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[Ko'rizna Falco]

Hey all, I don't really know much about electronics in the way I would like. I'm comfortable with soldering, splicing, and connecting electronics. I don't really know how or if something would work though.

So my question is in a simple fan circuit (for a helmet), most  squirrel fans are labeled as 9v or 12v that I see, I know USB is 5v  so my question is if I splice in a fan to a USB cable and plug it into a battery pack would the fan still work? My assumption is that it would work, but would not spin at full speed, is that correct?

I would love your help, I plan on doing some other DIY electronics as I really want to learn so there may be more questions down the road.

[Fi-8015]

The fans will most likely spin at 5V, but very slow. There are squirrel fans rated for 5V, you'll get better results using them.

[Ko'rizna Falco]

Thanks, I'll have to look into them. Do you know where I can find them or where to look? amazon is not producing anything that isn't 12v

[Fi-8015]

I was able to find them on ebay and several electronics stores in Germany.

[FransSacco]

Hi....Look on your laptop and camera wires. You should have a black box on the plug in wire. If this black box says (as most do) that it will accept input of about 5 volts up to 240 volts then you will not need a converter, it is built into the black box and you will have no problems. Most laptops and camera rechargers will have the converter built into them. I have checked my pCB assembly design of chargers and always found it there and it should be there in your case as well.

[MauAbata]

Thanks, I'll have to look into them. Do you know where I can find them or where to look? amazon is not producing anything that isn't 12v

[Edit: OOf, I just checked the dates on the OP and forgot we're now in 2019  . Well, here's some info if anyone else wants some 5v fans!]

If you haven't yet found fans, Amazon carries these which work pretty awesome and are rated at 5v. I've measured them at around 210mA when unrestricted. They're similar fans to the ones used in most TK buckets (I've got them in Phasma).

These will work just fine on a USB power bank, just make sure you get one with enough capacity to run your fans for a reasonable amount of time. The math for that is pretty simple, power banks and batteries are rated in mAh (Milliamp-hours), so divide power rating by fan consumption (210mA) to get runtime. A 2000mAh USB bank, for example, will get you just shy of 10 hours of happy helmet cooling with one of these fans.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0775ZM4DW