MikeRuth
Well-known member
Good day folks, I'm doing a little experimenting and thought I'd post up here for others to see.
I was tooling around Walmart yesterday and came across a small compressor fridge that was dirt cheap.
Here is a link Arctic King 2.6 cu ft 1-Door Compact Refrigerator, Black @ $ 79.00
The door is reversible and it is fairly light weight. It's also a Chinese piece of junk but hey it's cheap, if it does work and hold up then quite the deal.
I'm also planning to modify the electrical to allow the fridge to auto start an inverter and add one or two additional fans, one inside and one on the compressor. The interior fan will be small but should let it cool a little more efficiently.
It's a tad bit larger than I wanted but I'm going to see if I can make it work out. But first...
I'm doing a little test on shore power and it's power consumption.
The name plate shows the the rated current at .88A and the power at 75W.
Killawatt readings during operation off shore power at 118VAC is
Max .78A and about 70W as it fluctuates a bit.
With the unit empty is cooled down to Food temp in less than two hours.
I had set the T-stat high and I had a reading of 20F in that time. Not bad.
I reset the T-stat up a bit and let it be over night, right at food temp no problem.
So next I'll load it about 50% with food stuff and see how long it takes to stabilize at food temp.
After that I'll see how it performs and take readings off a 1500W MSW inverter.
Considering the small numbers on Shore power I know the 1500W inverter will fire this off no problem.
I have a maller 400W inverter that I think will handle it just fine. We shall see. If so that may get dedicated to the fridge.
I was tooling around Walmart yesterday and came across a small compressor fridge that was dirt cheap.
Here is a link Arctic King 2.6 cu ft 1-Door Compact Refrigerator, Black @ $ 79.00
The door is reversible and it is fairly light weight. It's also a Chinese piece of junk but hey it's cheap, if it does work and hold up then quite the deal.
I'm also planning to modify the electrical to allow the fridge to auto start an inverter and add one or two additional fans, one inside and one on the compressor. The interior fan will be small but should let it cool a little more efficiently.
It's a tad bit larger than I wanted but I'm going to see if I can make it work out. But first...
I'm doing a little test on shore power and it's power consumption.
The name plate shows the the rated current at .88A and the power at 75W.
Killawatt readings during operation off shore power at 118VAC is
Max .78A and about 70W as it fluctuates a bit.
With the unit empty is cooled down to Food temp in less than two hours.
I had set the T-stat high and I had a reading of 20F in that time. Not bad.
I reset the T-stat up a bit and let it be over night, right at food temp no problem.
So next I'll load it about 50% with food stuff and see how long it takes to stabilize at food temp.
After that I'll see how it performs and take readings off a 1500W MSW inverter.
Considering the small numbers on Shore power I know the 1500W inverter will fire this off no problem.
I have a maller 400W inverter that I think will handle it just fine. We shall see. If so that may get dedicated to the fridge.