travelergold said:
We purchased a kings 60lt fidge freezer and got it running with 30 cans in it and 2 x 2lt milk bottles full of water in it. We ran it set on 4 deg for 24 hrs then I put a minimum maximum temp gauge in the middle of fridge amongst the items and left for an hour to get thermometer down to fridge temp. Then reset temp gauge and left for 24 hrs to see how much temp variation there was.
Kings told me before we purchased the fridge that there would be maximum of 3 degrees difference between top and bottom temp.
Well, after 24 hrs we looked at the results and was gob smacked. Minimum was -3 deg and max was +10 deg.
I reset and tried again for next 24 hr period thinking I had stuffed up setting thermometer, and the results were -3 deg to + 11 deg.
The result of phone calls and lots of emails is the fridge has been packed and they are refunding my money and having a courier picking it up.
Not a good outcome.
I would be interested if anybody has done this same test on there fridges, whatever they have to see the temp variation.
I have tested every fridge and electric cooler I have owned, At present I have 4 fridges and 3 coolers but I have owned a few more,
Some fridges don't have the cooling element coming right to the top of the Box and they come up to within 2 or 3 inches from the top which is a great feature because It allows things that need to be kept really cold in the bottom and things that need to be kept around 2 - 5*c in the Top and in the Dairy area can be 5 to 8*c warmer than the set area,
Your figures seem to match the temps of what Domestic Fridges achieve, One thing to remember is don't expect to cool the fridge down and fill it with room Temp Beer or water straight from the Tap because your Tap water in Aus is going to be around 15 to 30*c and any fridge regardless of the brand will struggle to cool it down even in 24 hours,
At the bottom it can read 2 or 3* lower than what the setting reads some times more because that all depends on the cooling power of the fridge, This Is Normal and during it's off cycle as it gets close to turning on again the Temp in the top can rise as much as 4 or 5*c above what you have it set At, This too is normal,
The Brand is a minor issue, Where the real problem lies is when you try and compare it to another fridge you have owned, You just Can't Do That unless it is the same make and model as you have had previous,
IE, My ARB 47L does behave like my ARB 78L even though the 78L has the Bigger BD-50F Compressor because the Compressors are matched to suit the Size of the Box,
YET, My Snomaster 35L has a smaller Box yet it has a bigger Compressor that is almost as big as the BD-50F that is in the ARB 78L, yet the S/M 35L even though it has a small box and only cycles for 4m 40s and shuts off for 50mins sucks heaps more power than the ARB's even though the ARB's can run for anything from 10 to 20 minutes it will shut off for anything from 1 to 3 hours, and even when it runs for 15 minutes it still uses less power than the little Snomaster, I have seen the S/M 35L chew 99.8w while it is running yet they claim it is a 66w Compressor, I will test it on DC with a Watt Meter and see if it uses less/more,
ENTER the little Dometic CDF-18L, Power wise it uses a lot less than any other on the market and it Cools very fast and I have seen it go below -22*c and I have seen it use as little as 61w in 24 hours running on DC and a 101w running on AC in 24 hours,
Anyway sorry about the long winded reply, but as you can see No Brand behaves like any other unless you compare fridges that are the same brand, There might be a problem with your fridge there might not,
What you should do is pre Cool the Fridge and pre Cool the things you want to keep cool in the House fridge or freezer and then load the 12v fridge up and let it settle for 6/12 hours and then Test it's Temperature reading, You can't cool the fridge to say 3*c and put stuff in there that was cooled down to 1*c because the Temp drop of 2*c of the items you put in there will Delay the fridge from powering up which will then warm up the fridge in the Top area to about 5* warmer that what the fridge is set At,
If your fridge is set to -18*c and is 3 parts full and has been at the temp for a couple of days purring away and you top it up with non frozen gear it might run for 20 to 120min +/- and then it will cycle on and off until it gets back down to the correct temp again and each run time will get shorter and each off cycle will get longer until it gets back down to what it was doing before you added the new contents,
How a fridge runs depends on how you pack them and what you put in there, 4x4 Fridges are not like Gerry Cans where you just dump it in there and the job is done, Even Domestic Fridge freezers behave the same, Try shutting off the house fridge/freezer and defrosting it and loading it up to the top with New Unfrozen meats etc and it will take days for the Temps to balance out from top to bottom,
I think maybe you misunderstood the Hows and Whys of how your new fridge works,
Again Sorry for the long windedness of my post but there is a lot more to it than just powering it up and setting the Temp and brand loyalty etc.
But this is just the tip of the Ice berg,
Hope that helps,
J.
