Why is there foam tape on my amps heat sink

Hmm well the tape could be for electrical insulation if the heat sink and the panel behind it are at different voltages. The only other idea I have is to control the air flow.. is there a fan or air holes somewhere?

George H.

Thanks for your reply.

If you look at the first picture, there is a black hood to the right of my text. Under the hood is a fan. It doesn't look like the fan actually blows into the heat sink as the other side of the fan appear closed (unless the holes are on the bottom face, which I cant see).

Do you think I should try to replace the tape with something? what?

Geesh, I have no idea. What's it do? You might see if it's an electrical insulator.

You could try your question at sci.electronics.repair

George H.

I have a 10 year old AV receiver that I opened to de-dust. I noticed that on the heat sink there a black foam material running across the top length of the heat sink. The foam looks like double-sided foam tape, but is sticky on one side only.

I'm not sure what the intended purpose of this was, and if I should attempt to repair/replace it with something else as it is cracking off.

I could use regular foam double-sided tape, but imagine that the heat sink get very hot and the tape would get unsticky very quickly.

Any thoughts on why it would be there in the first place, and what to use to replace it.

Some pics:

Thanks

It could be for vibration resistance and/or to prevent the heatsink from shorting against the case.

Shaun

"Zack"

Stopping the lid from vibrating.

... Phil

Presumably, its being there hasn't caused any problem so far, you might not like finding out what it was preventing if it was removed!

I'd go for replacing it with something as similar as I could find.

It obviously cost something to put it there in the first place - the manufacturer probably wouldn't have put it there if they could get away with not doing.

I've found that some people like to cover any identifiable markings/stampings, etc. with the thermal `white paste'. Also when trying to remove the heat sink the `paste' has a tendancy to tear the pins off of cpu's.

I also believe that some people believe that the thermal paste is a magical item that makes heat go away. I just spent half a day scrubbing the wite paste off the back of an aluminum block that I would like to use as a heat sink. It's kinda like bolting a plastic fan to a GPU - yes it moves the air but if the air is hot enough the pastic will melt. I've found it better to direct air or water through the fins; heat usually goes up.

Then again your talking to someone that uses closepins to keep their transformer from vibrating too much :)

I believe this is the general idea - keep it sticky and some people (like myself) usually keep away from it.

To keep something from vibrating or running very hot?

As an indicator? I use the glue gun sometimes to make sure that a heatsink didn't get too hot. It's like wax but comes off very easily with a dab of alcohol.