Banana pi R3 fan with PWM

#54

That’s a shame… My script simply sets GPIO8 high/low and that sets the SATA 12v on/off. But I do have another script which actually generates PWM using core-utils sleep #!/bin/sh

function gpiopwm() {
    sleep_low=$(awk -v freq="$2" -v duty="$3"  'BEGIN{print (1/freq)*((100-duty)/100)}')
    sleep_high=$(awk -v freq="$2" -v duty="$3"  'BEGIN{print (1/freq)*((100-(100-duty))/100)}')
    echo "low $sleep_low high $sleep_high"
    var_count=0
    repeat=1000
    while [ $var_count -lt $repeat ]
    do
    echo 1 > /sys/class/gpio/gpio$1/value
    sleep $sleep_high
    echo 0 > /sys/class/gpio/gpio$1/value
    let var_count=var_count+1
    if [ $var_count -le $repeat ]
    then
            sleep $sleep_low
    fi
    done
}

echo 419 > /sys/class/gpio/export
echo out > /sys/class/gpio/gpio419/direction
lastcpu=0
duty=15
gpiopwm 419 20 10
echo "finished 10"
gpiopwm 419 20 90

Already tested, It works great. The frequency is not that high . All you have to do is to connect the SATA 12V to the fan VCC, no need to connect anything to the pwm input

#56

Hallo Dale, yes of course NC! I should have seen this! Thanks :+1:

I found R318 on the backside:

12V%20Fan

Next days, i will solder it. But before I have to gather some courage. :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

#57

Just make sure you remove R317 first or else you will see fireworks

#58

Hi AntonyFI

thanks for the “sensors”-command. Without you i could not check my W-Lan chip temperature!

What are you using for cooling? -> single heat sinks or one big heat sink?

I made a short overview:

W-Lancooling

For my temperature deviation i have an explanation. This could be the bad placed holes in the metal heat sink. If the values are right the CPU temperature is lower than the W-Lan chip temps. :roll_eyes:

But for your problem … i have no explanation.

If someone else has temp readout commands for the other chips (exept cpu and w-lan) -> I’m very interested!

#59

All these context switching does affect the CPU. nothing serious but still… I rather do that in kernel space. @dangowrt , is it absolutely impossible to change the PWM pin to GPIO_8 using the dts? the alterative would be to write a simple kernel module

changing the pins in pinctrl-mt7986.c should work, right?

#60

No the hardware only allows PWM0 to be assigned to pin 21 (PWM0), PWM1 can only be mapped to either pin 22 (PWM1) or pin 20 (GPIO_15):

The pinctrl-mt7986.c driver reflects the capabilities of the hardware, there is no point in making changes to this driver, it will not help you.

Why is it so important for you to be that specific pin?!

#61

I see… It is indeed there in the reference manual. unfortunately I didn’t see in the manual any IO mux that could help me as well.

I want to use GPIO_8 because it’s the SATA_PWREN line that enables SATA_12V. it allows me to have a controllable 12v pin for the fan

#62

Why not use a mosfet module on any of the available gpio pins on the gpio header? No need to solder on the board. Like this one, it is not very expensive:

mosfet @ aliexpress

Ha1930cf6bf8d448489ff614f33d5a8e0u

And get the 12V, soldering on a cable like this:

H89ad0d926f3542e38d0c48891e079096w

#63

Thanks, I know I have many options to solve this problem with additional hardware/connectors, but I wanted to try a software solution.

All I need is a timer. I bet it can be done easily in kernel space.

#64

Hello, this is my first post on this forum. I want to share my experience. I did some tests using small heatsinks on chips and the open case. I get the following readings from internal sensors in standby (no devices connected on WiFi) with a room temp of 20C:

phy0 2.4Ghz -> 68C phy1 5Ghz -> 43C

On the SoC the reading by internal sensor is 45C.

The temperatures detected with a thermal scanner (my bet was 3-4C low) are:

on 2.4Ghz -> 37.1C on 5Ghz -> 40.5C

On the Soc I get 45.5C.

It seems to me that the SW reading by sensor on 2.4Ghz chip is not so correct.

#65

Please report this on

#66

Is it possible to read temp of wifi-chips directly from sysfs?

Edit: found possible solution here

cat /sys/class/ieee80211/phy*/hwmon*/temp1_input
#67

Done! I hope this can be checked.

#68

Link to issue: https://github.com/openwrt/mt76/issues/729

#69

First of all, thank you for the many helpful comments which helped me with my decisions.

In my setup, I deactivated the wifi chip by unloading the mt7915e module, because I don’t need it. This dropped the heat development a bit. I only use the Banana Pi as a gateway for my 1GBit fiber optic connection for netflow traffic analysis.

To do this, I glued individual heat sinks to each chip with thermally conductive adhesive. All packed in a metal case. Drilled a hole in the cover and inserted a 5V PWM fan.

This usually runs at the lowest inaudible speed and is controlled by pwm. The temperature of the CPU is 26°C in a performance/stress test and the SFP connector is 36°C.

here is my part list:

Metal case: https://de.aliexpress.com/item/1005004885309544.html

SFP Transceiver Modul: https://www.fs.com/de/products/20140.html

Heat Sink: https://amzn.to/3j1ojQy

Fan: https://amzn.to/3D0pCGk

Fan grille: https://amzn.to/3Xrec6R

Thermal adhesive: https://www.webshop-innovatek.de/waermeleitmittel/waermeleitkleber/701/high-silver-waermeleitkleber-2x-4-g?number=501909-01

index1 index2 index3

3 Likes
[BPI-R3] Running Hot
#70

What is the OS? I have also 5V Noctua with PWM and the fan runs for just 5 second during boot and stops after that. What is the reason about that? Thank you.

#71

i guess your board does not reach the temperature where fan is activated :slight_smile:

#72

to activate pwm, you have to call

echo 1 > /sys/class/thermal/cooling_device0/cur_state

and my OS is lates openwrt trunk… but it does not matter for pwm.

2 Likes
#73

That’s the answer I was looking for. Thank you!

#74

Possible hw improvement would be adding a switch like bootswitches in v1.0 for R317/R318 to select fan voltage without soldering.

@sinovoip is this possible?

I’ve only seen heatsinks with fan and 43mm hole pitch using a 12v fan…no 5v fan. Ordered 2 5v pwm fans and heatsinks without holes to drill holes and cut a thread.