Refrigeration

[Peter Cryans]

Hello all,
I have been lugging ice for 28 years and thought that it is time to install a refrigeration system. I have a CD36 Hull #149. can anybody tell me what they have installed and the positives and negatives of the systems installed.

Thanks, PC "FALLEN"

Also I am ready to install a new autopilot. Any suggestions here?

[Tom Keevil]

Two years ago we bought an Engel MR040 portable. It sits near the front of the quarter berth, behind a cushion for sitting at the nav table. The space behind the fridge is used for storage - we don't use it as a berth. The old ice box is used for storage - there is a lot of room in there without any ice.

When we resupply at a port, we plug into AC, and let it run overnight in freezer mode to freeze all of our meat, which we have vacuum bagged. If it is only a week or less until our next supply point, we also freeze a container of water to reduce the time the fridge has to run. For a two week period there isn't enough room to include the ice. We then switch to DC mode, turn it up to refrigerator temperature and put in the milk and other stuff we don't want frozen.

It is highly efficient - it has only one moving part - and we have sat at anchor for four days with the battery still above 50% charge. Our house bank is 240 Ah. Of course we sail in a cool climate. Since we are in cold water, we store things like cheese, yogurt, fruit and vegetables against the hull under the settees or in the bilge, but for shorter trips we can toss them into the fridge as well.

The main disadvantage is that it takes up cabin space that you might need for some other purpose. They do make a drop-in unit that could go in your old ice box. Of course a major advantage of the portable is that there is no installation required.

We have installed padeyes that allow us to lash it in place, but truthfully we never do. It is pretty heavy, is wedged in between the hull and the engine bulkhead, and has surivived some large seas and sudden wind gusts without moving at all.

[bottomscraper]

We have engine driven Seafrost on our 36. The only down side is the need to run the engine about an hour each day here in New England, might be more in warmer water. Since we keep the boat on a mooring and only have one very small solar panel it works very well for us. With shore power and electric system or Seafrost engine driven with "shore assist" might make more sense. We actually do have "shore assist" (came with the boat) but we really never use it since we seldom spend any time on the dock.

http://www.seafrost.com/

[joemerchant]

We have DC Powered Alder Barber Cold Machines on both boats. We are able to run them off of Solar. 200 watt flexible on the Cape Dory and two 75 watt Kyocera Panels right now on the Island Packet - power to spare on both. Fairly simple to install and they are pretty efficient little beasts. While running, they use ~4 amps and a good insulated box will run 10 hours a day. If you spend all of your time in the tropics, you will want the water cooled option, which uses a little more power, but becomes a little more efficient in the heat.

When I was young and poor, I took a dorm fridge and gutted it to remove the plate and compressor and installed it in the Ice Box of my Yankee 28 for a liveaboard fridge primarily at the docks, but would run while motoring with an inverter.

[John Danicic]

Mariah has a Frigoboat Keel Cooler that I installed about 2008. It has worked flawlessly ever since.

Easy to install, quiet and very efficient. I have 440 Amp hours of battery power with 160 watts of solar power and I rarely take the bank down more then 20% while on the hook or while sailing on a passage. It will make ice for dark and stormys in about 24 hours if you use an upright metal ice tray. The compressor is in the port cockpit locker with the keel "cooler" attached directly below. It runs on a variable speed principle using about 4 to 6 amps when it runs. The panels can easily keep up with it on a sunny day. I also added a fan to circulate the cold better in the box. I turn the fan off at night as it does make the Frigoboat run more by about 20%.

I would suggest that you first insulate the box somehow. Many different ways have been described on this board to do that. I used the, "drill holes and filled with foam" method though not the best it seems to serve.

As for Autohelm. Mariah has a wheel pilot, Raymarine 2000 I believe, that serves ok. It would be better to have a below decks hydraulic system as the wheel pilot is at its weight limit. But it does hold a course in all but the largest seas and is great to have for motoring or single handled operation. A little noisy but it doesn't use much power.

[Matt Cawthorne]

I tore out the old box and heavily insulated the area and built a new box inside. The original box on my 1982 '36 had only 1 inch of insulation over most of the box and only 1 sheet of plywood on the top. I made custom lids with dual seals and vacuum panels inside to help with space. I have a Frigoboat system with the keel cooler. There are both a freezer side and a spillover fridge side. It works very well. Make certain that you get the new in-line filter or you risk plugging up the evaporator. Apparently it tends to happen in heavy seas when things get stirred up. Um....that is me and my tendency to go far away periodically. Since I got the new filter things have been really great. The frigoboat system allows for multiple compressor speeds. I find that I get the best efficiency at low RPMs. If the engine is running for some reason, the rpm gets turned up to get the most cooling when the electricity is flowing freely. Adding lots of insulation reduced the volume of the box. That is sorely missed on long trips, but all of the extra space used to get filled up with ice for long trips anyway. Tests showed that it uses 27 amp hours per day provided that one is not making ice or adding warm things to the fridge.

