@laharl2k]

i doubt it, take a look, even with an open back it has backflow problems. The fan has too many blades, take 30% of them off and it might work a but you cant simply add more blades with lower angles of attack and expect infinite static pressure. Static pressure is about constrainment, in such a way that it wont allow backflow, the more constrained the higher the static pressure.

[@scrambledmandible]

The fan is surging like in a jet engine, that's what the regular bursts of turbulence coming out the front and sides are unfortunately I can't remember how you'd fix that >~>

[@reinbeers5322]

Nah, it's a pretty bad design with that much turbulence.

[@criznittle968]

You must make the updated version of the all-fan PC case, but fully functional and only using custom showdown fans. Major Hardware is the only tech channel that can pull this super-meme off

[@qownson4410]

Contra rotation is really a pandoras box and I fully expect that more fans are going to be made with that design, and optimization in mind, so long as it is made out of abs, smoothed, with mas reduced, it’ll be legendary.

[@XxXshaharXxX]

can you do a video testing each component of the cheater like only the fan, fan + rear, fun + front? let's dissect this thing

[@leftcoastfunk]

i love the fan showdown as much as anyone, and honestly i love to see all the creative ideas - including the big oversized & multi-piece fans. However, I think it would be nice if in addition to just the big "master" results sheet, if the fans could be grouped into those who fit into the same constraints/dimensions of the Noctua and those that don't. I still want to see them, but like...i'm not going to put The Cheater in my case... Thanks for the fun, as always! Hope to see this thing through many many more seasons!!!

[@daxconnell7661]

there is regular crastination, then then there is pro-crastination lol (edit: that blue beast looks like it should be on an outboard motor)

[@SCComega]

I still want to see a competition where it's limited to standard profile fans. Or a separate board for such. I really don't like the oversized designs.

[@EinhanderSn0m4n]

Yeah this contest needs to be forked into a Standard and an Unlimited class.

[@emeraldoracle8706]

Agreed, make it about the blade design not the intake/exhaust channeling. Even though I like the intake scoop that the cheater has, every fan should be able to use it when testing and comparing against it.

[@bleepbloopblahp]

100% A regular el cheapo room fan will beat an a12x25 but it isn't designed to fit in a standard 120mm computer fan spot. All these oversized fans are "cheaters" and it's pointless to compare them to fans designed with the same form factor as an a12x25.

[@oceanbytez847]

@@emeraldoracle8706 probably wouldn't work as well as you think. Keep in mind the fan and diffuser of the cheater were designed to cooperate as a singular unit. Adding a fan that wasn't designed around that won't net the same performance boost or might even be hindered since the fan is moving air one way and the diffuser is moving air another way which might end up conflicting and cancel out to some degree.

[@awesomedude5]

I wanna see a 3rd competition where people just make a front/backs for a12x25. Then I also want to see the best fans with the best front/backs. But it would be a cool mode to slap some plastic on your fans and make them better.

[@clarencedube4853]

The airflow tests are always satisfying to watch.

[@davidjhyatt]

The cheater beater has two design advantages I can see. It has a diffuser (5-8% efficiency gain) and has tighter tolerances between the duct and fan blades. Next is the inlet duct which gives the flow more time to develop. The only design constraint is the power that the noctua motor produces. In fact providing the power draw + rpm characteristics will allow you to solve for optimal fan size. Past that reducing weight of moving parts, correct fin geometry (based on rpm and diameter). The last hurdle is in regards to the 3d print, designing something that prints reliably and has minimal surface roughness. The last little bit of design advice would consider the temperature and barometric pressure but at this mass flow they are probably negligible. Without specifying how to optimize all of these things I hope it gives a roadmap of details to consider. Love the show!

[@VincentNacon]

The size of the Cheater-Beater is just comedy at this point.

