Hot weather fridge failure
Our recent French holiday was marred by poor fridge performance which was made worse by a dismissive e-mail from Coachman when we asked for technical advice. I have spoken to Dometic's technical manager who made a number of very pertinent points and suggestions. It is well known that caravan fridge performance can decline markedly at ambient temperatures above 30C. This is exacerbated by the current trend of the caravan industry for siting the fridge on the nearside of the van which means that the fridge vents into a hot awning and worse that an open caravan door can cover the vents and reduce the efficiency of the air flow over cooling fins. Domestic recommend that owners should fit a fan kit before taking a van abroad to France, Spain or Italy; this greatly improves the cooling efficiency. I confirmed this by removing the fridge louvres and placing a small desktop fan in the upper aperture which greatly improved matters.
I am very angry that neither the manufacturers nor the dealers make any mention of this in their literature; cooling fans are not even mentioned in the optional extras lists for Swift and Coachman vans (I don't know about Bailey) despite being well aware of the problem. Dometic also tell me that they have had discussions with the industry regarding the nearside placement of caravan fridges.
Many people take their vans to the continent and with the climate changing here in the UK I would have thought that it would be in the industry's interest to do something about this problem.
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The same thing happens with MHs and I’ve heard of several people fitting cooling fans.
It's the old old story of manufacturers throwing together something they can rely on us mugs buying without them (manufacturers) giving due thought to fitness for purpose.
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With the higher temperatures we at times have in the UK it may well suffer the same problems ,
Do Continental. LV manufacturing companies issue a warning about high temperatures and the fridges they fit usually the same makes as fitted to LVs over here
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Lynne, check out the overseas section. There are numerous references to carrying food there.
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We were in France for a month with temperatures up to 34 deg. and the Dometic fridge coped reasonably well considering (although we were in full shade most of the time). When we had a caravan I fitted two fans salvaged from computers. I didn’t find that they helped a lot but most people agree that the proprietary fans work OK. Easy to fit but you have to pick up a 12 volt supply from somewhere.
As Tinwheeler says, the question of taking food to mainland Europe is discussed in the overseas section. I’m afraid we disregarded the rules and took several days supplies of dairy products etc. Haven’t heard of any checks being carried out but you have to make your own decision as most meat and dairy products are legally banned from being carried.
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On our recent trip to a very hot Italy our fridge struggled when on 220v. We have had this happen before and solve it by removing the vent covers and directing a fan at the lower vent. The fridge will probably work better on gas but who wants to use their expensive gas! However, a boost on gas after loading the fridge with room temperature items may help. However, the ice in the freezer never melted so no real crisis!
Lynne. basically no dairy or meat produce can be taken into the EU. Our fridge was not checked but s...s law says that ours would be if we took any prohibited items! We got an afternoon tunnel crossing, stayed near Calais and went shopping first evening. No real inconvenience.
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Ours seemed to cope OK in high 30’s temperatures for over a week. The fridge freezer is larger than any we had in caravans but the vents are disproportionally larger, perhaps that helped. Although we were careful to site the MH so the fridge side was in the shade, or extend the wind out awning to prevent the sun from heating that side up.
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"Poor" fridge performance is not a new thing. When first abroad back in 1999 I noticed our trailer tent fridge could not cope.
When I bought our first caravan I fitted initially one, and later a second fan just inside the bottom vent to blow air through.
On subsequent vans I have fitted two fans at the top to pull the air through and found this more effective.
The kits you buy have a temperature sensor on them. I do not see the use in this expensive route, they cannot react quickly enough. Buy a couple of 125mm computer fans and a switch with in-line fuses. If it is going to be hot turn the fans on and leave them on.
I have noticed the fridge in our 2017 van is better than previous 2007 van, but have also continued to take a second mains powered table top fridge, and sometimes a freezer, abroad. Make sure you get an St rated unit.
We have now swapped to a 12/230v combi fridge/freezer that we ca run in at temperatures down to - 15.We are away in NL at present and a couple of weeks ago when we had temps of 36c our caravan fridge was 8c during the height of day and the combi holding - 12.
Colin
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We have a Dometic fridge with an attempt to improve its performance by removing the gauze behind the vents and adding proper proprietary fans. Which made no difference. Several calls/emails to Dometic revealed that the fridge is designed to achieve a 20 Deg drop below the ambient temperature. That’s down to 10 Deg on a 30 Deg day - food needs to be stored below 8 Deg for safety, though 5 Deg is conventionally regarded as desirable. In short the Dometic fridge fitted to various caravans and motorhomes isn’t entirely fit for purpose. And they are advertised at well over £1000 to buy brand new. Add in a replacement cooler for £500 after five years and now a replacement control panel for £200, and Dometic aren’t going to get ***** from us. Let’s not blame British, they’re a Swedish product.
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The Thetford fridge in our previous Motorhome performed better than the Dometic.
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our Thetford in our 2008 caravan struggled at 43 degc C in the van, but it was woirking, and the temperature sensor failed while we were in Spain, but i contacted Thetford customer service Barcelona and they were brilliant, told me the nearest dealer that had the part in stock, 40 mins drive, sensor was €22 and then the engineer talked me thru fitting it, so all up and running within 24 hrs.
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We didn't have any issues with our fridge while in 36c in France. We try and park the fridge side of the van (drivers side) in the shade if possible. However we have heard that lots of others who have the same van are having problems, some resorted to gas during the hottest part of the day.
OH has now setup a 12v fan in the lower vent, not permanently connected but it's there should we ever encounter an issue.
The caravan fridge is on the awning side, which is a pain as we like to sit at that side and tend to face the sun. We do have a canopy though so that does help a bit to shade the vents.
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The Dometic fridge in our caravan was struggling to cope with the temperatures in France over the last few 36 deg days. We have a double 12v fan installed in the outlet vent. We reduced the mass of food and drink stuff, leaving a space around the cooling fins, and the reduced temperature was quite quickly about 5 deg. We now keep drinks in a separate 12v cooler box obtained from a supermarket. The fridge is coping OK.
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When we ordered our new caravan (collected Feb '22) we were given the option of choosing from a variety of fridges. Being familiar with the performance issues of absorption fridges having always had these before we took the gamble to go for a Thetford compressor fridge.
What a difference. Gets properly cold very quickly and stays that way (no matter how hot it gets outside). The large freezer drawer is very handy. The compressor is super quiet and power consumption not an issue (our battery box has space for two leisure batteries so was less worried about this than we might have been).
Compressor fridge every time now for us.
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"Most of the suggestions mentioned here are covered but also it is suggested that you do not pack items tightly against the cooling fins"
Yes indeed and our Thetford, which is now 13 years old, we had error code 13 showing on the front panel, this indicates that the temperature sensor has failed, this sensor is on fin 5 inside the fridge, it simply clips to the fin and is attached to the workings by a very thin cable, i was told it has to go on fin 5, i replaced this myself, so i guess if you pack stuff tightly against this sensor then things might not work how you would expect them to work.
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