RE: Refrigerator Run Time
These air-cooled units seem to have a very long life, if wired properly and installed so that the cooling air only passes through the fan condenser once. Many live aboard boats in southeast Florida have their 12 volt refrigerators on all the time. I have an AB that is at least 20 years old that has been running for nine years on my pontoon boat. This unit is connected to a long holding plate in an Igloo cooler, ( Picture on first page of my web site http://www.kollmann-marine.com ) The only maintenance in those eight years was to vacuum dust from the condenser and topping off water in batteries. I would warn that 12 volt refrigeration can over stress batteries when they are connected to a charger. For more information on this, click on “Battery Stress” on my web site. As to managing the boats DC power grid away from the dock it is important to not cycle the batteries any deeper than necessary. If there is a shortage of battery capacity the best way to conserve amp-hrs is to set the thermostat to a higher temperature. For each degree warmer a thermostat is set the daily power consumed can be reduced by 2%.