[@crisnmaryfam7344]

7:24 you can also see some recirculation going on with this. Its pulling air in from the bottom of the frame in the rear. Where it should be expelling. Ill bet it had an effect on the thermal performance

[@octane613]

How do you feel knowing this is what you're famous for? Frankly I'm jealous. No one has done anything like this before, and it's been an incredibly fascinating journey. I love this series.

[@TwistedAndVertigo]

I wonder how the Noctua would perform if you just add the 2 pieces from the Cheater to it (the outer ring and the bottom piece)! Good Job at creating that competition! Keep the fans spinning :)

[@cbadcruiser]

I laughed at this time stamp 2:20 because I am literally watching this instead of studying for my heat transfer final.

[@Zuxxkij]

i'm convinced Major forgot about the Slug mk2 👀

[@802Garage]

My thinking is that if the Cheater Beater was slimmed down and tweaked a bit, it could perform even better. There looks to be a lot of weight savings to be had.

[@jasonmajere2165]

Missed meme opportunity with the “inconceivable”. All I hear in my head is Wallace Shawn yelling it everytime from princess bride.

[@henninghoefer]

Can we all appreciate the insane quality these smoke shots have gotten to? Especially the side shots are sooo perfect! (Also: The Cheater Beater is the first fan to _really_ beat the A12x25, because it produces higher airflow on less noise - but then again, it's cheating…)

[@christophermorin9036]

I think Florian is onto something. The wider portion around the hub did seem to be accelerating the smoke into the fan blades themselves rather than pulling it into the center. And that put it almost 40cfm over the Mach E that technically had more blade surface area.

[@tomintoxicated]

I love it. Everyone is trying to beat the cheater's record, then the cheater breaks its own record just to solidify its dominance.

[@kimjuddpersonal]

I'd be willing to bet the reason the beater didn't do so hot is because the inner veins were oriented incorrectly in the design (relative to the fan rotation). It seems like they were the main cause of the backflow, likely from the intake air crashing into them rather than being guided through.

[@aethertech]

Four blade bat fan looks like it would have some potential...

[@ingos5233]

I wonder how the standard A12x25 would perform with the "splitter" and velocity stack from the cheater and how the bare cheater fan would perform without them.

[@connerknoth1563]

I am interested in the small details of all of the fans and one thing I notices with the cheater is that because the blades were printed separately from the hub, the layer-line from printing are oriented differently than most other fans. Most fans have the layer lines somewhat perpendicular to the direction of motion, so the air experiences a stair step surface. I think this leads to flow separation along the fan blade surface. The cheater's layer-lines are approximately collinear with the air flow over the surface of the blade. While the surface is still rough, the air in the flow at any given point along the fan experiences no sharp stair steps. To beat the cheater, more fans will need to have separately printed blades to better optimize print orientation.

[@trialbyicecream]

What a great start to the day. Fun fans and the best smoke test song in the world.

[@ofrenegades3185]

"The Greatest Fan We've Ever Seen" is a title that gains prestige by the fan as well Pretty heckin cool lol

[@cpljimmyneutron]

The outflow air on the batfan looks like the video is lagging, weird optical illusion.

[@Llohr]

The largest (not only) problem with the "cheater beater" is pretty obvious. It's shaped like a bowl. Few designers so far have seemed to recognize that fans inherently push air _outward,_ away from the axis of rotation. When that outward-moving air hits a slope, it's going to change direction. In this case, the slope moves outward toward the inlet. That's why we see those puffs of smoke coming out the inlet. Blades that rake forward-toward the direction of rotation, like those of the a12x25-minimize air being pushed outward by forcing it inward. The cheater uses its elaborate casing to perform that function.

[@Drycask]

The Cone intrigued me and its methods are clearly effective . A Cheater sized fan/casing using the same methodology would stand a chance to take down the cheater.

