Fans on amps.


Ive been checking out some posts about fans by amps but cannot find anything about them being good or bad for the amps. This is what I would like to know. Ok. I have a Krell Fpb 600 and I listen to my music about a 28-30 volume on my ARC Ref 6 which is pretty loud most of the time depending on recordings. Tonight I felt my amp like a lot of times and felt very hot like u could fry an egg on top. This is the normal with a few hrs of listening. Anyway I put a fan on the right side of amp and about a half hour later I checked the right side and was significantly cooler I mean like a night and day difference between the right and left top and heat sinks. I was wondering if adding 2 fans one on each side to cool the amp down would do more harm than good. Would I get more life out of the amp with fans ? Or are amps designed like that without using fans and just heat sinks to get rid of the heat. Btw my amp has plenty of ventilation as it is on the floor. Thanks. 
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Showing 1 response by jerroldls

I use a Bryston, in the 4B series at 300 w/c. It sits on the lower shelf of an antique Chinese piece of furniture. The rest of the gear is above it on a second shelf. Not much room for convection air circulation. What I did was utilize a pair of 4" computer case fans (Antec btw). They are 12v and dead quiet. I did some minor insulation on the fan frame so it does not make direct contact to the wood shelf. I was able to power the fans from my Bryston Pre Amp power supply. The pre amp turns on the amp using the Bryston trigger feature and when it does the fans come on as well. Even slight air movement will aid most amp cooling. My point is that there are many computer grade quiet fans available and most can run off any run of the mill wall wart ps. I recommend looking at them as a solution for air movement. Oh ya their costs are very low as well.