Lapping

Geoff

VIP Member
Yes people have, although I haven't personally. Check around Google, I know there are several great guides out there.
 

royalmarine

New Member
ive lapped everything i could get my hands on!

my advise is buy a lapping kit with some good grit level's.

get an old cpu and an old cooler and practice 1 or 2 times before attempting on something valuable.
 

voyagerfan99

Master of Turning Things Off and Back On Again
Staff member
What exactly is lapping? What does it to? Wikipedia did not help me too much.
 

StrangleHold

Moderator
Staff member
We used to do it all the time and have contest to see who could get it the flatest and the most like a mirror. In reality it just gets you a few degrees at most and allows you to use less compound. But unless you do the heatsink and CPU heat shield both your wasting your time.
 

StrangleHold

Moderator
Staff member
What exactly is lapping? What does it to? Wikipedia did not help me too much.

Short version, you sand down starting with heavy grit down to fine grit, to get the CPU Shield and heatsink as flat as possible then as smooth as possible to have the most metal to metal contact you can for better heat transfer.
 

sniperchang

New Member
What exactly is lapping? What does it to? Wikipedia did not help me too much.

Basically sanding and polishing the contact area of an heatsink to have a mirror finish. It decreases microscopic fissures/holes to increase the surface area in contact with the CPU for better cooling.

EDIT:

Short version, you sand down starting with heavy grit down to fine grit, to get the CPU Shield and heatsink as flat as possible then as smooth as possible to have the most metal to metal contact you can for better heat transfer.

That was a photo finish! :)
 

jgotfire

New Member
I was always told not to go to a mirror finish. I was told that having a little bit of the scratches (form the sand paper) is better. Also that when lapping to put the processor and the heat sink with the scratches going in different directions.

I do own a lapping jig that someone built for me. I lap with 400, 600, 800, 1,000, and 1,500 wet dry sand paper. I know that some people go all out and go with 2,000 and then 2,500. There are mixed thoughts of how far fine to go with lapping. Most of the time lapping to 1,500 will drop about 7* on idle.

I never lap a processor until it has run for 3 months.
 

just a noob

Well-Known Member
if you get a good lap on the processor and heatsink it reduces temps and amount of cpu compound needed P.S. typing on a psp is pretty friggin' hard lol
 

lion149

Member
From what ive been reading on the web its seems to drop temps about 5-10% in most cases. That seems worth it to me, i might have to give this a try
 

lovely?

Active Member
10% is pushing it. i would say just a few degrees. hell, reseating it could make more of a difference than lapping.
 
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