Sunday, July 14, 2013

Fridged Again.

Got the fridge moved over to the pad yesterday and spent at least an hour cleaning the inside with a bleach based kitchen cleaner. It had a lot of mold in it from not running for months and there was some food in there that I'd forgotten to get out so it stunk like the dickens also. Now its clean enough to eat off of the inside and smells much better to (Although a little like bleach).

Note the Velcro straps on it. I had to put them on it to keep the wind from blowing the doors open because I'd let it set so long on rough ground that it got a little warped and cause the doors not to stay shut good. Hopefully now that its level that will reverse its self? If not then I'll just have to deal with the Velcro.

In the last picture note the very large Styrofoam ice chest above the crispers. I decided to use that as an attempt to cut down on the run time on the fridge since it would cut back on the space the refrigeration system has to cool. I can already tell that it is doing as I figured it would do because its already cycled off and on a couple of times since I plugged it in this morning about 8:30. Normally it would have been running probably non stop with the sun shining on it like it is now. That should do even better by about noon when the shade of the porch roof covers it. It will be in the shade after that until the next morning.

I need to modify the lid to the ice chest where I can put it on and get it off easier than I can now because it is a very tight fit. Once I do that I can stock it with hot sodas and other condiments that are hot and it won't effect the fridge much at all. It will just slowly cool them down until they reach the inside fridge temperature. Its been a major problem to do that before because the fridge was running way over time just trying to chill the hot stuff.

I picked up that ice chest on the bench at the Study Butte Store way back before it closed and its been in the tank every since. There were a lot of mouse droppings on it as well as mouse urine stains on it so I had to clean it well also with the bleach based cleaner. Damn mice and rats!!!

I'll still have the use of the crispers in the bottom and the door storage plus the room above the ice chest so will have more than enough room for about anything I want to put in there. Once stuff in the ice chest finally reaches inside fridge temp I'll be able to move some of that stuff out to either the crispers, door space or above the ice chest and restock the ice chest.

I figure once I get the fridge restocked, get a couple of bags of ice in the freezer and other stuff in there I just might be able to squeak by several cloudy days without the batteries going to low. I'll add and remove a bag of ice as I need more room in the freezer for frozen food.

I'm also going to be out shortly moving some panels from the trailer's bank to the main battery bank because I don't need so many on the trailer. Also have others that I've never even wired up and will be adding them to the main bank. That should help a lot on cloudy days to.

My nephew is supposed to be coming up with 8 good used batteries before long and I'll be able to add those to the main bank, BUT I'll have to ditch the small battery hut and build a utility room to move all of them and the electronics in to. With that many batteries and solar panels running the AC also shouldn't be a problem probably running it 24 hours a day. That will give me a total of 14 batteries.

Since the It'll Du has outlived its usefulness its quiet possible that I'll add on to it and the old shower and turn that in to the utility room to keep from having to start from scratch. Of course it will receive a full make over in the process and the old business part (the Pooper) will be removed. ;)


8 comments:

  1. Dang David, it is too hot for you to be doing all that work. You should have done it last winter (grin).

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  2. Yeah I agree DD, but I can't wait 3 more months to get it done. Just went to the trailer to reset the modem and noticed the water hose (pressure side) is busted and I've been loosing a bunch of water. That was a fairly expensive RV hose and wasn't all that old either. I just measured the water in the tank and I lost a little over 100 gallons of water to that. Grrr... Now I need to get out there and fix that so I'll have water again. Sure hope we get the rain that is predicted so it will hopefully make up what I lost and maybe some extra. Always something around here!!!

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  3. Another good addition! Every little bit helps!

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  4. HJ, I just unplugged the fridge and put the ice in a cooler along with what few items were in the fridge. Its totally cloudy and dark for day time and the voltage kept dropping on the batteries. I'd rather have lights and to be able to use the computer at night than have the fridge running. At least it has been sprinkling so maybe it will rain and make up the water I lost yesterday?

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  5. No doubt you are a very resourceful guy...it would have never occurred to me to place an ice chest inside the refrigerator...great idea!

    Bummer about you losing that much water. Hopefully you will soon get rain to help replace it.

    Awwwww...the demise of the It'll Du! I remember when you built it like it was yesterday.

    How have you been feeling?

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  6. MsB, the ice chest in the fridge does help a lot, BUT with these real cloudy days the solar just don't cut it so I've had the fridge shut down again. :( I think I may have a fix for that, but that's a new post on this blog now though.

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