Our New Fridge...

My sweetie just helped me make a cover/insulation for our new fridge :) As you may remember we recently bought two Dometic portable fridges for ORION...one 53 quart which we use exclusively as a fridge and one 33 quart which we use exclusively as a freezer. We "tested" them for a few weeks now and are extremely pleased...actually we are ecstatic...they run on our solar panel and wind generator only (!), so that we have not had to use our engine or our 2K generator for charging up the batteries at all...AT ALL...and it is over a month ago that we bought them :-)

We also decided where we want the units semi-permanently placed (they are portable, so can be moved again if we feel like it)...the fridge will stay in the main salon and the freezer in the aft cabin...the reason is quite obvious: one uses the fridge much more often than the freezer. Since ORION is a Morgan 41 Out Island she has a center cockpit, so both main salon and separate aft cabin can easily be accessed...in other words we can still reach for the ice cubes quickly and put them in that sundowner, hahaha ;)

Today I will report on the fridge only, leaving the freezer for another day...after all we are retired and it's hot in the Caribbean, so one project at a time please!

Our friends Bruce and Connie, who also have a Morgan 41 Out Island, were interested in our new refrigeration set-up...Connie wanted to see some pictures, which inspired me to make this blog post...thanks Connie :) Maybe some other cruisers and our landlubber friends will be interested as well...so here are the gory details...

We decided to put the fridge right next to the galley, sacrificing one of the benches surrounding the dining table for it to sit on. This will still leave enough space for Rick and I to dine and entertain in the main salon...however we usually dine and entertain in ORION's huge cockpit, so no big changes to our every day life are involved...phew!

For good insulation from below we put two layers of closed cell foam on top of the seat cushion...we used a blue camping mat (the ones you buy rolled up at big stores like Walmart for placing underneath a sleeping bag) for all of the insulation...we just cut it to fit! Then we cut pieces to fit the outside of the fridge and attached them with duck tape...omitting the spaces where the fan blows and the air intake. To hold the fridge in place when times get rough...after all we do live on a sail boat...Rick screwed in two Ubolts in the wall that separates the galley from the dining area to attach a strap.

Here is the "naked" fridge...

Here is the "shell" made of closed cell foam mat...

Here is the cover put on loosely...

Here is the completed cover attached with duck tape...

Here is the fridge put in place and strapped in...

View from salon towards galley...

Fridge can be opened easily from galley...

Holds everything we need in a compact space...

We put additional insulation on the inside...I used a car sun shield (cut it to fit)...this prevents "sweating" on the outside of the lid :)

I placed a pretty quilt cover on top of the fridge...this insulates as well as adds a touch of decor :)

Here is another view of the dining area with the fridge in its place :)

There you have it...our new fridge and dining area on ORION...all in one :) Life is good!

 

 

Tales from the Cold...

Good morning from the ferry from Culebra to Fajardo

We are still on cloud seven with the new Dometic CF50 portable refrigerator, which we purchased from West Marine in Fajardo. It is over a week ago that we plugged in the new unit...the fridge is cold, our batteries are full, and we have not had to run the engine or the generator at all! We are truly self sufficient now electricity-wise...wow! Our 210 W solar panel and our KISS wind generator produce more than enough energy to load the battery bank and run our equipment...sometimes they even go into diversion load, which happens when the batteries are so full that the excess energy has to be diverted...a pretty nice thing to happen :)

We changed our mind about using the Dometic CF25 as a designated freezer...the unit only runs of 12 V and is smaller than we had expected. With the kind cooperation of West Marine in Fajardo we are now getting the next bigger size, a Dometic CF35 which runs with either 12 V or 110 V just like the CF50 we already bought and use as a designated fridge on ORION. The CF35 will be our designated freezer on ORION. We are looking forward to this new unit...as soon as we have it running we will be free to take off and explore different anchorages around Culebra :)

We are using the fridge and freezer space from the retired cold plate system for storage of our canned goods now...it freed up an enormous space...but since we have an enormous amount of canned goods the space is appreciated and already filled to the brim, hahahaha...it's a good thing!

