Anyone using Polar Bear tubes?

THIS NEEDS TO GO IN THE "HANDY HINTS, GADGETS, PRODUCTS & GIZMOS" THREAD!

We too freeze some water bottles when we need to ice a cooler. Keeps stuff cold and gives us cold drinking water as they melt. Much better solution than making tubes. Cheaper too.

I take a 9x13 cake pan and freeze blocks of water then i set some on the bottom and some on end around the cooler walls.. They pop out of the metal pan pretty easy. I throw some Ice cubes from the home freezer over the top of the pop and water bottles.I also put a sheet of aluminum foil in the bottom of our cooler . It sits outside the camper door and I throw an old throw blanket over it. It helps keep the cold in as well.. Works for us..

memtb wrote:
Not a real contribution to the thread, but something to ponder. Though, not practical on a smaller unit. We once had two (2) recliners, and replaced one with a small chest freezer. They can be purchased for well under $200.00, which is not much more than a quality ice chest. When covered with a decorative table cloth (or whatever suites you), it's not that unappealing. It also makes a great (but a little tall) end table. We installed a separate (low watt) inverter just to run the freezer. Not powering the big inverter(which powers most of the unit) helps save the batteries when boondocking. You gain a bunch of freezer space, and never have to use ice again!! memtb

How does it set?

Not a real contribution to the thread, but something to ponder. Though, not practical on a smaller unit. We once had two (2) recliners, and replaced one with a small chest freezer. They can be purchased for well under $200.00, which is not much more than a quality ice chest. When covered with a decorative table cloth (or whatever suites you), it's not that unappealing. It also makes a great (but a little tall) end table. We installed a separate (low watt) inverter just to run the freezer. Not powering the big inverter(which powers most of the unit) helps save the batteries when boondocking. You gain a bunch of freezer space, and never have to use ice again!! memtb

I use my ice maker

I use Snapple Peach Tea plastic bottles. The plastic stays good a long time. A 64oz size is $1.67 at Wally world.....:B

we just freeze plastic water bottles. Use them for ice then drink them

Chris

I've been using hard-sided freezer packs for years now, and have had decent luck with those, both in carrying stuff, as well as tossing them in my RV fridge to get it to operating temperature.

I have our friendly newspaper delivery guy throw our daily paper on the lawn rather than the driveway. The papers are now in plastic sleeves rather than tied with string as back in the day. The undamaged plastic bag is great for making ice. Fill it with water, seal with a twist tie and stand in the freezer. When frozen, stand them up in the cooler and pack around them. They take up less space that a quart just and, as in our case, are taller. Best part is that when melted you have a thin bag to dispose of rather than a large plastic bottle.
It works for us.

Haven't used polar bear tubes yet but I suspect their cooling time length is in direct proportion to how much insulation your cooler has and the exterior temperature.

Currently, I use 1/2 gal rectangular juice bottles (takes up less space and has less air pockets than milk containers) and blue ice packs to keep the cooler contents cold and I generally get between 5-10 days use before they become just cold water. I use a Coleman 5 and 6 cooler as a freezer and fridge and a MaxiCold 5 day for beverages so this helps to explain the varying length of times. The beverage cooler I've come to find out could be just any old cooler since it's opened so frequently that a daily bag of ice is needed. The freezer cooler needs additional ice about every 3 days to keep the block ice frozen and the fridge cooler every 2 days. This works for beach weather. I expect it would be better in cooler temperatures with more trees.

Polar tubes and block ice in juice containers are pretty much the same idea in different shaped containers:). One caveat....get the biggest diameter PVC pipe you can find that'll fit in your cooler because the bigger the ice block the slower it'll melt.

We frequently camp for 2-3 weeks at a time but if you are going for say a 3 day weekend you'll prolly be going home w/ the block ice still solid. Oh and don't forget to put a sacrificial bag of ice in the cooler the night before you leave so the box is already cold when you put the food in.