Moderator: Luke
Beaker wrote:If you get one of the flexible panels like I've got, you won't even know the van has one fitted on the roof as they are only 4mm thick. They are easy to fit too. At this time of the year they will recharge a leisure battery in no time if the sun is out. Even if it is cloudy they still work well, just slower on the recharge.
Passive ice boxes are usually found on the decks of small fishing boats to keep your catch cold, street food stalls and the like.They are also what the emergency bike couriers use to transport organs and blood. They are just better made and far better insulated than the usual picnic ice boxes you get in camping shops. You just fill them full of ice cubes or ice blocks - used supermarket 4 or 6 pint milk jugs 2/3 full of water left in the freezer for 24 hours work a treat.
Yeti, Igloo, Waeco and others make good ones.
A really good way to top up while on the go (at least on the coast) is to call in at a harbour fish market and ask for a few scoops of ice.
My real problem with electric ice boxes is that they struggle to cool down more than about 20 degrees C below air temperature - even the best and most expensive ones. That's fine on a cool day, but on a hot sunny 30 degrees C day in a closed vehicle it is easily 10 degrees hotter than that; your coolbox is madly chewing through electricity just trying it's best to get the contents down to lukewarm.
vampirequeen wrote:We have a semi flexible 100W solar panel on the roof. It was so easy to fit. We run our electric cool box from it and charge our phones, tablets etc. Makes life so easy when off grid (which we are most of the time). We also ran a split charger from our engine battery to our leisure battery but it strained our 17 year old alternator so be careful if you do that. When we had a new alternator fitted we went for one with a larger amp and the garage auto electrician said we'd be fine from now on.
Beaker wrote:That's really good to hear about the Waeco compressor boxes, and that you guys rate them so highly. I looked at them quickly when I started building but discounted them due to the price and the fact that they are described as freezers, which I have no need for.
I've just watched the video for them and now realise that you can run them a as fridge, a freezer or both at the same time (on some models). That's pretty impressive, especially given the tiny current draw making them solar power friendly.
It looks like I completely underestimated them, and I'm going to have to start saving pennies!
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