Cooling Fans in ARC Raiders are a rare Technological material used to progress the Expedition Project, especially the upgrade from Core Systems to Framework, so it pays to target a few efficient farming spots instead of searching randomly.
Method 1: Farm Space Travel (Buried City)
Step 1: Load into a Buried City match and move directly toward the Space Travel building in the center of the map, marked as a high-value Technological location.
Step 2: Enter the building as early as possible in the raid to beat other Raiders to the Technological loot, since this area is heavily contested.
Step 3: On Level 3, search the southwest side of the floor for large old-style computer terminals with tape reels, and breach any that can be interacted with.
Step 4: Go up to Level 4 and check the area behind the elevators where sand has built up, again prioritizing the big reel terminals over regular desk computers.
Step 5: Continue to Level 6 and loot the room on the southwest side before the breach door, breaching every tall terminal and server cabinet you can access.
Step 6: Still on Level 6, search behind the elevators and in any nearby server rooms for vertical computer terminals or server racks that require a breach action, since these have a strong chance to contain Cooling Fans.
Step 7: If the reel machines and vertical terminals are empty, quickly sweep nearby desk computers and small terminals on the same floors as a backup chance before moving on.
Step 8: When you have one or more Cooling Fans, put them into a backpack safe slot if available, then exit via the nearby train station entrance in the northwest alley between Space Travel and the Parking Garage.
Method 2: Use Other Technological Hotspots (Dam Battlegrounds, Spaceport, Stella Montis)
Step 1: In Dam Battlegrounds, head for the central high-value complex that includes the Control Tower and Research & Administration buildings, both of which can spawn Cooling Fans.
Step 2: Once inside this complex, look for large server-like cabinets and electrical machinery that require a breach action, and open as many as possible while watching for ARCs and other players.
Step 3: Still on Dam Battlegrounds, check the Water Treatment Control area and the small building with two doors between it and the eastern extract, where multiple breachable server cabinets can yield Cooling Fans across repeated runs.
Step 4: In Spaceport, prioritize the Technological buildings with good fan rates: the Arrival Building, Departure Building, Control Tower A6, Launch Towers, and the North and South Trench Towers.
Step 5: Inside these Spaceport structures, focus on breaching big electrical cabinets and server racks on the upper floors, especially around the tops of the Launch Towers, where players regularly report multiple Cooling Fan drops.
Step 6: If you are comfortable with end-game difficulty, run Stella Montis and clear Technological areas such as Assembly, Assembly Workshop, Medical Research, Communications, Lobby, and the command centers above the Sandbox where fans often sit in command consoles.
Step 7: Across all maps, ignore regular lockers and generic containers and instead concentrate on breachable server racks, tall terminals, and large cabinets in Technological-marked zones, opening as many of that specific container type as possible each raid.
Step 8: Once you have collected at least five Cooling Fans for your Expedition upgrade, stop recycling them unless you intentionally want Plastic Parts and Wires, since the material remains valuable for projects.