[@אלוןאנגל-ה9ש]

I wonder what would happen if the cheaters design and the little beetle size would be combined

[@Nurhaal]

The Cheater Beater needs a taller plenum to increase air velocity and thus hopefully developed better laminar flow on the housing walls. I'd also consider removing 2 blades from the Fan itself to reduce vortex interference OR, go with 2 more blades that have a less aggressive AoA at the tips.

[@jesse-dg8yx]

Hey, I've watched this series on and off for a while but never really payed attention. Can I ask anyone who wants to reply, if I make a cone like funnel for the front or back of my 140mm fans can I increase the air volume it blows? What's the best angles/dimensions and should it go on the front or the back? Any help is appreciated thanks

[@flushroyal970]

Bat Fan was so stylish ^^ ... I liked it...

[@qownson4410]

The cheater bearer is surprisingly quiet for being fourth place by comparison to all the other fans in that range!

[@brillcomicsandmovies]

It's amazing how a simple device can be designed a countless different ways with massive performance differences.

[@AdelineTurner]

I think next season we should move to the Noctua Industrial PPC 3000 rpm fan as the base to really get some power into these bigger designs.

[@erkinalp]

And govern it to 2000 rpm under full load using a feedback loop

[@TBonerism]

The Cheater Beater looks like it could drop a fin or two and see an improvement in it. I think part of the reason that there is the turbulence in front of the fan is because it is almost bounding off the tops of the fins due to the large number.

[@sirmrmcjack2167]

To beat the cheater a funnel behind the fan is needed in my opinion. Just like the cheater has it, the thing I call funnel makes it so the air can flow even behind the hub which would normally block parts of a cooler. In terms of airflow? Well, I have no clue how it's gonna help with that but I'm sure cooling performance will benefit from it

[@aroventalmav888]

I like this show. One might say I am a fan. As to the cheater, I think it may be keeping it's lead because it's not trying to go big itself. The fan of the cheater just looks like an ordinary fan, the extra parts are to focus the air. Everyone has been trying to beat it by getting their fans bigger without accounting for the increase in mass.

[@sepg5084]

The cheater just has better aerodynamics. The others seem to be trying to brute force it, to no avail.

[@brettleisy356]

a few interesting design choices on the "beater" that actually hold back the idea of a larger fan. the increased mass, the increased hub size takes away useable space, and the "shroud" is terribly designed for airflow.. I wish I understood the 3d printing design process, Id have a field day with designs.

[@sienile]

You should break up the Fan Showdown into 2 groups: ones that fit entirely in the A12X25 frame, and ones that don't. It's nice to see what can be done with the motor, but it's also nice to see what's the most people can get out of a standard form factor.

[@MaNNeRz91]

Surprising no one has made the Porsche rim design. People used to get their tyres changed by inexperienced people who put the wheel back on the wrong sides and it would massively alter the feel of the car as the design was to sweep air in one direction crossways.

[@buzkie314159]

You should add a column in the sheet for whether the fan fits within the standard fan body and could be a direct replacement.

[@Ohio_etsu-masu]

Is there a place we can get the design files of fans presented in the show we can print for ourselves?

[@olafmarzocchi6194]

The cheater beater is however the only one that beats the Noctua in flow while not being louder. Definitely a good design (but ok, it is known that bigger fans produce less noise for a given flow, so not surprising either).

[@ronsamson537]

Got to wonder how much more effective the cheater beater would have been if it was actually aerodynamic instead of being rougher than velcro. I suspect that is where a large amount of the turbulence was coming from. Didnt you display print material in a previous season that you were able to smooth out with some solvent?

[@DMAN699669]

I dare anyone to count how many times he's said Noctua A12x25 up to this point lol, gotta be a high number

[@Fantaman900]

Cheater is designed by someone with fluid flow knowledge. The cheater beater is clearly designed by someone who clearly does not have any of that knowledge. Like most entries it's just wing it! But it's fun to see all different idea's.