Ice still gets lugged, but just enough for the drinks.


Matt

[jen1722terry]

A timely thread.

We're in the planning stage of installing a small fridge on our 31. Nova Kool units are popular up here in Nova Scotia. Has anyone had any experience with them?

The plan is to use one of their counter top units in the existing ice box space, cutting the counter top to fit the insert.

Can't wait, as we're planning a long coastal and inland cruise (9-15 months) and not having to stop and hunt for ice will be a huge time-saver.

Jenn and Terry

[Jim Walsh]

A timely thread.

We're in the planning stage of installing a small fridge on our 31. Nova Kool units are popular up here in Nova Scotia. Has anyone had any experience with them?

The plan is to use one of their counter top units in the existing ice box space, cutting the counter top to fit the insert.

Can't wait, as we're planning a long coastal and inland cruise (9-15 months) and not having to stop and hunt for ice will be a huge time-saver.

Jenn and Terry

Could you be more specific as to which of their products you're interested in? I looked at their website and they have a wide range of products. Thanks.

[jen1722terry]

Hi Jim,

We're looking at the NovaKool R-1200, R-1600 and R-1900. One of our friends over here in Nova Scotia mounted one of these (R-1200) as a top opener (air cooled). I just emailed the mfr. to see if this is a recommended way to mount the unit.

They're happy with the unit so far, but they have only used it for a few weeks. They're heading down to the Bahamas as we speak, so we should get a report on performance later in the fall.

We're looking for an air-cooled unit for simplicity, as it doesn't get all that warm over here and if we go south it will be in the winter time.


Any other ideas would, of course, be most appreciated.

And it looks like that storm will stay east as of this morning. Bermuda may now get it worse than the East Coast. Hope the friends you made over there fair well.

Jenn and Terry

[John Ring]

Hello all...Also I am ready to install a new autopilot. Any suggestions here?

It was a lot of work, but I crammed a new Garmin below deck autopilot into my CD36, great system. It's part of the boat's NMEA2000 and talks to the rest of the system, following routes you preset on the chartplotter, and other neat tricks.

Installation involved making a custom bronze offset tiller arm to get the linear drive unit low & well aft in the sail locker, extending the drive's arm a few inches to reach the arm, and making a custom aluminum angle bracket to securely mount the drive unit. I installed the control in a single display pod low on the steering pedestal.

After struggling with wheel drive units for years, this new below deck system is wonderful; absolutely silent, powerful, and reliable. It holds a better course than most people can steer over long periods of time and I couldn't be happier with this system. The downside is the cost, about 3x a wheel drive system cost.

John Ring
CD36 TIARA

[mashenden]

I held off from posting on this until I was sure it would fit. I am at the tail end of installing an Engel MB40V-D refrigerator. While not quite done, it is going to fit like a glove in my CD-36.

The Engel MB40V-D is a 12v vertical chest with a 42 qt capacity. Power consumption is 0.7 - 2.8 amps. Its probably too small for a live aboard, but seems just about right for weekend trips and the occasional week trip.

I am installing it in the area to port of the sink, in place of the food locker. This past week I ran the wire (stranded tinned 10 AWG - two lengths that I twisted together to reduce noise interference), removed the food locker, carefully drew the cutout, then cut the hole using an oscillating saw. While this unit is designed so that the compressor can be moved around a bit for installation flexibility, I don't think that it will be necessary to move it in my installation.

A few things I learned/noticed along the way...

The overhang lip on this fridge is about a millimeter and a half (aka 1/16") on each of the sides. That is not much margin for error when cutting the hole. I made the hole a bit small, and will be using a belt sander to fine tune it so that it can be 100% installed.

My water lines going to the sink in the head run through this area - guess what I hit

The other unexpected effort was that the pieces of wood that were used during the original construction to support/attach the counter top to the cabinet sides extended into the area for the hole, meaning it took some extra cutting beyond the 3/4 ply counter top. There was also a piece of wood that followed the curved contour related to the stove alcove that extended into the space that needed to be trimmed back about half an inch. All pretty easy work for an oscillating saw, if patient. I recommend having a few extra blades though.

Also to properly manage the battery system, I am installing a Blue Sea 7635 Low Voltage Disconnect and a Victron BMV702S battery monitor. I decided against the optional battery temp sensor since it appears that you can either do temp monitoring or voltage monitoring of a 2nd battery bank, but not both... plus I have a temp sensor on my Xantrex battery charger.

