residential refrigerator vs rv gas/electric refrigerator?

Bob Vaughn wrote:

John & Angela wrote:
Residential refrigerator all the way. We have one now. Best upgrade ever. When we get a replacement for this RV we will build the cost of converting to a residential. No brainer. And tes we are dry campers.

What would be the cost of solar panels to keep the batteries charged unless you use a generator?

Depending on your source I suppose. Currently I would say about 500 to 800 bucks for 400 to 500 watts. In our case we also added a separate sine wave inverter as our other one was at my comfort zone for load. Plus redundancy etc.

I have an 18 cu ft res fridge in a travel trailer. I have 2 6v GC batteries. We have to run the generator about 1.5 hours in the am and 1.5 hours in the PM

If the trimetric says 100% when we head out, it says 100% when we get to our destination so my truck must be keeping up OK

Linc

John & Angela wrote:
Residential refrigerator all the way. We have one now. Best upgrade ever. When we get a replacement for this RV we will build the cost of converting to a residential. No brainer. And tes we are dry campers.

What would be the cost of solar panels to keep the batteries charged unless you use a generator?

Residential refrigerator all the way. We have one now. Best upgrade ever. When we get a replacement for this RV we will build the cost of converting to a residential. No brainer. And tes we are dry campers.

"and a nice Yeti cooler (about $700) for boondocking"

Tinstar, with the right solar and batteries no need for the Yeti.

pulsar wrote:

Note: our rig came with 6 12-volt group 31 AGM marine/rv house batteries and a 2800-watt inverter.

When it comes time to replace them, check into true deep cycle batteries, not marine (dual purpose) batteries. I'll bet you can reduce your battery bank to 4 batteries.

I go dry camping quite a bit and love the gas fridge in my old Travel Trailer for those times. I would hate having a all electric one.

Unfortunately , on my brothers new 5th wheel he can't seem to keep his fridge cold with his gas fridge. I plan to start a new thread on it this winter and see if we can trace down the problem. I'm starting to thing that some of the new gas fridges are just poorly designed.

The biggest problem with absorption refrigeration is that it really can not keep food cold/frozen in extreme heat.

I have been battling for nearly nine months now trying to get my stock rv (absorption) fridge fixed under warranty. I may finally have some success, but in the event I don't, I decided for the price of a new absorption fridge I could by a residential fridge (about $500) for when I have full hookups, and a nice Yeti cooler (about $700) for boondocking (since it will keep things cold for a week), and still have about $800 left over.

To answer your question, I think I would prefer residential.

rockhillmanor wrote:

Bob Vaughn wrote:
If given a choice of the residential refrigerator or an rv gas/electric refrigerator which would you choose?

It seems like all the new 5th wheels come with the residential model.

I suppose if you never drive more than 5-6 hours and never dry camp then the residential would be ok...but if you make long drives and dry camp or boon dock then the rv refrigerator would be the logical choice....

Wow, I didn't know that they started putting residential fridge's in the new RV's??

IMHO that would suck. If you RV a lot IMHO, there would be no way I would want a residential fridge in my RV. You will find more often than not real quick how much you need a fridge that can run off of propane.

My friends replaced their fridge with a residential one simply because of the cost vs replacing the RV fridge. They REGRET doing it.

AND I when we travel together I have to carry their food in 'my' RV until we get to a place with power. :R

On the mid-range to high-end diesel pushers, residential refrigerators are standard equipment. They are becoming, at least optional, on some gas-powered class A's.

Using Winnebago as an example, in 2014, residential refrigerators were optional. In 2015, residential refrigerators became standard equipment and absorption refrigerators became optional. Now days, absorption refrigerators are not offered.

Our current rig, a 2015 Meridian, is the first we have owned with a residential refrigerator. We would not want to go back to the absorption type.

It would seem that your friends switched to a residential refrigerator, without providing the infrastructure required.

Last summer, we spend 16 consecutive days off the grid in Glacier National Park, Banff, and Jasper and had no issues. Of course we used our generator, but all three of those parks have limited generator hours.

Note: our rig came with 6 12-volt group 31 AGM marine/rv house batteries and a 2800-watt inverter.

Tom