Fridge woes

[pomp Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close pomp]

Need some fridge advice here folks:
I've had the Waeco CF50 fridge/freezer for about 4 months now, I also have the dual battery setup.

My problem is that the fridge doesnt seem to be working as well as it did, well the system in general. I get in my car in the morning and the fridge is always off. The battery isnt able to keep the fridge working overnight. I never had a problem before, if I barely used the car over the weekend the fridge would still be on for Monday morning.
Could it be the recent temperatures?
Im a bit concerned with the big Alice Springs GTG coming up. (the main reason I got the fridge)
The fridge settings are set to low (so the fridge will cut out when the second battery drops to 10.8 volts..I think)

PomP

[Guest Close Guest]

Re: Fridge woes

Have you checked your battery voltage? It could be your battery is on the way out perhaps.

[samo Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close samo]

Re: Fridge woes

hey pomp is your 2nd battery a deep cycle or a crank battery, i had a recent weekend away where it was 40deg all weekend, i got there at 1pm and didnt start my car until the next morning at 10am, my fridge was on the low setting for power and also set at -2deg, i also ran an led light that draws 2.5 watts for 6 hours and in the morning my fridge had the error light flashing, now my 2nd battery is a crank battery and is original so i reckon its on its way out, needs to be replaced with a deep cycle, hope this helps. i forgot to tell ya mines a cf 60 cheers samo

[Pedro Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close Pedro]

Re: Fridge woes

Pomp , How is your 2nd battery set up and do you run off this battery overnight ?
When was battery last fully charged?

Have you tried it on 240v. this might show whether its the fridge or the battery

[pomp Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close pomp]

Re: Fridge woes

Pomp , How is your 2nd battery set up and do you run off this battery overnight ?
When was battery last fully charged?

Have you tried it on 240v. this might show whether its the fridge or the battery

I've used the fridge on 240v while we were camping recently as we had a powered site and the fridge was fine.
Its a deep cycle battery that the fridge runs off overnight.
Now the fridge is always in the car and therefore always running off the second battery, Im thinking that maybe if I take the fridge out for a couple of days and allow the second battery to fully charge it may help.
Is this the 'norm' ?

PomP

[pomp Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close pomp]

Re: Fridge woes

Have you checked your battery voltage? It could be your battery is on the way out perhaps.

The battery is deep cycle and is only about 6 months old, I will check though as its still under guarantee.


PomP

[Pedro Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close Pedro]

Re: Fridge woes

Pomp,
I think you maybe draining your battery too much , between fully recharging your 2nd battery.

The fact that it runs OK on 240 would point to a problem with battery.
I use a ctek700 to recharge my battery overnight and run the fridge off 240 at the same time.
This way 2nd battery (AGM120a) is always reasonably charged.

[samo Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close samo]

Re: Fridge woes

what setting have you been running your fridge at pomp at over night when on 12v

[Gingerbeer Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Gingerbeer]

Re: Fridge woes

Hi Pomp, I have a friend with a 90 series with the same problem. All the charging gear checks out OK. He only does a very low mileage and I believe that this may be his issue. If you don't run the vehicle very long, you may not be getting enough charge into the second battery. Running it down to 10. something may also be a bit low from what I have read, unless it is a deep cycle type that doesn't mind that. :?:
I also know on mine that if the temp is set around 1 - 4 C it lasts double the time than if set to under 0 (freeze) (Waeco 40)

[jcas24 Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close jcas24]

Re: Fridge woes

I had have the same problem the last month or so.

I had swapped fridges with the old man to see if itwere the fridge or the DB setup.

We have identical CF50 waecos.

Red error light flashes intermitantly (spl?)

Upgraded wiring from 10A to 30A to try and cancel out volt drop. Wen I orignal installed the 10A is enough, but I didn't even think of volt drop.

I have a Sidewinder ABR DB isolator, and N70T wet cell deep cycle battery all purchased new June08.

The wife does only drive the car 10min to work and back 2-3times a week. So there is the possibility the 2nd battery is not getting enough charge.

