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Finally getting around to fixing the Fridge… pulled the Adler Barbour compressor/condenser about a year ago and had to pull the evaporator as well…
Has anyone rebuilt their refrigerator box to observe how much insulation American Yachts used when manufacturing?
Reading the instructions on the new Evaporator, they say – don't even bother if you don't have 4" of insulation. I used calipers and measured 2.5" between the inside of the refrigerator and the forward counter sides. Being an energy miser, I'd really like to have good cold and not burn out my new unit by having to run it (or the motor to charge the batteries) too often.
I'm already committed to adding 2" of insulation – port, bottom and starboard will be inside the box, which I'll glass in – the fore and aft will be outside the box (which I'll probably also glass in, forward certainly for looks). If you have any practical information you can share, it would be much appreciated!
Thanks,
John
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ok... i deleted the other duplicate topic... 🙂
I don't think there is a lot of insulation.. the depth between the inner wall of the fridge and the outer wall in the exposed part of the galley would only hold about 2 inches of insulation. You would have to build up inside the fridge to make it thicker or rip the fridge area out and rebuild totally.
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Yes, so it seems... ..and thanks for deleting my erroneously titled post.
Here's the approach I'm going with. I'll be adding 2" R10 Dow blue foam to the hull side, bottom and inside the engine wall - all inside the refrigerator box. I'll be using Evercoat spray in foam to fill in the seams. Then, for fore and aft walls, I'm adding 2" R10 Dow blue foam outside the refrigerator box.
In the mean time, I got a copy of Nigel Calder's Refrigeration for Pleasure Boats and am carefully considering what it takes to tear down the bulkhead with the refrigerator box in it and rebuild from scratch. That seems to be a big scary job but at least the fiberglass base doesn't rise up to meet the deck - that bulkhead it wood. Thus, it could be temporarily jacked up in place while grinding and rebuilding the counter base.
Looks like the short term modification might be another 2-3 weeks before the fridge is operational... stay tuned!
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It would be really interesting to get an idea of a "before and after" analysis of how much electricity the fridge was consuming. I have to standard DE 38 fridge with nothing done to it. And I've noticed that I almost never hear my battery charger running when I have to fridge turned off.
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my solar charger is adding an average of 50 amps a day to my battery bank with us away from the boat and the only thing running being the fridge. So I would say… about 50 amps 🙂 here is the amps added over the last 10 days. The 4th day I was on the boat using other stuff like fans and lights.
| 47.1 | 43.8 | 49.0 | 87.3 | 41.3 | 55.7 | 56.2 | 57.1 | 56.6 | 53.4 |
here is the same days in watts added
| 660 | 610 | 680 | 1200 | 530 | 730 | 770 | 790 | 780 | 740 |
hmm.. ok that is fall temps of 50's or so in evening to low 80s during the day.. so it would be more in the summer. Temp in Degrees Fahrenheit.
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Do you any idea what consumption was before you enhanced fridge insulation?
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I'm not sure that mine has been enhanced.. It's stock on the inside and outside that I can tell. Maybe someone sprayed some extra spray foam around it in back in the engine compartment as I can see some blown into there where it expanded. Might just be around where they ran the lines for the cooling box into the fridge space. I have thought about doing some exploratory surgery to see what is in the walls but don't really want to damage the nice visible areas.. It's working so it is low on my priority list.
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based on size of the fridge and stuff I have heard if it was super efficient then I would expect it to draw about 24 amphours a day total. If it was really bad it would draw about 75 to 100 amp hours a day. I consider the 55 average to be just a hair worse than an average efficiency. Putting the little insulation cover over the top has helped a bit as the lid is a weak area in heat gain/loss of cool.
scott
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