MIT recently announced its research on toroidal propellers to create quieter drones. That got [Major Hardware] thinking about noisy PC fans. The obvious solution was to adapt the toroidal shape for a PC fan. He was familiar with the idea from similar screws on boats that are commercially available. You can see his tests in the video below.
The shape of the blades on the MIT drones is visible in video and pictures, but there were no available 3D models. [Major] did a design and 3D printed the blades. Watching the comparison with a conventional fan using smoke was pretty impressive.
The fan appeared to work pretty well, but the stock fan worked better. Oddly, the stock fan was also a little quieter overall, but the MIT-inspired blade was quieter at high frequencies. Static pressures were a good bit less for the new design.
Of course, this was a first attempt so there could be improvements that would help. And, as [Major] points out, flying a drone is a different job than cooling a PC, so these tests don’t really negate the idea that the design may lead to quieter drones.
We looked at the MIT drones earlier. If you don’t want to spin a blade, maybe you could move PC cooling air with a flapping wing.
Spy Drone Propeller Makes for a Quiet PC
Source: Manila Flash Report
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