Bitcoin Forum

Has anyone here ever tried cleaning hashcards or so with Supersonic cleaning unit? I've just recently stumbled upon this and would really like to try, but if anyone has some experience or pictures from before that would be nice.

I recently watched a vid on youtube and the guys from “bits be trippin” uses an ultrasonic cleaner to clean gpus. Works well apparently. Bot sure what settings or fluid he uses though

Edited the quote...
Ultrasonic cleaners work great for just about anything. Fluids can be distilled water with or without a few drops of soap, most solvents inc alcohol, ect.

Do be aware that anything that has been glued MAY separate if it is not a very strong bond.

You sure can, but why would you do that? I don't see any economical benefit in doing this, those ultrasonic cleaners suck a whole ton of power and distilled water isn't that cheap, I mean if your hash boards got to the point where a normal air dusting or a brush (in the worst case) can't make them clean enough to operate then they are probably outdated anyway, also there isn't really any hidden places where a brush can't reach, there is no oil or any of that hard-to-remove to stains that require ultrasonic cleaner, plus the risk of removing glued parts as NFW mentioned.

cant you just run them through a dishwasher? ive run countless keyboards and motherboards through standard dishwashers. gpus too but i remove the hsf of course.

Ultrasonic cleaners vibrates at a certain frequency which helps to free up the dust and stuff AFAIK and they're much safer than using dishwasher because they wouldn't have any free ions or salts if you're using distilled water. I could see a problem with the components rusting if they're not dried properly.

I really wouldn't let mine touch water though, giving it a good compressed air does the job well enough. And I don't have to worry about anything shorting out.

i generally do a quick rinse with distilled water or 90% iso after the dishwasher (doesnt take much). then air dry in front of a fan for like a week. im generally not in a hurry.

We have used compressed air, but would like to expand our knowledge on this topic - compressed air just isn't effective and efficient enough. That's why I'd like to hear if anyone had used Ultrasonic cleaning on hashcards.

This is larger scale so compressed air is good but not optimal.

What I'm worried about on e.g S9 hashcards is that the heat sinks would detach from the cards from time to time.

If you never try then you will never know, I can tell you one thing about S9 hash boards, the thermal paste they used to glue those heatsinks is SUPER strong, you will need a ton of heat or a hammer to take them off, some guys run their S9s above boiling temperature and have no problems whatsoever, so my semi-educated guess is that it will be safe on the S9, on the other hand, it will be extremely dangers to attempt this on the all the 17 series, heatsinks literally fall form nothing due to the terrible quality of solder Bitmain used on those gears.

As far as compressed air, I am not sure what is your definition of effective, I owned, bought, sold a truckload of mining gears, 100% rely on compressed air for cleaning, and mind you, temps here go above 40c in the summer and things have always been under control as far as temps are concerned, of course, you wouldn't be using compressed air cans (those are very expensive) just get a small-sized air compressor or a strong blower, and the trick is to blow against the default airflow, so remove the fans and force air from the exhaust to the intake, use a brush if some hash boards are super dirty.

While ultrasonic cleaning is without a doubt more effective, from an economical standpoint, it really isn't worth it.

Good luck.

We've tested Ultrasonic cleaning on some hashcards and this is our results, fun experiment with good results so far - literally 30 seconds on each side.
Card is currently drying, this card was marked as dead and non functional after 2 test processes (testing and compressor cleaning) - excited to see if it works fine after this method.

Has anyone else tested something similar with some good results?

https://i.imgur.com/jhLj4ke.jpg

Of course the board is now sparkling clean. You do know that all PCB's and their components go through through ultrasonic cleaning at several points as part of the manufacturing processes right?

As to if it will fix anything - maybe. Biggest help is that components will run a bit cooler when not covered in dirt.

  Base on my experience on how to clean hashcards is  to use dry wipes, and never put some liquidation and avoid to touch the micro chip so that the micro chip will malfunction.
 
  Otherwise put in secure card holder the hashcards to make it safe.

At first I thought it was a joke.. maybe I should try with some legacy hardware first. Thanks for sharing it, never had this idea ! Is it really necessary to rinse afterwards with distilled water?

 How did you come up with using the dishwasher in the first place?

i do, distilled water or iso rinse is so no residue is left behind (minerals, salts ets that may be in regular tap water).

i was a smoker the only way to clean that residual smoke was iso alcohol or a degreaser and rinse. did some web searching and found that, in general,  low voltage solid state electronic devices are remarkably tolerant of water as long as power is off and its completely dry when power is applied.

definitely try on some old expendable stuff 1st. not responsible for damage etc if you try it and you kill it. i am an internet rando after all.

Back in the 1980's we used to ultra-sound completed pcb's in TCE, but I think its been banned, got to find something equivalent; We also made thick-film pcb on ceramic's, before dipped we would ultra-sound, problem now is the solvents that worked back in the day, now what?

Another thing to remember is the ultra-sound was one time solvent, basically to clean the weld-joints, and get ready for final encapsulation, I don't think it would be wise to repeat a n solvent ultra-sound over&over on a pcb, you would cause lots of problems with the components over time

Some people just use water, u could always just use dish-soap warm water , then its not likely to kill the components, just make sure you dry well

IMHO most of the problem is just dust-bunny's forming on the volt-reg chips, which get super hot, static electricity, build giant dust bunny's, which just need to be blown away, if u don't clean say every 3 months, then cards get hot and magic smoke; That's how I know its cleaning time when I see a 2-3C rise in temp on the boards, so I know its cleaning time.

normal pcb cleaning is mostly just removing the flux, which can be conductive, but your card is/was clean when you bought it, not sure why  your cards are getting 'soiled' as usualy its just dust that needs to blown away, an air-filtration system in the mining-rooms help catch the airborne dust

I personally don't solvent-clean my pcb's unless I have done work to them, e.g. remove flux

I have a large ultra-sound tank, mostly just gets used to clean my wifes jewelry; when I solvent clean my boards, I only clean the area that got covered in flux, if they needed repair

That's how the chip industry cleans their wafers, using $1M USD dish-washers.

Yes, either that or a final rinse with IPA (isopropyl alchol). As said earlier, tap water usually contains minerals and salts along with whatever was used in the detergent you use. The final rinse removes the remaining residue.

Just a little PSA - ultrasonic cleaner with IPA is not advised for general people, since those probably don't have a blast proof tank.

Just stick to distilled water. The low flash point of IPA and the large amount of fumes produced when ultrasonic cleaning stuff with IPA aren't a good mix if you value the stuff in and around your ultrasonic cleaner  ;D