Date:         Wed, 17 May 2006 09:47:46 -0600
Reply-To:     Richard A Jones <jones@COLORADO.EDU>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Richard A Jones <jones@COLORADO.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Vent cover
In-Reply-To:  <20060517041046.22E8983E9E@mx11.Colorado.EDU>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

> Why would you need this cover in a car wash but not in the rain
> going 60 mph? And while we're on the subject, have you ever felt how
> HOT the exhaust from the fridge gets? It would take a super-robusto
> robo-spider to survive that blast furnace...

I've washed my car at a self-service carwash many times with the
fridge running and never put it out.  It never goes out on the
highway, either.  But if you aim the carwash wand into the vent
at an angle, I'll bet you could get some water down the tubes and
cause trouble.  Maybe some automatic carwashes would do that, too.
Hence, the VW warning.

It isn't the spider, it is the webs it might weave that can cause
enough problem that the fridge won't light or run on propane because
the airflow is impeded.

My fridge made ice cubes for us every day around Moab a couple
of weeks ago, as Bob Stevens commented in an earlier post.
I generally light the fridge before I leave and leave it on
propane for the whole trip--up to two weeks.  (Please, no
flames for this; the archives are full....)  The only time
my fridge goes out is certain mornings about 5-6 am.  It did
it on the beach in Baja on Syncro Safari '01 with Mark Drillock
(as did his, I think) and at 10,500' at Syncro Safari '04 and
it did it one day near Moab.  Who knows why?  My guess is some
certain conditions when the air is very still and the temp hits
the minimum and then starts up for the day and the fridge is
cold so the thermostat has the gas minimized.  From Baja to Molas
to Moab, it can't be humidity, at least simply "high" or "low."
It usually relights very easily.

Not to brag, (well, to brag) but last summer in a friend's
driveway in Billings, I removed the fridge, replaced the thermocouple
and reinstalled the fridge in exactly 1 hour.  Experience! :-)

A final comment.  I discounted the "fridgeCOOL" fan idea until this
year when I used one for a week at the Arizona Bus Roundup and for
a week around Moab.  Now I'm sold.  The fridge temp was more
uniform and I believe it froze the cubes faster (2-3 hours.)
http://tinyurl.com/ozkpf
                                Richard A Jones
                                Boulder, Colorado