Cooling Fan Question / AV Gear in a tight rack

[LoungeRat]

Hey folks,

I have a Sony ES 7.1 Receiver that I'm putting into custom shelving (and a Blur Ray, HD Cable box, etc) I built into the side of my fireplace. Out of necessity we built the shelves just barely past the sides of the equipment. The distance vertically is adjustable, but I'm still worried about heat. The ventilation is on the bottom and top of the unit, but even though the shelves will be open in the back, it's only opening into a small crawl space just big enough to squeeze into to hook up cables...not big enough to disperse a lot of heat.

My question is - even though I'm not covering up any of the receiver's venting - would I want to be considering adding some type of additional fan just because it's in a fairly tight area? Initially I thought about installing a rackmount fan at the back of the cabinet, but I'm not sure if the noise would be an issue, or if it's even needed.

You suggestions and advice would be very much welcomed.

I haven't posted enough that they'll let me put pictures up yet. Sigh. What a bunch of hoops it is to be on a message board.

 

[Rickster71]

The idea is to take advantage of heat's need to rise, and exhaust it up and out.

Get a thermometer and put it above the receiver and see how warm it gets.
Compare the temps with all the gear cool, to temp at the end of a loud action movie.

A fan won't help much if it's just blowing hot air around in a confined space.
If you have attic space above, I'd get a good = quite bath exhaust fan; or a vent with a $20 computer fan blowing into the attic.

Also, if the shelving is solid, if would be best if you could route some slots in them for ventilation.