saturn wrote:

I would not even bother oiling it or replacing the bearings or anything.

Same.

I once had a nice PSU that I wanted to keep, but the fan had completely locked up.

Some PSUs have some sort of fan connector, but iirc it was a bit larger as I remember having trouble replacing the jammed up fan, but this is one way.
In the end I just added a fan adapter to one of the molex connectors and somehow had it run back into the PSU to power the replacement fan and it worked perfectly 😁
Only thing is to be careful not to unlodge the cable running back into the PSU. And I did make sure that inside the PSU nothing could go wrong like the cable running to the fan touching something hot or anything.

I know it's not very professional, but I'm no professional so I just did it this way 🤣

D

I replace the fan. Many PSUs fans have two wires directly soldered to the board... I just cut them and twist the wires of the new fan to connect it.

I clean them and re-lube them if possible. It's easy and keeps plastic out of landfills. It's also a good opportunity to blow all the accumulated crap out of your PSU and inspect the caps. If you discharge the PSU and are careful, you can even use a small paintbrush to dust it further.

I usually replace dead PSU fans; only time I revived one was in an SFX power supply that had an odd-sized, low profile fan. Took the sticker off, cleaned and relubed the bearing, then turned it by hand until it moved freely. Alas, it only lasted 2 more years before it got very noisy again; the owner just trashed it.

Surprisingly this topic has come up here before many times. Here are a few that I found:

Cleaning a PSU fan
Power Supplies And Age?
IBM PS1/pro maintenance and IDE led
Thermaltake Silent Purepower 480W PSU - can you change the fans?
Change PSU fan - is it possible?

I'd change the fan if it was the only problem with the unit, but the fan has never yet been the first thing to go wonky on me. Unless they were crappy when new, then they got switched out right away.

Splicing wires is easy enough. Soldering the old fan's wires to the new fan's spots is nice and clean too. I've also come across fan headers that lifted off the board without much force at all and exposed the pins well enough for a 3-pin connector.

Normally, I will add oil to cheap fans and keep running them. But with a PSU I'd be more inclined to replace with a fan from some quality OEM (Delta, Nidec, NMB, Panaflo etc). I really don't want a PSU running fanless when the cheapie seizes up.