Residential or RV Fridge?

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rhugga

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Joined
Sep 29, 2022
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Austin, TX
I'm not gonna be a full-timer. Mainly use RV for 1-week get-aways to go off-roading.

What fridge would be ideal? I see quite a few complaints about RV-style not getting that cold.

And a dumb question, but how does each type stay powered like when driving? About to buy my first 5th wheel. So many noob questions.

Thanks,
 
When you say you’re off roading, does that mean no shore/110v power? RV fridges can be 3 way which is very flexible… and can be one of:
  • 110v power from the pole (shore power)
  • 12v from your tow vehicle or battery in the RV.. good when towing
  • Gas - use propane as a refrigerant when battery power is at a premium
I have A 3 way and use all three modes as described above with 5 coldness settings which seems to be standard. I haven’t yet used it in summer, but we spent the first 3 trips stepping down from 5 (coldest) to 3 (medium) because food was freezing.

Typically they have “auto” mode that selects the right one, though I do manually set mine to gas when i don’t have a shore power hook up as I only have one battery in the trailer
 
Rhugga,
We changed to a domestic reefer about a dozen or more years ago. I got the original repaired, but my wife wouldn't have it back.
Yes, AC powered reefers cool down faster. They do this by eating electricity.
Absorption reefers (gas) do not cool down as fast, are often larger for the same capacity (ours was), but they can run about a week on the fuel consumption of candle.

If you are buying the unit with a residential reefer, it should come with an installed inverter. While towing, the power consumption will not be noticed. It will most likely be less than an RV LP/AC unit on electric.

The problem comes if you will be standing still a long time with no generator running. That is where the LP reefer shines. The amount of gas it will use may not even be noticed.

There is one strong advantage of a residential over an RV unit be it 2 or 3 way.
Cost.... I went to get ours repaired and while I finally did, just replacing the cooling unit with a rebuilt section was several times the cost of an inverter and a small residential reefer.

Matt
 
PaulBates said:
When you say you’re off roading, does that mean no shore/110v power? RV fridges can be 3 way which is very flexible… and can be one of:
  • 110v power from the pole (shore power)
  • 12v from your tow vehicle or battery in the RV.. good when towing
  • Gas - use propane as a refrigerant when battery power is at a premium
I have A 3 way and use all three modes as described above with 5 coldness settings which seems to be standard. I haven’t yet used it in summer, but we spent the first 3 trips stepping down from 5 (coldest) to 3 (medium) because food was freezing.

Typically they have “auto” mode that selects the right one, though I do manually set mine to gas when i don’t have a shore power hook up as I only have one battery in the trailer
Click to expand...
Typically I'll have 50amp but will also do some boondocking at times.
 
If you’re typically going to have electric hookup, residential will do a much better job of keeping your ice cream hard. We have four 6 volt GC batteries and an inverter. If we don’t run much more the residential fridge and lights, we can go a couple days without charging. If we were to add solar, who knows?
 
We had traditional RV refrigerators for 30 years. The motorhome came with a residential refrigerator, and I am never going back to a standard RV model again. The residential cools down fast, just 2-3 hours, instead of the 24 hours that the old ones took. That is really important if you want to go somewhere after work. Yes, they use power, but we just added two more 6v batteries to the ones the rig came with (for a total of 6), and we have no issue boondocking for extended periods. And our rig has lots of other ways to use electricity since all the sockets are on the inverter except the fireplace and washer/dryer! In fact, our entertainment system takes about the same amount of electricity as the refrigerator. The refrigerator will run off your battery through your inverter while traveling, and your tow vehicle should supply the power to re-charge the batteries while driving. When you get set up, use your generator to charge up the batteries if you don’t have solar.
 
UTTransplant said:
The residential cools down fast, just 2-3 hours, instead of the 24 hours that the old ones took.
Click to expand...
My oldest RV propane refrigerator cooled down the fastest by far. Took a couple of hours instead of a full day. What changed since around 1980?

My Y2k RV as well as my year 2022 takes around the full 24 hours to get to the correct temps.

Or perhaps it was only because my 1979 RV started from cool weather in South San Franciso and was always parked perfectly level.

-Don- Auburn, CA
 
If my Norcold were to suddenly quit working I might replace it with a residential. Only because I can get one cheaper than a new cooling unit and our boondocking days are over.

For now it keeps ice cream very cold, cools down in about 12 hours, and doesn't make much noise.

I added 4 120mm computer fans to suck the air through the heat exchanger. By far the best mod for an evaporative refrigerator.
 
