Getting Rid of a Residential Refrigerator

[chasfenwick]

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 engineering. What is the practicality of junking one of these residential refrigerators and replacing it with a decent RV refrigerator?

[John_S_]

chasfenwick wrote:
This marathon thread says as much about people as it does about refrigerators. Thanks to the several of you who actually understood my concerns and addressed them. Clearly there are pluses and minuses to both residential and RV fridges. I may end up with residetial, but it will certainly not be all positives. Few choices in life are black and white. One beauty of the RV fridge run in propane mode is not having to be constantly worrying about state of charge of batteries. Fridge will run on propane, typical tank size, for a VERY long time. Believe it or not, right this minute I am riding down interstate highway in RV, fridge running on propane, and I could care less what the state of the
coach batteries may be.

I never worry about my batteries running down the road as my alternator keeps the well charged. Now I also run the generator running down the road to run two roof Acs so I am comfy in the summer.

[dodge_guy]

With good batteries and a good solar panel. A residential refrigerator will run just as long as an absorption fridge! Without a generator running.

[chasfenwick]

Religion? Politics? Civilization going straight into the toilet? Unemployment, monetary policy, and the 1%? Refrigerators are looking like an appealing alternative!

[tropical36]

hanko wrote:
Me thinks most of you have way to much time on your hands. Cant you all find something better to argue about other than refrigerators, you sound like a bunch of old ladies

Don't know about all that and this mega thread has provided some insight to many, I'm sure. Thing is, I sure wish one could get that many responses to a difficult tech issue, when one arises.

[chasfenwick]

This marathon thread says as much about people as it does about refrigerators. Thanks to the several of you who actually understood my concerns and addressed them. Clearly there are pluses and minuses to both residential and RV fridges. I may end up with residetial, but it will certainly not be all positives. Few choices in life are black and white. One beauty of the RV fridge run in propane mode is not having to be constantly worrying about state of charge of batteries. Fridge will run on propane, typical tank size, for a VERY long time. Believe it or not, right this minute I am riding down interstate highway in RV, fridge running on propane, and I could care less what the state of the
coach batteries may be.

[pianotuna]

Hi Doug,

I resent having to add ARP protection to my fridge. What's worse is I don't really know if it does work.

I resent a cool down time of 6 hours with zero cycling from an ambient temperature of 20 c (68 f).

I resent the lack of a cooling fan in the "chimney"

I resent having to add freeze protection for winter time.

I resent the 2:3 duty cycle that causes an absorption fridge to use nearly 6 kwh per day.

I resent that the Norcold in my former 1987 class c appears to work better and has MUCH more storage capacity than my 2004 Dometic unit.

I resent that the 12 volt setting on the Dometic is pretty much of a joke (though it draws the same amperage as the 120 volt AC mode). There is one caveat to that statement. 12 volt works well--when I'm plugged into shore power and it is being "fed" 13.2 volts. But--why the heck would I do that?

I resent having to be nearly perfectly level when I stop in a parking lot for 15 minutes.

The only thing I gain from the Dometic is the ability to burn propane (at my expense) instead of using power from the battery bank/alternator/solar.

The OP's cost for moving from residential to absorption are going to be high. If he can special order from the factory, that would be the best solution.

It may be more economical by far for him to add enough solar to cover running the fridge.

[MrWizard]

The OP s concern, was he wanted to purchase a Florza from Winnebago and it only came with a residential fridge
And he asked about removing it and replacing it with an absorption fridge ... could it be done..had any body done it..cost..where

No one had.. And could not understand his concern
He could give no reason other than his stated "read about issues"
Which made no sense, as no one has issues with there RR
And that it could be an impractical and costly process to install an l.p. line to the RV fridge in the RV that did not have it as an option

It took him many pages to come out with the whole story and mention the Thor forums as his source of concern

[Mr_Mark1]

.

[dougrainer]

I had to wait. Cannot believe this. Less than 48 hours and 13 pages of responses.
1. A Man asks about going Absorbsion and the Forum Guru's that never met an Absorbsion they like, blast him.
2. People that have and have gone residential act like someone called the kids and wife/husband UGLY in public if you mention Absorbsion. These same people when someone asks for help with their Absorbsion refer, NEVER RESPOND WITH HELP, They just jump on their soapbox and state to hell with you and go residential. If you do NOT, you must be a moron.
3. I DEFEND Absorbsion refers, because unlike 99 44/100% of the people on these forums, I KNOW what the actual risk is in Absorbsion and there is NO real RISK. there is a LITTLE risk but not much
4. Would I prefer Residential. YES! But I do NOT knock Absorbsion or residential, they are equally viable solutions. The plain fact is, Residential is CHEAPER and if people do not boondock much, residential is better way to go.
5. Are residential cheaper in the long run? The jury is still out. MOST of the Hop on the bandwagon Residential people here on this forum do their own work. IF like most RV'ers, you have to pay someone to do the work, residential may cost you for future repairs, but will never rise to the cost of the intial Absorbsion price. So, I charge 2.0 hours($250) to pull and reinstall a residential refer for the Residential repairman to diagnosis and fix. I usually have to remove the doors and such and install the refer on a platform I made to prevent damage to the floor. I pull a residential about once a month for the Service man to diagnosis and fix. Others he can fix without the refer being pulled. Most are warranty or ESC repairs. A few have been Customer pay and have run as high as $600 parts and labor plus my $250 pull and reinstall. AS MORE residential become standard, we will see the longevity of theses refers after running down the road at 70 mph. Doug

[Ivylog]

Sounds like there is only one RV that you want and it comes with a RR. I'd buy it and for less than $600 double the number of batteries and put 200W+ solar on it and see how it goes.
We boondock a lot and I'm giving up on my Norcold having spent more than $1600 on it and going RR. Even with it we had to run our generator two hours at night and one hour in the morning. Now that I have 250W of solar I may be able to cut my generator time in half with the RR... they are that efficient.

[Old-Biscuit]

chasfenwick wrote:
Old-Biscuit. What is your PROBLEM? And all of this is supposed to be fantasizing on my part?

I don't have a PROBLEM.....you are the one with the residential fridge issues which the more you post seem to be 'lack of proper planning', 'misinformation about what was purchased and how to use it' and yes fantasy on your part.

I like absorption fridges in RVs (Dometic has served me well) but not closed minded about a residential fridge in an RV.
I would just make sure RV was set up for use as I intended to use it.

[John___Angela]

2oldman wrote:

John & Angela wrote:
we just got in the habit of running the genny in the morning for heavy loads.

Yah.. there's no way I'm going outside in my jammies to start a generator for coffee! 🙂

(Unless my batteries are sitting at 24.4,or 12.2 to everyone else)

🙂

[mpierce]

pianotuna wrote:
Hi 2oldman,

Time to spring for a remote start. $498.00 Cdn from Pinella's

2oldman wrote:
Yah.. there's no way I'm going outside in my jammies to start a generator for coffee! 🙂

This is the Class A forum. You have a Class A that requires you to go outside to start the generator??

I can start from the bedroom, or from the kitchen, or from above the driver.

[pianotuna]

Hi 2oldman,

Time to spring for a remote start. $498.00 Cdn from Pinella's

2oldman wrote:
Yah.. there's no way I'm going outside in my jammies to start a generator for coffee! 🙂

[TropicalRV]

I have a friend who owns an Allegro Fred and is having problems with his Norcold. He's going to the Tiffin factory and having a residential refrigerator installed. He said that Tiffin is building their new ones mostly that way. My 2015 has a Whirlpool residential and I'm happy with it. There have been too many reports of failures of the propane units.