We have recently talked about how you can Fix problematic fans of Gigabyte Windforce VGAs as the company tends to use cheaper sleeve bearing fans that are more prone to failure when used for GPU mining rigs. Interestingly enough Gigabyte does seem to use multiple suppliers for their Windforce fans and even though on the top the blades of the fans are the same, inside there could be interesting differences. So far most of the RX 400/500 series of GPUs from Gigabyte with Windforce fans that we’ve seen used 2x5x5.5mm metal bushings inside and as we have already mentioned these are easily replaced with readily available ball bearings and you can upgrade your fans to be more durable long term. It is a well known facts that sleeve bearings are much less resistant to higher temperatures and dust than ball bearing fans and as the operating conditions worsen their life span drops significantly.

It seems however that Gigabyte has Windforce fans with larger and not so standard metal bushings as well that cannot be directly replaced with ball bearings as their size is just not as standard. We have stumbled on some Everflow T129215SU fans used on Gigabyte Windforce fans that used 2x8x5mm metal bushings and there are simply no standard bearings that you can use with so small inside hole and so big outer diameter available. So fixing or upgrading these becomes a bit more trickier and you need to either do your own bushings with the right size to replace or use spacers so that you can fit 2×5 size ball bearings inside. We have actually done both of these already and have tried them, but not on Gigabyte Windforce. To our surprise Asus and their STRIX GPU fans turned out to be using crappy sleeve bearing fans instead of better quality and more durable ball bearing fans. The STRIX fans use the same size metal bushing as we’ve discovered in this particular Gigabyte Windforce fans, but we are going to get back with more details about that very soon…