[@teardowndan5364]

The problem I'm seeing with the Beater is the housing necking down as air hits the stator. Whatever forward momentum the air gains from the stator converting spin into thrust gets countered by back-pressure from necking down. It could probably benefit from being smaller to reduce the neck-down ratio and allow the fan to spin faster from reduced motor load.

[@RotGoblin]

Starting to feel like we need two divisions, Regular and Cheater. I want to see fans beating the A12x25 within the same margins, personally.

[@tdata545]

I'm guessing the cheater wins due to the fact that there isn't a lot of stress and weight on the bearings unlike the. Also the stem on the Beater, is too long which increases its instability and slows down the fan. THOUGH, this was a good episode. Was impressed by the NOT-Batman fan.

[@extectic]

The clincher for the Cheater is the intake cone. That design accelerates the airflow and directly contributes to the increase, I'd say.

[@alexandermaverick9474]

an off season with a custom hub mount powered by a brushless (one that's meant for mini jets and modelling planes) motor would be really interesting, having all that extra power and seeing what people manage to do with it, not just in terms of cooling, but also with sound!

[@Lazadude]

I wish I had the patience to learn 3d design. People don't seem to realise that it's not the size of the fan that means the "cheater" wins. Its the matching cone and (for lack of a better term) exhaust bits that create the laminar flow. It'd be interesting if any of the top "normal" fans were placed in the cheater housing and what their output would be.

[@EngelsNederfiele]

The more I see the Cheater the more it looks like a bow thruster, in the realms of such engineers have found placing the blades facing inwards inside a large stator produces optimal flow with reduced cavitation. I wonder whether with a bit if creative out of box designing a fan with a low central mass and centre facing fan blade edges can mimic these new type of bow thrusters in pushing air not water...

[@epmcgee]

So The Turk DID design it off of the comic book superhero, and he's using the city as an excuse.

[@MrMCDiggles]

It seems like breaking the 700fpm in this competition is the magic many cannot seem to find.

[@doggothedog7744]

Improving the cheater would be the best route but the improvements would be marginally small. Different or lighter material. Smoother print. I think the blade profiile and blade spacing is already ideal. Maybe a little tweaking would help. They look like a ship prop, which from my experience is the best a slicing and moving water. Not an aero engineer so that might be something worth looking into cuz the medium is air after all. Also maybe conforming the diffuser to the shape of the vortex created by the fan would help exhaust the air faster and air hitting the diffuser walls have less wall friction and deflection. Having a longer shourd and diffuser would help smooth out the air going in and out which would improve things too. Ultimately the limit factor for reaching a higher cfm is the motor if anything else.

[@hanksadventures4132]

So I think people are tackling the cheater the wrong way. Instead of focusing solely on the housing, we must also analyze the fan. It uses a variable pitch fan vs the majority of fans maintaining the same pitch along the entire blade length. I think the best way to beat the cheater is to add more blades with larger diameter utilizing variable pitch blades. The cheater beater was on the right track, but the blades maintained the same pitch. I would submit a fan, but to be honest, I can barely operate my phone. Lol. Just a suggestion for those of you who are more tech savvy than myself.

[@NN1Ckl.]

On a set up like the cheater beater(low power, big fan, small tube)clearance between fan blades and shroud need to be as tight as possible(less backflow). Also, possibly adding a few more blades(blade count should be prime number) to increase blade overlap might help(Also less backflow)

[@longdonpiano]

caugt this 12 second after upload always hyped for a new fan showdown!

[@NemoConsequentae]

Looking at the Cheater Beater, it seems to have a blade design intended for higher static pressure, rather than raw CFM. More blades, overlapping, and a lower angle of attack. A redesign there with higher AoA could potentially move more air and succeed, perhaps? Also the higher mass from the larger diameter means lower RPM...

[@warpedweirdo]

Greater mass doesn't translate to lower RPM, all else being equal. Time to reach top RPM will be greater for a heavier fan, but it will get there.

