How to keep my stack of Adcoms cool...

Ive seen alot of telecommunication racks use a passive ventilation system that works rather well, seeing as how delicate the electronics are.

Take some aluminum plates that will fit snug in the rack flush side to side. bolt the front of the plate about 2 inches above the the front of the adcom unit, and the rear of the plate about 4 inches above the unit. (doesent have to be exact, but you want it sloping backwards to pull the heat away.

when the heat rises it will be pushed out to the back of the cabinet and away from the gear.

Of course, you will need vents in the back of your cabinet for this heat to escape.

This method works better than people would expect.
Like i said, this technique is used in alot of communication racks with hundreds of thousands of very delicate electronic circuitry.

I think this passive method works better than the fans do, as the fans will either pull from above or from below, but either way whatever gear is at the end with the "Pulling" fan will get plenty of heat.

You could always couple this with a single fan placed at the bottom of the cabinet and have it blow up and slightly towards the door, providing cool air in the front that will help reduce the heat as well.

Careful with the heat dude.
I fried 2 dvd players because the reciever i was using was such a powerhouse it generated alot of heat.

personally i like open air racks the best. less to worry about. lot more dust though

Peace!

Yeah, don't put them inside cabinets. All right, you probably didn't want to hear that, but that's the answer. Fans might help somewhat, if they're positioned in a way that really circulates air over and past the amps. (But if both intake and outflow are in the back, they won't do that!) But fundamentally, heat-generating electronics do not belong inside wooden boxes. I'd consider getting a separate rack for them and tucking them in a corner somewhere.

Both good responses. However, the entertainment center option was a compromise solution, taking spousal approval factors into consideration. I am probably stuck with the unit (and it's fairly nice, for what it is). I am currently thinking about trying to re-engineer the door hinge so that it can be laid/slid flat with the side of the unit when open.

In the meantime, I plan on adding some ventilation holes at strategic locations. Hmmm, maybe just one fan, sucking air out near the top rear of the cabinet, with ventilation holes at the bottom near the front (underneath the amps, facing the floor, so you won't see it).

Still, I'd need to find a very quiet fan that still moved a good bit of air...

Thanks for the advice, Tom.

You can't get around the fan in a closed rack. However, try putting the amps on the bottom of the rack near the floor. Don't play with the 555 when its gets hot it shuts down. Their are also passive chimney designs. The first guy responding was describing a type. Most are pretty unsightly.

I'm building a closed cabinet for my equipment but it has a fan that exhaust out the back.

if you DO decide to put a fan in to suck the air out, you might want to locate it in the middle of the back instead of the top. cause then it will pull all the heat to the top