We traveled in a Class B van with a 3 way and now a B+ with a 2 way. We like the flexibility of an RV refrigerator since we often camp unplugged and occasionally in a hotel.
 
Not only did the residential fridge cost less that half of a replacement RV type,, but also gained 5 more cubic feet of internal space in the same mounting hole. I will never go back..>>>Dan
 
Our new camper has a residential mini fridge. We have solar panel and an invertor. When going down the road I use a 3 ft extension cord and plug the fridge into the inverter outlet. We only use this method when traveling more the 3 hours at a time. Otherwise the fridge is cold when we hit the road and stays cold enough to reach our destination.
 
There are 3 (or more) types of Refrigerators
The standard Residential units are not all that energy efficient. compared to some newer (And expensive) Designs... These units often draw hundreds of watts so if you need to feed them battery power.. OUCH.
The standard RV fridge.. Well it can burn propane instead of watt hours but like the Residential about 350-400 watts is common on Electric.
now the New, what I call the "Danfoss" class (one of the companies that make the compressors) RV fridges. both Dometic and Norcold made them at one point.. LESS THAN 50 WATTS. and they can eat either 120vac or 12vdc... If you want a compressor fridge.. I suggest.

I had a chest freezer lasted 16 years of that class.. Got a new one they are that good.
 
John From Detroit said:
There are 3 (or more) types of Refrigerators
The standard Residential units are not all that energy efficient. compared to some newer (And expensive) Designs... These units often draw hundreds of watts so if you need to feed them battery power.. OUCH.
The standard RV fridge.. Well it can burn propane instead of watt hours but like the Residential about 350-400 watts is common on Electric.
now the New, what I call the "Danfoss" class (one of the companies that make the compressors) RV fridges. both Dometic and Norcold made them at one point.. LESS THAN 50 WATTS. and they can eat either 120vac or 12vdc... If you want a compressor fridge.. I suggest.

I had a chest freezer lasted 16 years of that class.. Got a new one they are that good.
Click to expand...
Our 10 cu ft residential fridge draws 2 amps or less while running, and the typical duty cycle is about 25%. That's 240 watts max for about 15 minutes each hour. That's a long way from "hundreds of watts", John.
 
We put a Thompson 7.5CF Top-Freezer refrigerator (on sale and used our Sam's cash so it was basically $30) in my daughter's old truck camper last summer. Installed a 2000W Jupiter MSW inverter that was returned to the store (my daughter works there). There is (currently) a 100W Thunderbird Solar Panel on the roof plus two Group 27 DC Deep Cycle Marine batteries also on the roof. This set up will run the refrigerator all day and overnight. We did a trip to NC from NM and plugged in one night going East (Lake Dardinelle SP), otherwise we were parked directly under parking lot lights (we don't drive at night). We used virtually no other power except the LED lights (sparingly), 12vdc water pump and charging our two cellphones. I had installed a little motion detector solar light inside the rooftop vent (no fan but did have a MaxxVent cover) so that it gets powered by the light. It turns on at dusk and brightens up when someone goes in the bathroom (I also have three of these lights on the outside of the camper for exterior lighting, we turn them off when traveling, otherwise they stay on all the time). We hadn't turned on the camper's bathroom light since I installed the solar light. We have a 2nd 100 watt solar panel in storage that needs to be stuck up on the roof (this hub is already installed with the first panel so all I have to do is plug in the 2nd panel) and we need to add two more batteries on the roof. My daughter takes the truck to work when she is scheduled a "swing shift" or her normal 4P-Midnight shift with an opening or early shift the next morning. Beats driving home. So it's normally one night with the refrigerator running on the battery bank. Other than that, we take the truck into town a couple times per week to take the dog to the town's dog park (no bathrooms at any of the city parks) and then we do any shopping while in town. We turn the refrigerator on at around 10AM and off when we finally drag home around 5-7PM. The refrigerator runs off the inverter and is quite cold by the time we have lunch (we often shop and bring frozen food home in the freezer). I do have an uber cheap solar charge controller for the solar/battery bank. I think that once we add the extra set of batteries and the extra solar panel for charging, we will leave the refrigerator on 24/7.
 
We recently stayed 4 nights in a hotel because the state park campground we had planned to use while visiting our granddaughter at her university was unsuitable. Parked our 22 foot Pleasure Way B+ in the hotel parking lot with the refrigerator on propane. Took one block to level up. No worries. Lots to say about simplicity.
 
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