Windows 7: Air cooler mods

I have noticed a trend with high end cpu coolers towards multiple fans. An example is the Zero Infinity Free Flow +. I can't help thinking that if you blow air through one heat exchanger and then another that the downstream one cannot work well with hot air entering it. If the centre fan was removed, the gaps at the sides and base were sealed and the outside fans set to blow inwards, the cooling would be improved. The central duct would have a cross sectional area of about 20X120 mm. A cutout in the case side would allow all the heat straight out. The air inside the case would be a lot cooler.

The big problem I see with that is you wouldn't be able to get enough air flow through the exhaust opening to cool the heatsinks. As is, the area of the exhaust is 11.3 cm². With your setup, it would be only 2.4 cm². Trying to force the airflow to make that hard right angle turn would pretty much shut the airflow down, especially since each fan will essentially be blowing into each other.

Even though, with the present setup, the second heat sink is getting preheated air, it will still be able to give up enough heat to that air to allow it to be effective.

Ducting is a good idea and is often done. Usually, a duct is fastened to the exhaust side of the heat exchanger (or fan, if it has one) and is run to either the back of the case or the exhaust fan on the back of the case.

If I understand what you are saying I don't think its a very good idea.
Two outside fans blowing at each other hoping the air coming out will make a quick 90 deg turn and exit is not going to happen. It would cause a huge turbulence dead spot in air flow. I have looked at reviews of that cooler and haven't found a good report yet.

Air flow in a computer is like a old lady on a bicycle path.

Nice and smooth, gently curving, no sharp turns and no bicyclers coming from the other direction to get in her way.

Bit confused without seeing what the set up is.

Surely having the fans all blowing in one direction and ducted into an out blowing case fan would be more logical than blowing the air back makes no sense to me at all.

I'm no mathematician but I make it 24 square cm or 3.68 square inches between two fans which is 10 times your result. The air velocity is too low for the change in direction to be a serious problem. There are several different makes of cooler using this new system. Anyone who knows anything about temperature gradients would understand my point. Perhaps the poor performance of this cooler is an indication of the design flaws.

I don't see why you would want this > [H] < Instead of < [C] >.
If you have both fans pushing air INTO the headsink you are just concentrating warm air against eachother fans pressure. Making the system useless and more prone to heat up.

You are correct about my math; I put the decimal point in the wrong place (I hate old age!). The ratio in areas remains the same however.

I think what he is describing is more of like this:

......... Exhaust.........
..._____^^^_____ ...
...........\ ^ /............
Intake >____< Intake
............CPU............

lol hope that came out right...

Seems like as long as there is even pressure, the air would be exhausted out of the case effeciently. Only thing I could see wrong with this is that it is more of a mod than most people would want to go through. It would require a case mod and a custom duct for the depth of case and type of cooler.

Checkout the Zero Infinity Free Flow+, the dimensions of the gap are even better for airflow: 130mmwide by 25mm across or 32.5 sq.cm, 5 sq in. I always try to get hot air out of the case as quickly as possible unlike the purveyors of self contained watercooling who recommend blowing air into the case through the radiator which cools the cpu nicely but leaves the case full of hot air for the graphics card to use.