Portable Fridge

[dwaters]

G'day all, I am thinking about buying a portable fridge to mount in the back of my D3 on sliders.

Can anyone recommend a worthy fridge?

I know the engels are great and have been using them at work for the past 20 years but would like to hear of some other opinions.

Cheers
Darrem

[justinc]

i recognise engel as a great brand too, but i have 2 waeco, a cf50 litre and a cf80. apart from dodgy electrical plugs, they are now hard wired, they have been excellent.

jc

[SimonM]

I had Waeco, same as JC, and it was fine. I now have a fibreglass Evakool - made in Oz and love it.

[DoctorJ]

Totally agree with JC that the only problems I've had with my Waeco have been the electrical plugs my solution is to use the Merritt plugs

Cheers
Julian

PS if you look at all the reviews the Waeco is consistently on top with the Engel and ARB fridges, choose from one of those and you will be fine

[dirtdawg]

I've had my evakool for a few months now hard wired I to the disco so it's always on its a great fridge I paid 650 for the 60l with the cover and all leads can't fault it for the money and its identical to te waeco except that this says 60l and it is 60l the one thi g amount the Engels and waecos that annoyed me was the sizing they are mostly around 5ltrs less than what they say like the waeco cf50 is only 45 Ltrs inside

[Ashes]

I have an Engel MT45 and it has operated perfectly for 2 years. I don't have experience with any other brands so can't comment on them. You don't hear too many stories of the better brands failing. Avoid the 3 way 240v/12v/Gas jobs as these don't work well on 12v in the car.

Size is important! Fridges can take up quite a lot of boot space so bigger isn't always better. Carefully work out your needs here. Big fridges take up space, are heavy to lift and use more power especially if they aren't full. If you have kids, look to build a box around your fridge/slide so you can still use space on top of your fridge for gear (with a cargo barrier installed of course). If we are touring, the box and slide go in. Day trips near home or supermarket runs on a hot day, just the fridge tied to the anchor points.

[connock]

I Had a engel running in my Defener and roll lux befor that and it ran 24/7 for 11 years ( had sola panel on roof hard wired) So came the time to get a new one (sold last one with car) and had to go for a new engel ( the best IMHO)
When off roading with a not so full fridge place a beach towel in fridge to stop everything bouncing about

connock

[komodo]

My suggestion is 40L or smaller.

40L is more than enough for a weekend trip.
40L is also a great freezer size and you can keep an esky cold by rotating out ice packs or frozen water bottles from the "freezer" on longer trips.
Beer is better out of an esky than a fridge

I had an 80L and whilst its great its just too big. I'm actually getting two smaller fridges to replace it. This gives me flexibility to have one in the trailer one in the car or two in the trailer one as a fridge one as a freezer etc.

The other thing is that it works out nearly the same $$.
Oh and "theoretically" two smaller waecos will draw less for the same cabinet space as a single larger fridge.

[BigBlueOne]

I have a 40l Waeco which has been running either in the back of the 90 or in the house full time since i bought it in March. Great fridge.

[~Rich~]

I have a really old 29ltr Engel, I made up a lid which extended the capacity to the same as a 39ltr Engel.

On my recent Simpson trip we managed easily to fit all the food in for 2 weeks in the bush for 2 adult men.

Some points though:
Cryovac meat packed in meal lots, packed into shallow flat plastic storage containers and stacked.
Cheese & dips also fitted in these containers.
Only have enough beer or other cans in the fridge for that evening, restock as you take them out.
Use heat treated milk in 250ml popper packs which does not have to be stored in the fridge.

Be smart on what has to be in the fridge and you do not need a huge one!