Refrigeration Question (Engel perhaps?)

Loren Beach

Loren Beach

O34 - Portland, OR
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
https://www.engel-usa.com/products/ice-box-conversion-kit-228

Our decade-old 12 volt system abruptly stopped cooling recently. A conversation with the vendor leads me to suspect a pinhole leak somewhere in the joints of the tubing. Perhaps. Maybe. (?)

No one locally to trouble shoot it, that I know of.
Given that paying anyone 100./hour to work on it and then buying a new compressor or other parts will quickly zoom right by the cost est. for a new system, I got to looking into starting over.
No decision yet, but this is a vital part of the boat and we are "no way no how" going cruising without it. (Used to be that only the Admiral felt that strongly, but nowadays I am in full agreement with her!)

I've seen some favorable commentary on the Engel product. Anyone have any experience or knowledge of it. Completely Different type of compressor motor, and of course they claim that it's better. :rolleyes:

Thanks for your help.

Loren
 
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F

Frank Langer

1984 Ericson 30+, Nanaimo, BC
Hi Loren, I am not familiar with the Engel conversion fridge, but it looks just like the Norcold conversion kit in our boat, and the description is the same. We have been very happy with it. When we bought that unit I recall that there was one other manufacturer of these conversion kits, but the name escapes me at the moment.

Frank
 
F

Frank Langer

1984 Ericson 30+, Nanaimo, BC
Hi Loren,

Yes, that Norcold fridge at Jamestown looks like the one. We already had the same Norcold fridge conversion on our boat when we bought it, installed by a previous owner, but it broke down after about 11 years. I figured that was pretty good, and that installation of a replacement would be easier than trying to fit a different brand, so I bought the same one and installed it myself. That was about three or four years ago, and it has been working fine since then.

The installation is quite straight forward. The only slightly tricky part is attaching the copper tubes, because they say if you don't do it right the gas coolant will escape. It only involves placing the tubes on the compressor part and tightening the two nuts down carefully--so I was very careful :) and had no trouble with it.

I really like that it can run on either 12 or 120 volts, is fairly quiet, and only uses about 3.5 amps. We are still careful in how we operate it--start with a block of ice, run it whenever the engine is running (only when we have food it in, of course) and otherwise monitor it with a separate thermometer that I hung in the fridge. We don't run it overnight unless it's a really hot night.

I hope it works well for you!

Frank
 
Bob Robertson

Bob Robertson

Member III
Hi Loren,

I'm a big Frigoboat fan as I know you have been. A leak in the tubing doesn't sound like a seriously expensive problem to find or fix.

There's a number of postings and Utube videos on the internet that discuss different ways to trouble shoot the problem.

Best of luck on your project,
Bob
 
M

Maine Sail

Member III
Loren,

Engel is a decent product but for a retro fit of an ice box I would urge you to contact Cleave Horton at Sea Frost. His new DC stuff is beautiful.. By far and away he has some of the best customer service in the entire marine industry, builds a top quality product and it does not use lots of "proprietary" components etc..

I have yet to have a single complaint from anyone I sent Cleave's way.. We have two Sea Frost systems on our boat, DC and engine driven, and even well out of warranty, 12 years out to be specific, Cleave has stood fast behind his product.

Sea Frost BD Series
 
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Loren Beach

Loren Beach

O34 - Portland, OR
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
It will be sometime next week before I have anything definitive to report, but now I have an excellent reference for a local marine refrigeration guy. We've talked on the phone and he sounds credible.
He sez our brand of fridge normally has a long life and our Danfoss compressor in unlikely to be the problem -- most likely a leak in the copper lines and that's likely a bad O ring in a seal.

So, "stay tuned" as the saying goes...

:nerd:

Loren
 
M

Maine Sail

Member III
Loren Beach said:
It will be sometime next week before I have anything definitive to report, but now I have an excellent reference for a local marine refrigeration guy. We've talked on the phone and he sounds credible.
He sez our brand of fridge normally has a long life and our Danfoss compressor in unlikely to be the problem -- most likely a leak in the copper lines and that's likely a bad O ring in a seal.

