The chamber fan is pretty noisy at 100%. Am considering getting a Noctua fan to replace it. There are some Noctua fans that run on 24V, a 120mm one, and a 140mm.
Had anyone had experience replacing these fans?
You could just edit a filament profile to run the fan at 50%, which seems more than adequate most times. This is what I do. I’m not convinced that replacing the fan will accomplish much.
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I have found that 70% is the sweet spot for noise. Falls in with the motor noise.
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Noctuas are much more silent than standard fans so from my experience I would reckon the difference will be significant if not running at full speed continuously.
Noctuas are quiet, to be sure, but in part because they move less air, turning more slowly, than the noisier fans.
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Yes but also they have a better, efficient and noise reduction optimized design. What counts is achieving the required cooling performance with as less noise as possible.
My X1 does yet have to arrive but if the fans prove to be terribly loud I’ll almost certainly replace them with Noctuas and am almost certain that the result is going to be worth it. 
will post here if I do.
Pushing and Pulling the air through those tiny holes will always cause noise, doesn’t matter if you put by design a silent fan in it.
At 70% you only hear the noise caused by the air pushed trough the tiny holes.
Also, the part cooling fan is anyway at 100% when you need the chamber fan… and this will be thr loudest.
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You make a good point on the “pushing through the holes” part. It’d be nice if I could easily compare the two, but swapping out the fan would be irreversable if I wanted to make use of the 4-wire pigtail.
But I disagree with you on the comparison; the chamber fan is way louder than the part fan.
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I agree on that when you leave the chamber fan on 100% - I compared it to 70% where it still moves enough air to keep the chamber „cool“ and is ± on the same level as the part cooling fan in noise.
Also, removing the totally useless filter helps a lot to reduce noise of the chamber fan.
For PLA and PETG you don’t need the filter and for ABS and co you want a high chamber temperature with no airflow and therefore the chamber fan will be off.
(what a design fault btw…)
Oh, in that case yes.
It’s not only about the noise. Those Noctua fans are fantastic for quiet AND airflow as well. So, for example, with the stock fan you can move XXX amount of air, you’ll be able to move the same amount of air at 60% with the Noctua fan.
You pay a premium for a reason… That being said, be careful what you’re doing because you don’t wanna voyeur warranty. These printers are still relatively new and a lot of things can go wrong. You want the Bambu support staff to be able to support you without any warranty void issues standing in your way.
Also, in terms of pushing and pulling the air through the holes, that’s a very low percentage of the noise you’re hearing. Most of the noises from the actual fans operation.
I’m not sure that’s correct, but that’s easy to test the next time I take the back off the X1C. I’ll keep you posted!
I have known Noctua since the very beginning of them - I know what their fans are capable of.
And I know they can have a higher CFM with less noise, but believe me, the “hole design” of the “fan guard” will always cause most of the noise if you are using a fan with a proper static flow pressure.
And again, if you reduce the fan speed of the original chamber fan, it will not be the loudest part of the printer anymore, so the Noctua will be useless.
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Trust me when I say that I appreciate your experience and your opinion.
My opinion is also based on experience so until someone tests it with a sound meter, we can assume that we both have a valid opinion. Lol.
It’s simple physics…. anything which is blocking an airflow will cause noise. Believe it or not.
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My two cents:
The only way I could think to have the same airflow with less noise would be IMHO to use a bigger fan with a bigger fan duct.
When I want to achieve same airing with less noise, I always found that using bigger fans (or thicker) is the way to go when it is possible, but it is not always possible.
The reason is quiet easy to understand, they move a lot more air at a lower RPM.
EDIT : …and the air is going slower but with a bigger surface wich result in the same total aireflow
I say just cut it out and put a less restrictive mesh of some sort or a PC fan wire cover
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That, I think, is going to have the biggest impact.
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Running fan at 90% drastically reduces the noise, I run it at 60% for PLA with great success. You can modify the gcode per filament to set the fan speed automatically. I wouldn’t change the fan for the noise, it’s just not going to give you much.
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I’m running mine at 65% in the Gcode, have the filter and it’s access door removed. Like this it’s noise level is just below the rest of the rig for me.