Getting Rid of a Residential Refrigerator
I want to move up from Class C to Class A but, from what I am reading, one would want to avoid a residential refrigerator like the plague. I love the Norcold in my Jayco Melbourne; it is a marvel of ...
Forum Discussion
chasfenwick wrote:
If you want the best of both worlds, especially if you're going to be carrying around propane anyway, get an absorption unit (Like my Norcold N621) that will switch seamlessly back and forth between AC and propane. Install a bunch of dedicated golf cart batteries, solar panel, inverter and, so long as it is getting AC, the fridge will perform just like a residential fridge. But if something craps out in the delivery of AC, you have the propane for backup.
Sort of. The power required by an absorption fridge is about 6 to 8 times that of a residential fridge. An absorption fridge running on AC 120 volts will drain your batteries fairly quickly. The electric element draws closer to 5 to 6 amps of current at 120 volts vice 1 to 1.5 amps of power to run a compressor. Plus the duty cycle of an absorption fridge (2:3) is much higher than that of a modern compressor type residential fridge (1:3) From a power point of view absorption fridges are very inefficient. Of course different residentials have different efficiencies.
Hope that explains it a bit.