Right now my sweetie and I couldn't be happier about our change of power management...it is not cheap but it is not outrageously expensive either (less than 2K) and considering the savings in fuel and equipment (as we don't have to run the engine or the generator twice a day) it is so worth it! We also could close the thru hull from the retired system...it is no longer needed! The old cold plate system was using sea water pumped through a thru hull which basically is a hole in the hull of the boat (for our non-boating friends). We eventually will remove the cold plate system along with the compressor...this will free up even more space in the old fridge and freezer unit as well as in the engine room where the compressor is housed!

So happy :)

The biggest benefit to us is our peace of mind...honestly and truly...no money in the world can pay for that feeling of true independence...of not having to worry constantly about this very important piece of equipment on our boat :) The future is here...these compressor driven portable units with digital display are revolutionizing the RV and boating world...they are designed to work with solar and wind energy...they use very little amps...renewable energy at its best! In a way it is a good thing that our old cold plate system started to fail when it did...it gave us the opportunity to look into alternative methods of handling the refrigeration on ORION...and it happened whilst we were still on home turf so to say where things are available or can be ordered and shipped within a reasonable time for a reasonable price. So all is well :)

Will post again on the issue when we have the CF35 running...Happy Sailing in the meantime! And yes...will post pictures next time also :)

 

Keeping our food cold and our minds sane!

The Two Sweeties on a quest

This is it! We have had enough, enough, enough of problems with our built in cold plate refrigeration system on ORION. It was slowly driving us insane...when connected to shore power at the marina the units worked just fine, but ever since moving off the dock we have had intermittent problems trying to keep temperatures in the lower levels! Having had to run the Diesel engine sometimes for as much as a few hours in order to keep things cold because the wind and solar could not keep up with the power drainage...we finally decided that..yes...enough is enough! We (again) researched boat refrigeration on the net for alternative solutions and decided on a portable compressor driven unit that would work both with a 12 V system and a 110 V system. West Marine in Fajardo looked promising for the purchase of such a unit.

Ferry ride from Culebra to Fajardo

So this morning...the morning of my birthday...my sweetie and I took the ferry from Culebra to Fajardo...and so our quest began. There are several portable compressor driven refrigeration/freezer units for RVs and boats on the market. Our two finalists were ENGEL and DOMETIC...both extremely reliable companies with reliable products! We ended up going with DOMETIC, because that's what West Marine had available to take home with us...and we wanted it NOW...we NEEDED IT NOW...our sanity was at stake!

Our new refrigerator...on top are water jugs...

Here is the unit we bought...a 52 quart Dometic compressor driven refrigerator/freezer, which works either with 12 V battery power or 110 V power. The unit can be used either as a freezer or as a fridge...we will use it as a designated fridge. We ordered a 24 quart unit also, which we will run as a designated freezer. These units are compressor driven just like a normal fridge, but they make hardly any noise and use hardly any power. They are not cheap, but they are the solution to our problems :) And they are excellent for combining with solar and wind energy!

We took the unit home with us, which is an entirely different story by itself...suffice it to say that we made it back onto the ferry, and with the kind help of a local publico (public transportation car) driver to our dinghy, and with determination back onto ORION :)

The new fridge is already running like a charm! We plugged it in, adjusted the settings, filled it with the food stuff from the now demoted cold plate system and within one hour it had reached the set temperature of 37 degrees Fahrenheit, using only 7 Amps! Best of all...it is so quiet that we had to check and re-assure ourselves several times that the unit was in fact running...WOW! We are very happy so far...will give it a few days to find out how things will progress...don't want to jinx it, but hope that this will be it my friends...

For now we got our sanity back...I am happy and so is my sweetie :) Living on a boat has its challenges...we hope that the refrigeration challenge will no longer be a challenge...as usual please stay tuned as we adjust to being on the sea full time. We are in beautiful Culebra still and will start sailing to nearby little islands soon...we love to explore and we love to share it with you through this blog...God bless!

happy

happy