NoNothing
Well-Known Member
I finaly decided to get a stir plate together since I had most of what I needed already. I know I saw a post here before by (name escapes me) and it was a great tutorial! He put the motor inside a cigar box if I remember right. I dont have a cigar box, and not many shops up here in the UP, so I went to wal mart and got what I could.
The list of mats is as follows:
Container, I used a Sterilite small 3 drawer container, I will only use the top drawer.
Motor, Im using a 120mm computer fan.
Magnets, I pulled these suckers out of a hard drive.
Power, Some on the website built circuits, now Im good with computers, but Im lazy, I used a AC-DC power converter from Wal Mart
How to get the magnets out of the hard drive:
Take the hard drive apart, this can be a bit hard. I had to use Torx 8 drivers to remove the casing, you could ofcourse just drill out the screws. Once you have the case open, the magnets you want are in the actuator. Remove the big peice of metal in the corner of the hard drive, that has the magnets you want in it. As a quick side note, if you have a REALLY old hard drive (I had a 240MB hard drive) they may only have one magner, you will need 2, I had to take apart an old 60GB to get the 2 I needed. To get the magnets off the metal bits they are on you will need to take 2 pairs of pliers and bend the metal so it forms a U shape. This will give the magnet less surface area to grab onto and it will come right off.
Preparing the power
As I said before, I am cheap and lazy. I could have made a circuit and used a pot to dial in the speed, but this handy peice of equipment I picked up from walmart will do just fine.
Computer fans run on 12v, so I will set the adapter to 12v when I run it at full speed. The fan I have has LEDs on it that I think Im going to just pull out later, could get annoying. It also has a speed control on it, High, Medium, and Low, I can use that to adjust the speed, I can also change the voltage of the regulator. This sucker only cost me $12 at Wal Mart, pretty good deal for minimal wire work. I have cut the ends off of the adapter and the fan. The fan will only spin one way, and the wire with the white line on it connects to the red wire, and black to black. I am going to solder these together but its not a nessesary step. Keep in mind the fan blows towards the side that has a 'frame' the side with the logo sticker on it. Which in my case, will be 'down'.
Applying the magnets
Getting the magnets centered is pretty important. I put a nickel on the very middle of the fan, and glued up my magnets and set them down. It doesnt matter which side of the magnet is up or down, both top and bottom of the magnets EACH have a north and south pole on either side.
The list of mats is as follows:
Container, I used a Sterilite small 3 drawer container, I will only use the top drawer.
Motor, Im using a 120mm computer fan.
Magnets, I pulled these suckers out of a hard drive.
Power, Some on the website built circuits, now Im good with computers, but Im lazy, I used a AC-DC power converter from Wal Mart
How to get the magnets out of the hard drive:
Take the hard drive apart, this can be a bit hard. I had to use Torx 8 drivers to remove the casing, you could ofcourse just drill out the screws. Once you have the case open, the magnets you want are in the actuator. Remove the big peice of metal in the corner of the hard drive, that has the magnets you want in it. As a quick side note, if you have a REALLY old hard drive (I had a 240MB hard drive) they may only have one magner, you will need 2, I had to take apart an old 60GB to get the 2 I needed. To get the magnets off the metal bits they are on you will need to take 2 pairs of pliers and bend the metal so it forms a U shape. This will give the magnet less surface area to grab onto and it will come right off.
Preparing the power
As I said before, I am cheap and lazy. I could have made a circuit and used a pot to dial in the speed, but this handy peice of equipment I picked up from walmart will do just fine.
Computer fans run on 12v, so I will set the adapter to 12v when I run it at full speed. The fan I have has LEDs on it that I think Im going to just pull out later, could get annoying. It also has a speed control on it, High, Medium, and Low, I can use that to adjust the speed, I can also change the voltage of the regulator. This sucker only cost me $12 at Wal Mart, pretty good deal for minimal wire work. I have cut the ends off of the adapter and the fan. The fan will only spin one way, and the wire with the white line on it connects to the red wire, and black to black. I am going to solder these together but its not a nessesary step. Keep in mind the fan blows towards the side that has a 'frame' the side with the logo sticker on it. Which in my case, will be 'down'.
Applying the magnets
Getting the magnets centered is pretty important. I put a nickel on the very middle of the fan, and glued up my magnets and set them down. It doesnt matter which side of the magnet is up or down, both top and bottom of the magnets EACH have a north and south pole on either side.