I'll add pictures in a couple of weeks, once I go back to finish up.

[Jeff and Sarah]

I've been considering the same Engel unit for the same place (just outboard of the galley sink) aboard my 33. I measured and it looks like there is plenty of room under the cabinet but there isn't quite enough room on the countertop for the hatch. I need to do some more research to see if I can modify the lid to have a smaller opening. I'll be interested to see photos of your installation if possible and also hear what thoughts you might have about modifying the lid. We just don't use the storage in that corner very efficiently so it doesn't seem like much of a loss. Also, it keeps the unit far from the engine which should offer some additional efficiency.

[mashenden]

I've been considering the same Engel unit for the same place (just outboard of the galley sink) aboard my 33. I measured and it looks like there is plenty of room under the cabinet but there isn't quite enough room on the countertop for the hatch. I need to do some more research to see if I can modify the lid to have a smaller opening. I'll be interested to see photos of your installation if possible and also hear what thoughts you might have about modifying the lid. We just don't use the storage in that corner very efficiently so it doesn't seem like much of a loss. Also, it keeps the unit far from the engine which should offer some additional efficiency.

Both were prime reasons why I gravitated toward this unit and this location.

I'll post pictures, with measurements, but it will probably not be for another week and a half.

There is plenty of depth in that area, with some minor trimming of wood that is related to the stove alcove. I do not envision needing to modify the lid. The defining horizontal footprint is the lip around the Engel (its this lip, or more specifically the lip at the 4 corners, that actually supports the whole unit). This measures 500 mm by 340 mm (sorry - metric is whats in the manual).

It is definitely a tight fit, but it will just about squeeze in that area on my CD-36. Aft, there is 0.5" between the Engel and the wood strip around the stove and .5" between the Engel and the vertical half wall. Side to side, I didn't center it in the available space because I was concerned about being able to angle the Engel into the hole, what with the cabin potentially being in the way and the fridge not bending . I went against the warning in the manual about not installing it near a sink/faucet, and located it within 0.5" of the sink. Which left about 2" on the outboard side between the unit and the cabinet.

Speaking of the lid, of all the positive things about this unit, the lid seems the most oddly designed. It rests on top of the unit's lip, not in a recessed area. While it has a magnetic seal around it, the lid itself kinda floats around a bit. I think they envision the installer finishing it by putting a raised frame around the unit that the lid drops into, and maybe attaching a cosmetic cover to the lid... not really sure, but of all the positive things I like so far, this was not one of them.

Now that I look at the manual a bit closer, I think they envisioned the unit being installed in a larger hole than I made, and making it flush with the counter top (mine is not), then with some border around it to keep the lid from moving around. That would certainly explain why they made the unit's overhang soooo small (1/16").

Regardless, that is not how I installed mine - it sets slightly raised above the counter top by about 3/16" (although not much remains of the counter top in that area since the Engel takes up almost all of that space!), and I have not yet decided how I will do the finish work.

[Russell]

Nearly all 12v fridge systems use the exact same compressor and the same evaporator. My recommendation is to buy what you can find for the best price. That is for icebox converstions. If willing to give up space such as a quarterberth, the Engle and Dometic ready to go systems are fantastic (just make sure your wiring at your 12v outlet you plug into is properly sized).

[mashenden]

My fridge project is mostly finished - I am very happy with the turnout. The test - I drank beer cooled by 12 volts!!

The only thing left to do is to add some sort of trim around the edge to hold the lid in place as well as to serve as a barrier so water cannot leak from the counter top into the fridge's electrical equipment. I'll also add a piece of teak to the lid to make it look more decorative.

The dimensions of this unit are 19 5/8” x 13 5/16” (not the lid - the unit itself). As you can see in the following pictures, the counter space was about 0.5" wider on 3 of the 4 sides and about 2" on the outboard side (by the cabinet). Its like this unit was custom designed for the CD-36.

To get the unit to angle into the hole, I moved the compressor/fan unit to the inboard part of the base - an easy change involving 8 screws and holes that were already pre-drilled. In addition to allowing the needed angle to install it, this modification also allows the air flow to go inboard to outboard, with the idea being that the heat would go up behind the cabinets like a chimney and then dissipate.

Here are some pics:



Just the hole cut out as well as the installed unit without a lid:
---------

In this pic (taken from the cabinet door opening below the sink) you can see the compressor/fan unit as well as a KW-Hr meter that I added so that I can get a feel for how much energy this unit uses. I plan this to be temporary - its "From China" so definitely not marine hardened but for $20 it was worth it.