The fridge never loses power. Its always on when on 12V, but the compressor doesnt stay on so temps go upto mids 20's

I have to check for voltage drop and have a good look over things.

Cheers

[Rainman Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close Rainman]

Re: Fridge woes

I used to keep my fridge in the back all the time as well, then I noticed that each time I started the vehicle up the fridge compressor would start running. Took me a while but this obviously meant the second battery was being drained too much so I had to take the fridge out. I was starting to get worried about leaving it in the back all the time anyway as I had heard about a few getting pinched in the local area.

I do around 40-50 kms a day and thought that should be enough to keep things charged, but alas it wasnt. My fridge is an Engal and the second battery is a cranker but it still sounds to me like you arent getting enough charge into the deep cycle. Its probably taking longer to drain, but its still being drained, particularly in the warmer weather Perths had recently.

[IRON-PAWW Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close IRON-PAWW]

Re: Fridge woes

I think the thing to do is take the Prado on a decent trip to fully charge both the main cranking battery and 2nd battery. Or put both batteries on a decent charger. Then get a multimeter and see what voltage you've got at "full charge". Then see how the fridge goes. I've been told that it can take a good 40 minutes to get both batteries fully charged, depending on how flat they were to begin with. With this in mind I don't think a trip of 50k's would charge a fully flattened battery. I was told (and someone might be able to confirm) that both cranking and deep cycle batteries first need to get warm before they can take on a full charge. No problem on a decent trip under your bonnet with the heat of the engine and charging occurring.

If I understand correctly, cranking batteries do not like being flattened, if you do it too much it does begin to affect them. They are designed for cranking and moderate power use (Eg, headlights) during operation. The slow power draw of fridges and associated gradual power loss is not what they're designed for. Deep cycle, or Hybrid crank / deep cycle is the way to go. Deep cycle batteries are designed for constant power draw and recharging from flat.

Unless you did a reasonable amount of driving each day, say a good hour, then I'm not sure you could get away with having a carfridge in the car constantly working. I'm thinking you'd always be out of battery power. If it was necessary to always have a working fridge in your car then you'd need to connect it to 240 volts when parked in your garage, then switch over to 12v when out and about. That's the thing to do when loading up for a trip as well. Load the fridge in the car, but have it running of mains power to conserve battery power for the trip. Switch over to 12v when you roll out the driveway.

[Pedro Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close Pedro]

Re: Fridge woes

This is a very userful link to Frige and Solar technical advice on batteries and other matters
http://www.fridge-and-solar.net/info.htm

Mr Val is the supplier of this info and knows his stuff.
I am a customer of his.

[Russ WA Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Russ WA]

Re: Fridge woes

This is a Quote from fridge and solar web site.

Standard car and truck alternators are designed for various reasons to recharge car batteries to 70-80%, and this works very well, until it comes to charging storage batteries where you need as much capacity as possible, also batteries can take 8-12 hours of continuous engine running to achieve this 70-80% charge.

From this I would recommend that you buy a charger to fully charge your battery to 100% .Smart chargers are the go.

Cheers
Russ

[embi Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close embi]

Re: Fridge woes

Apart from the above comments about charging etc I have been having issues recently with my fridge as well. Ive since destroyed another battery and now I have been doing a lot of research.

From now on after a trip away I will be charging the batteries up with the CTEK charger. This will ensure that I am getting the batteries back to full charge.

Also before now I have always had the fridge running full time. I have since changed my thinking and will only run the fridge when I need it e.g. when going away or doing a market/supermarket trip etc.

Also i was just reading today that Roothy (4WD Guru) turns his fridge off at night. He was saying that he turns it off for 6 hrs and utilises the insulating bag to help keep it cold.

I did an experiment last night while we were away. I only had about 10 cans in the 60l fridge ( the rest was in the camper fridge). I turned off the fridge at 9pm. I then turned on the fridge at 7am. A total of 10hrs. The fridge was at 8oC. I reckon the drinks were colder. I feel if the fridge had been half to full it would have retained a temp below 4oC which is the food safety temp maximum. I will now start using this method to save a few hours of battery life. I will also do another test soon with the fridge half full.