Ambient temperature effect on refer interior temp

pianotuna wrote:
Hi Rob, Add a chimney fan, and a fan to draw air over the cooling unit inside the fridge.

Yes, I have ordered a fan for the refer interior. I'll consider the chimney (flue?) fan also.

Good news! Outside ambient temp is 64F at 6am today. A cold front came through last night - thank goodness! Temp in the fridge is 34F. I disconnected the temp sensor plug on the circuit board yesterday - that may or may not have had an effect. It's been on AC power for the past 16 hours.

Bottom line: I'm gonna visit a service technician and have the unit checked out and cleaned. Possibly replace some parts too. I hate to admit it, but I've done zero maintenance on the unit for almost 9 years - my bad. But I'm starting to think I don't really need a brand-new unit (yet).

I have never had an issue with my 12.2 cu-ft reefer. We are consistently 100 F (+3,-2) here in Austin. My issue is freezing the food occasionally...

To me I utilize the US government's standards for food maintenance temperature. This includes the door. it has shelves and I paid for them.

I even went SO FAR as to.

Seal comb the rear edge of the unit and pass air conditioner outlet air around the unit. What a miracle. Loss of around 30 degrees on the refrigerators non working surface ambient temperature. But it needed AC always on.

YANK! HURL! in went the SunFrost. The Norcold should have been named NORCOOL. I had more fans going in that compartment than Carter has Little Liver Pills. at 240 watts instead of gas it was useless. 3 brand new units tried. "Sal" at KOOL FUN (a rebuilder and manufacturer near Pasadena) finally admitted "Jeese wotta hassle".

The SunFrost worked perfect in 100+ F temperatures. Door shelf temp remained at 37 degrees even at 4PM. The freezer? Try -5F. Hard ice cream. But that was a huge, incredibly heavy unit that had to be loaded through the emergency door of the Crown. A 10-wheel converted Cummins powered, roadranger geared school bus.

I think more insulation is the key. I've added 2" of rigid insulation on the sides and 5" on the top between the fridge and the roof. It stays perfectly cool (on elect.) in temps temps up to 104 which is the hottest we've been in.

Our fridge is in the slide and was having cooling issues also. When I opened the top vent to see what was going on the metal aid dam( not sure of technical term) that is supposed to force hot air of of top vent was actually sitting in front of coils forcing the hot air to go in cavity above the ridge. Took the metal out and refitted it behind the coils and now you can feel the heat come out of the top vent. We also ad four ice packs into fridge every eight hours or so when temps get above 90° it that seems to make a big difference. Per wife, next fridge will be residential as she is tired of dealing with warm fridge temps and limited time in keeping it opened. Good luck.

ed6713 wrote:
40* is the max. safe temperature for food in the ref.
I would be careful eating things that got as warm as you described. If the temp. was above 40* for two hours or more, I would not eat any meat or dairy products, or things made with dairy, like mayo.

40F is just a guideline agreed upon by FDA and similar Canadian institutions. At 40F some items last days, and some - months. Food storage chart. If it lasts a week at 40F, how long will it last at 63F? 3 hours, 5 hours, 8?

A frozen meat or fish taken out of freezer may take more than 8 hours at 77F to thaw and warm up to this temperature. At 63F it will take longer yet - it probably won't even thaw by the end of a weekend trip. You can't, of course, freeze dairy products, other than ice-cream or frozen yogurt.

The biggest problem with RV refrigerators is insulation especially on top of the Fridge. The top of the Fridge always has a space between fridge and structure of the Motorhome. This space should be filled with Insulation and most important a baffle should be at the end of that space (towards the back of the fridge) to facilitate proper air flow from the condenser tubes to the roof vent. If possible insulation should also be on the sides of the fridge. I did this installation recently and my Dometic stays at 36 Degree with the outside temp around 93 - 95

When we purchased our 08 HR the reefer needed to be set at 5 to cool to 40F. I installed a solar chimney fan and a D battery powered blue box fan inside the reefer. We were able to back the temp setting down 2 positions and we had consistent cooling even in 100+ weather with the reefer on the sunny side.
Randy