So, "stay tuned" as the saying goes...

:nerd:

Loren
Click to expand...

If you have a good refrigeration guy this is probably your best course of action...
 
Loren Beach

Loren Beach

O34 - Portland, OR
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
Frigoboat restored to life

With help from a friend who is a custom boatbuilder, I located a great local guy who does a lot of 12 volt refer work on boats. He also does ABYC electrical stuff, and I suspect that fridges and freezers are a sideline. (He has no web site and like other busy-all-the-time guys that I have met, he works by personal reference and does not need any other "advertising".)

He's been busy lately and it took over a week for us to get together at our boat.
I got quite a lot of explanation of principles and care-and-feeding of small fridge systems in the hour he was there. :nerd:

Long story short, we first powered up the system on and it just worked. Which bothered me, since I did not know why it stopped, or why it started cooling again. :confused:

He said that once in a while a tiny particle of material might be in the system from manufacturing and there's one Very Tiny orifice where something like that could temporarily plug it. Rare, but he'd encountered this before.

He checked the refrigerant level and added just a little bit more. It was not particularly low, in his opinion. One note regarding weighing the amount of refrigerant volume is that the total amount in these boating systems is so small and any scales used on a boat rocking in its slip is prone to gross errors. Judgement and experience seems to be the important factor!

He speculated that it could go another ten years without trouble, given that the components are of good quality.

So, again, it's purring along (when it's on) and keeping the interior at the usual indicated 37 deg. f.

All this for an hour of time and quite a bit of information about how it works.

I thought this to be a bargain, all in all.

Like an excellent diesel mechanic that I know, the best technician is often as good a "teacher" as he is a "repairer".


Cheers,
Loren

ps: Gotta say... all the advice I got here seems well-thought-out & sincere and I would have followed up on it if needed. This group is wonderful!
 
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O

oregon18

Junior Member
Is it possible to provide a name or number? I've been looking for someone for months--thanks
Jim Elder
ericson 35-3
 
Greg Ross

Greg Ross

Not the newest member
Refrigeration mis-adventures

Loren,
I had a significant episode with LAYLA the first year we sailed her in Prince Edward Island, in 2006. I won't repeat the painful story, suffice to say I destroyed the existing Alder Barbour machine that had been with the boat for something over 20 years and it would probably be merrily chugging away still. Ok if you feel you must know, you can scan back in my posting history and look for a title something like "Wife saves boat"
I was fortunate enough to come across an Adler Barbour complete 12v system (New in the Box) but circa 1983 on eBay that Winter, the Seller was generous enough to offer a highly attractive Buy-it-now price and I grabbed it. Following spring (2007) I installed it following "installation instructions" obtained separately. I also bought the modern solid state controller/ and low draw muffin fan to improve on it's performance. Torqueing without a specified value or the crow's foot type torque wrench to accomplish same is highly judgemental, so when mating the line connectors I obviously did not tighten them sufficiently and had a slow Freon leak (original charge R12) over that season.
Moving on to 2008 I brought a refrigeration Tech to the boat, he spliced in a Schrader type filling fitting, evacuated the residual R12 (not necessarily in that order) and then filled the system with I believe it's R409 (commercial refrigerant) which uses an oil that is compatible with the oil used with R12. R12 has been outlawed in Canada since the '90's. This now 33 year old system is hopefully good for another 20 years, or my lifetime, which ever comes first.
Last intended alteration not yet made is to eliminate the Fan/ condenser and hook up to the Frigoboat Keel Cooler that we installed (new hole in the Hull) when we did the bottom job a couple of years ago.
Like any "Boat System" if you feel you absolutely must have it you must also demonstrate the appropriate level of determination!
 
E

e38 owner

Member III
Thermostat Box

Does the Thermostat box need to go in the icebox on the Norcold/Engle
It appears the sensor is connected to the evaporator
Mine came from Jamestown with the thermostat box plugged in to the compressor.
Can't reach to unplug it.
 
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