Pi2AEs Lite on Rpi 4b get hot, need help with cooling solution

[Ride154]

Hi There,

For a year now I have been using Moode Audio on a Rpi 4b with the Pi2Design Pi2EAS Lite on a daily basis.
Great Stuff!!
But recently it came to my attention that the Pi is gettin' too hot and throttling occures.
I have a couple of these fans lying around and would like to use 2 in a push-pull configuration.
But the audio shield is using all the GPIO pins and my soldering skills fall short to use anything on the bottom on the Pi.

https://www.kiwi-electronics.com/nl/vent...search=fan

So my question is, does anyone here have a cool ;-) idea to power the fans at hand?
They are rated as 5V but will also work on 3.3V.
As the Pi2AEs comes with a nice acrylic cas,e I don't want usb's with wires sticking out from every side of the case :-)

Another option would be the fan shim of Pimoroni as there looks to be enough room between the headers but on the bottom of their product site it says

-Because Fan SHIM uses pin BCM18 to control the fan, and this pin is also used by I2S audio devices, you won't be able to use I2S DACs like pHAT DAC, pHAT BEAT, and the IQAudio boards at the same time as Fan SHIM-

So I think this is a no go but would love to hear if this is not a problem.

I contacted Micheal Kelly from Pi2 Design and he responded very quickly to my emails but he has no solution at this moment.
He offered to dig in to it if it was beyond me but I don't want take up too much of his time.
Real nice guy!

What are the 4 pins directly behind the RJ45 connector for?

But I'm hoping someone here can answer my questions.
Thx in advance.

Greetings from Zandvoort,
Menno

[Tim Curtis]

Try taking off the sides of the case to allow air flow.

[Ride154]

Thx, will try that!

[kopas]

I wouldn't worry too much about your Pi throttling as long as it's not impacting performance. You could also get one of those small copper heatsinks for the CPU from amazon, might be enough to keep things under control.

[TheOldPresbyope]

@Ride154 

That acrylic case makes a pretty package but basically it's a coffin for your Pi.

Tim's suggestion to try with the two long side panels (or, better, all four side panels) removed is a good one, especially if you turn the case on its side so the PCBs are vertical. This basically forms a chimney with cool air entering through the bottom and exhausting out the top via natural convection. You'd need some feet on the new bottom, of course. In the end it's no longer as pretty looking a package, I'm afraid.

I'm dubious about the efficacy of the Pimoroni fan shim in this application, even if the side panels are off. Possibly it would fit into the inter-board gap but it looks like there would be remain only a narrow slot between the top of the fan housing and the bottom of the Pi2AEs board, throttling the air flow. YMMV.

For the same reason, I'm not sure how well a passive heat sink would work, although normally they are the first thing I reach for in Pi4B projects. Again, YMMV.

I'm not aware of a heatpipe-based cooler that 1) is readily available, 2) is affordable, 3) is low-profile, and 4) pipes the heat some distance from the source (like the ones found in some laptops) but that would seem to be ideal.

Regards,
Kent

[Tim Curtis]

Passive heat sinks or heat pipes require air flow otherwise they are pretty much useless.

Automatic temperature based CPU throttling in the Pi is meant to be a protection measure. It's not meant to be a normal operating mode. I'd definitely take steps to make sure the operating temp stays below the threshold where the throttling protection kicks in.

Typically just getting good convection air flow over the board will do it but sometimes depending on ambient temperature etc, air flow plus heat sinks are needed, and apparantly for the new Pi-5 the Raspberry Pi guys are recommending (and selling) a good quality active cooler (PWM fan based).

[Ride154]

Hi Guys,

I did as Tim suggested but removed only one side as a test first and that already did the trick.
I removed the side closest to the heatsink and the temp is still below 70 degrees after a weekend.
Thx for the reactions and the help!

GreetingS Menno