[@NemoConsequentae]

@@warpedweirdo Good point! The greater surface area of the bladeface, however, does mean higher air resistance, and _that_ will reduce the maximum RPM the motor can drive.

[@Pohtaytohs]

My first thought about the Cheater Beater doing as well as it did was only because of it's larger size. I think the other fans up in the top 5-10 that are a similar size as the rest are well designed fans, and are more likely to perform better than the Cheater if they were placed into the same housing.

[@richardcrawley9530]

Nice video again. Could you do a different series with a more powerful fan motor? I'd love to see more complex designs like the gear fans and larger fans.

[@chrisanderson2368]

I think the hub on this fan is the key. Most other fans have integrated hubs vs the pressfit that the 12/25 hub.

[@eric0w]

Yay!!!! It’s awesome to see my Mach-E GT fan!!!

[@EricSchnabel]

I just love how the Cheater was printed in the color of baby poo.

[@mica4153]

The mach e crash. Man please my sides can’t take this 😂

[@bentlikeitsmaker]

The cheater honestly reminds me of the 3 blade delta 38mm thick fans honestly the thickness with just 5 blades plus all the work put in making it efficient is what did it for him it's amazing how much a difference going from a 25 mm thick to a 38mm thick fan at same rpm is just insane

[@shamancredible8632]

how can fair use apply to batman when for one, everyone knows you didn't invent it, and for two, nobody knows who invented it?

[@sobertillnoon]

So, what if you put the back of the cheater on the beater? What my theory presupposes is that maybe the secret sauce is in the rear ducting and those static fins. Oooh, maybe you could test the cheater with a rear duct that has straight or no static fins. That would probably take a lot of time.

[@DavidFlores-et1ph]

I think only the creator of such a beast can put the same fight to mirror its power or surpass it... I call upon thee, owner of cheater, aerodynamics engineer 🛐

[@nathancallahan7313]

I would love to see the cheater used in separate pieces: the fan by itself, the fan with the shroud, the fan with the back piece, and then maybe the shroud and back with a different fan design

[@jessewalker5413]

i have a question, not sure if it this was previously tested before, How does the cheater perform without the tail section, how much efficiency is lost if any?

[@hovant6666]

low-key making me want to externally mount my fans on my rads sandwiching the case and installing chonky trafficlight cheater housings around them

[@luke_fabis]

I'm not an aeronautics engineer, so take everything I say with a grain of salt, and I could be gravely mistaken. But, it seems to me that the intake on the Cheater Beater has it backwards. It's kind of bowl shaped, which would scoop in a lot of air around the rim and give it nowhere to go, forcing it back out in a turbulent fashion. I suspect it would be better to have it shaped like a horn with a conic section profile to accelerate the gas flow, and then bell out again to make full use of the fan port's diameter. The principle would be similar to a hyperboloid cooling tower or a liquid fuel rocket nozzle, and it's kind of the opposite of how a turbofan engine is structured. I also have to question the role those stator vanes play here. Their purpose is to regain some efficiency by straightening airflow, but they are an obstruction in and of themselves with an efficiency cost of their own. If they're not carefully designed to match the fan blades they interact with, they could potentially worsen efficiency.

[@johnthegiant320]

I don't know why I find this series so interesting, but I do.

[@matthewluttrell9413]

I too should be studying for my heat transfer class...

[@urieelSEptim]

completely new to your channel, but did you already test the Noctua NF-P12 redux? Thats a fan that is optimised for high air flow and should beat the A12x25 in your setup.

[@psiah9889]

The blades on the cheater beater seem to be static pressure optimized, compared to the cheater's airflow. You could probably tweak it for airflow and get better results.

[@ehsnils]

I see that the cheater beater might benefit from some tuning of blade angle, but I also think that it would do better with a stronger motor. After all the motor is dimensioned to cope with the load the original fan puts on it. So with a strong motor with constant RPM the figures would be different.

[@Jsteeeez]

Congrats on 200k subs!