Date:         Mon, 2 Jul 2007 22:34:11 -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: Refrigerator help-yes, I've already searched the achieves
Comments: cc: kimbrennan@MAC.COM
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

> If the condensor however is so hot that the water vapor continues
> over to the evaporator side, the cycle is disrupted and your fridge
> will not be efficient.

Kim:

Thanks for the excellent post on the operation of the fridge!

I can attest with experimental data.  I posted 6/30 about testing
my fridge on 115V AC:
http://gerry.vanagon.com/cgi-bin/wa.exe?A2=ind0706e&L=vanagon&F=&S=&P=12202
So yesterday morning, I switched to propane.  Another 95 degree day.
When the van interior temp reached 115+ or so, the fridge reached its
limit--the ice on the cooling fins melted, the interior fridge temps
started climbing.  At 5 pm, I switched back to 115V.  Shut the
propane off.  It took *3 hours* before the blue LED light went off.
That shows how hot it was behind the fridge--with my Fridgemate fan
running all the time.  Maybe the extra fan ventilation out the
water hookup door would make a difference.

Propane and 115V should be equivalent, but, in fact, are not.  When
you have a hot Colorado sun baking the driver side, 13% humidity
(which means lower thermal conductivity), and high temps, then
the fridge hits the wall.  115V operation heats the tube; propane
heats the burner box and the tube, so makes more heat in back.

The Norcold DC0040 folks can be smug.  The Dometic folks need to
park so the afternoon sun bakes another part of the Westy!

Richard
Boulder