Overclocking and Air Cooling the WRT54G
*Read Disclaimer At Bottom of Page Before Beginning*
I decided that if I was going to overclock the CPU and increase output power on my WAP54G and WRT54G using DD-WRT I might as well put some active air cooling. I also read at Bitsum.com a listing of CPU frequencies overclocked on the WRT54Gv4 and cooling methods.
Now, I did this after having played Halo CE for 7 hours and was a little groggy. For some reason mods that WORK (I said work, not look good) happen when I am on Vicodin or groggy.
For this project we will need:
First remove all power sources from the router. Don’t want anybody getting shocked now. Then remove the antennas. Using some force pull apart the front section from the back section. There might be an easier way but I just use brute force. It gets the job done for me.
Once the unit is disassembled remove the back-half top plastic piece by sliding it to the rear. Once it is removed you should have what I have in the picture below. Cut out the center grid with the box cutter. A Dremel too is MUCH better for this but I still haven’t replaced mine from 2005. Place the fan on top of the lid, measure the screw holes, then drill them out.
Attach the fan to the top with two screws (opposite corners). Run the power wire next to the fan’s outer housing and into the top plastic section (ignore the front attached housing shown in the picture).
Set the top half aside and continue to disassemble the router.
Remove the two screws from the mainboard and slide in direction of arrows. Lift the mainboard up and flip it over to expose the underside.
At this point go ahead and plug in the soldering gun. Let it heat up. BE VERY CAREFUL!
Put the bottom section back together (reverse steps): Slide mainboard on bottom plastic, put screws in, etc. Reassemble the unit WITH THE EXECPTION of the front of the router. Leave that off for now. Attach the upper section.
Once you have your soldering gun heated up wire the black fan wire to the negative voltage and red fan wire to the positive. If you are SURE (hence the multimeter) that you have it wired properly, without shocking yourself, plug in the transfer and power to the board. The fan should run. If it does unplug it, if not reseat your wires.
Go ahead and re-attach all the plastic housing pieces at this point. You might run into a power with the main board/lower half sliding completely into the upper half. If you do look at the rear and make sure no wires are in front of the Ethernet ports or power plug. If they are use a smalls screwdriver or non-sharp object and push the wires behind the yellow circled section.
Attach the antennas and anything else you left off. Plug in the power and voila: you have a massive fan (completely overdone) on your WRT54G.
To get a general idea of the sound (sorry for the ambient background noise) there is a small video.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Fva9_6I8is]
For a much, MUCH sexier fan mod check out this guy’s mod at http://gallery.bcwireless.net/gallery/v/Hardware/radios/album09/. It looks REALLY professional.
*Disclaimer: I’m not responsible for any damages caused by following the steps that I have posted. Follow these steps at your own risk. You ARE dealing with electricity so use MUCH CAUTION!
Leave a Reply