How dumb is my genius idea?

Mar 13, 2024, 4:23 PM

Our 'server room' at the office is a closet.

I'm wondering if I can set up a small fan to blow hot air from the top of our server room at the office into the plenum space above the suspended ceiling?
Fan would be run on a thermostat (so it kicks in at 85degrees or so) and with a backdraft damper that closes when fan is not running.

This would cost me a grand total of about $40. It doesn't matter if it is ugly AF.

This would be set up along with an A/C unit. I'm hoping the A/C unit wouldn't have to run so much with this vent rig (A/C unit puts off a fair amount of it's own heat, plus introduces moisture into a place I don't want it and uses lots of power).

________________________________________________Roof

|Plenum Space 8 feet tall or so|

__damper on top of duct closes when fan is not blowing
| |
| |______ suspended Ceiling______________________
^^
^^
|Fan|

flag link

military_tech

thumb_down

thumb_up

gfy nerd***

i've only built a couple server rooms

Correct, this is 100% FBC solution. We have an AC unit and it is needed

Just opened the window for Bandito.***

How hot is the room getting and what do you have in there?....

Just seeing this...

As I've been "enjoying" some quality time in a data center for the last few weeks myself. It's been at least 8 years since I was behind a server console for any amount of time. Lets just say this..it takes a while to catch back up.

You didn't say if you are using plenum A/C, or if its ducted, but I'm assuming it's ducted.

Anyway, your idea will work, but you might be better separating the front of the rack from the back with partitions, and blowing the hot air toward the open ceiling in the back. Most, if not all, servers and equipment, if they are rack mounted, suck in cool air in the front, and blow out hot air in the back. If you have "in-air" separated from "out-air", you don't care how hot it is in the back (I mean to an extent), hence the term "hot aisle/cold aisle" when referring to datacenters.

If you can make your own "hot aisle/cold aisle" setup its a lot more efficient than trying to cool ALL the air in server room (or closet).

How dumb is my genius idea?

gfy nerd***

i've only built a couple server rooms

Correct, this is 100% FBC solution. We have an AC unit and it is needed

Just opened the window for Bandito.***

How hot is the room getting and what do you have in there?....

Username checks TF out...

Just remove one panel in the ceiling grid. A border tile would do it.***

I did that, and it got us through the last few months. But in a few weeks it

DOWATM8?***

Just seeing this...

Good info, thanks. I have a fan circulating air to avoid hot spots but hadnt

TigerBoard POTD