Cooling fans

[waynestewart]

I have a PCIe expansion box that would hold up to 19 cards but it has very few installed. There’s some large noisy fans in it. I’m thinking that with only a few cards I don’t need anything like that amount of cooling. Unfortunately I can’t see any way to unplug one and if I clip the wire it’ll be awkward to reconnect one so the idea of blocking one from turning came up. With larger motors if they can’t turn, they heat up and burn out but I believe I’ve see computer fans that couldn’t turn and nothing bad happens

 

[cheesestraws]

if I clip the wire it’ll be awkward to reconnect one

I've successfully used scotch-lok connectors, the ones with the orange button thing on, for this job.  I was turned onto their usefulness when some Noctua fans I bought to replace some proprietary cooling gubbins came with them and they worked really well, even in a 1U, space-constrained enclosure.  I drop this in for what it's worth.