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 Topic: Refrigerator on the move
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13/2/2023 at 3:34pm
Location: London
Outfit: Lunar Cosmos 524
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A few extracts from my modern Dometic Fridge user manual, which are pretty much common across models and other brands.
It can get a little more complicated than simply using 12V or gas in transit, some fridges will automatically switch to gas if the 12V supply is disconnected for more than 15 mins, as in maybe stopping at a service stop with the engine off! Easily overcome by ensuring gas cylinder valve is shut off, so no gas supply!
I'm not aware of UK legislation (but I believe the French do!) that bans the running of caravan/MH fridges on gas when mobile, but it is considered pretty bad practice! It's an open unguarded flame a couple of inches behind a plastic grill, and who can say when you may stumble upon a fuel leak at say an accident, you're fridge may be all it takes to turn that into a fireball!
"WARNING!
Operating the appliance with gas is not permitted (on basis of being a naked flame!)
1 at petrol stations
2 on ferry boats
3 while transporting the caravan/motorhome by a transporter or breakdown vehicle.
There is the danger of fire! Leave the equipment switched off.
In Europe, gas operation is permitted while travelling only on the condition that the gas system of the vehicle is equipped with a hose rupture protection. The national regulations of the respective country must be observed."
Unless it's a very old model, it won't work on gas without a 12V supply being present anyway! The control panel (and power management, and gas ignition/re-ignition in case of flame out) is run off the 12V system regardless of the cooling power source chosen.
If run on gas, cleaning the gas burner 2 or 3 times a year is recommended, as it soots up and operation can be problematic, so another reason to minimise gas use!
As well as the above Dometic notified prohibited sites, motorway service areas, and most tunnels also ban naked flames, so you could have a busy old time pulling over and extinguishing the gas flame before entering any of these on your journey, assuming you take a responsible approach to these things.
"12V-voltage
CAUTION!
The refrigerator should only be used in 12VDC-operation while the vehicle’s engine is running, otherwise the on-board-battery would be discharged within a few hours!"
The correct pin on the 7/7 or 13 pin car/caravan socket/plug is ignition controlled so as to prevent the fridge discharging the car battery when engine is off.
I use mine on 12V (powered by the tow car) on all my journeys, and have no problems.
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17/2/2023 at 12:32pm
Location: London
Outfit: Lunar Cosmos 524
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Quote: Originally posted by Pixie_Hez on 17/2/2023
When you are travelling, the 12v setting on the fridge will run it from the car battery. This won’t cool your fridge but it will help an already cold fridge stay cold. The best thing to do is to get the fridge nice and cold before you set off by either using gas or mains electric. This way, the 12v from the car battery will keep it cold when towing.
We currently store our caravan away from home so we don’t have the facility to cool it before we set off. To help with cooling, I always freeze a 2 litre bottle of water at home and put it straight into the fridge when we get to the caravan. This seems to help the fridge cool down, and even a few years ago, on the overnight ferry to France and then with a full day of driving on the other side until we got to our site, the bottle was still semi frozen when we arrived and the things in the fridge were fine.
This notion, which is quite widespread, that fridges cannot cool down on 12V, only maintain an already chilled state because it's somehow got down-rated performance, is quite false at a technical level! That's not to say that a fridge on the move is ideal though!
My van is in storage, so I have no opportunity to pre-chill on mains or gas before setting off on a journey, so it is ALWAYS started on 12V, and at the end of my (often long) journey it is substantially chilled and ready for swapping to EHU or gas and use soon after arrival.
The thing that people also overlook is that Absorption fridges are PAINFULLY slow to cool down, my Dometic user manual advises waiting 12 HOURS after switching on (regardless of power source!) before putting food in it! You can hardly reasonable expect it to be fully chilled after a few hours on the road!
There are a number of factors that can compromise the efficiency whilst on 12V supply from tow vehicle/MH engine though, but all things being equal there is very little difference between running on 12V or 240V in terms of performance, both have very similar power ratings for the heater cartridge (on mine 125W on 240v, 120W on 12V), which is what dictates the cooling capacity! 12V is NOT a substantially inferior power source, only 4% less powerful! .... and possibly even better than being on the end of a long site 240V EHU system and 25m EHU cable where the volt drop could be substantial and compromise performance even more!
Where running on 12V on the move can suffer is in things like the 12V supply being slightly under voltage, due to alternator charging characteristics, volt loss on cable runs etc., and what no one ever seems to grasp, Absorpsion type fridges are VERY sensitive to operating angle, with performance being compromised (and even not working at all!) from anything more than a few degrees off level! When on the road the fridge is rarely anything like level, and the refrigerant is constantly 'slopping around' due to vehicle movement which must impact it's sensitive operation! Look at most caravans when hitched and they have a nose down attitude, which in many cases must be getting close to the 5 degrees from level that is the limit for satisfactory fridge operation! These things must all have a detrimental effect to some degree and combined may well have a significant effect.
It's NOT the 12V power source that is the issue, it's running a very sensitive to operating conditions fridge on the move, it probably wouldn't perform any better on gas or 240V if available, it's the operating conditions that are the problem if indeed beyond the inherently very slow to cool time there is an issue!
There's a LOT of variables in operating a fridge on the move, and likely no two people will have the same experience, for my caravan fridge, it performs perfectly well on 12V making allowances for the far from ideal operating conditions it suffers when being towed. Just to back up that experience, I've also got a 3 way camping fridge, which is an identical system to the caravan fridge, and I've used that for decades on 12V in the boot of the car with similar success.
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via mobile 13/2/2023 at 3:33pm
