Waeco 40 Review (long)

[bdosborn]

I splurged and bought a Waeco 40 electric refrigerator/freezer.



Jean thinks I'm crazy for spending so much money on a cooler but she's putting up with it (as long as it keeps me out of the bars). I patiently explained that it would pay for itself in 20 years of not buying ice but she wasn't having anything to do with that argument.

Since it was awfully spendy I did a ton of research before buying it. There's a lot of information out there and it seems to be aligned along Engel versus Waeco versus everything else. The best review and comparison I found was at this site

Rays Caravan

Engel is definitely the preferred favorite with the off road crowd. It has a proven history of reliability. The Waeco is $200 cheaper and appears to have somewhat better performance. I'm not convinced its as well built as the Engel but time will tell. Waeco used to have a better warranty but its now only a year long after Dometic bought them. I found the best price for the Waeco from here:

Waeco Linky

One big argument seems to be that the Engel uses less power than the Waeco. I believe that's true but I'm more interested in the energy usage than I am the power usage. I don't care what the amperage draw of the refrigerator is (power) as much as I care about the amp-hour usage (energy).

So I measured both last night.

I plugged the refrigerator into the load output of the Morningstar MPPT controller for the solar panels. I have the optional meter that measures current and amp-hours. Here's what I found.

I turned the fridge on at 8:00 p.m. last night. It had been sitting unplugged inside the trailer for a week and was at 80F inside and out. The fridge was empty for the test, I'll fill it up and test it some more later. I set the fridge at 39F as that's probably the warmest I'll want it set at. The warmer the fridge, the less energy it uses.

The load current started at 3.8 amps and slowly climbed over 5 minutes to a peak of 5.5 amps. Then it slowly fell back down to 4 amps over 10 minutes or so. The battery charger was on so the voltage was at 13.2 volts. For comparison, the Engel has a maximum current of 2.5 amps. After an hour, it was at 39F and the compressor had cycled off.

At 6:00 a.m. in the morning it was at 7.7 amp-hours of energy usage. The temp was still 80F in the trailer. The total energy usage after 24 hours was 14.7 amp-hours and the interior was still at 80F. That's pretty darn good, less than 1 amp/hour average usage. Its also the best case scenario as I never opened the fridge during the test. I don't expect it to be that good when I'm grabbing beers out of it all day. I threw a 6 pack in it tonight and I'll run the test again for 24 hours.

So it looks like the electrical performance is pretty good. The maximum amount I've harvested from the solar panels is 59 amp-hours in a single day. That's without tilting the solar panels so I could probably harvest at least 10% more with perfect orientation. The most I've ever used in a night was 44 amp-hours in the winter with the furnace running all night (I also fell asleep with the DVD on). I think I'll be able to use the fridge as long as I want without worrying about running the batteries down (assuming the sun shines every other day or so).

As far as the cooler itself goes, I love it. No more ice to hassle with. It has a light in it so I can find the beer instead of the diet sodas in the dark. Its tall enough for a wine bottle to fit in it. While the interior isn't huge, it sure holds a lot more when its not filled with ice. I can fit 3 half racks worth of beer cans in it with room for a six pack of wine coolers. The only complaint I have is the LED readout is too dim to be able to see in sunlight. I guess I'm wondering why I waited so long to buy one of these. I'll follow up with more information as we use it more.

Bruce

P.S. I can post pictures of the inside for reference if anyone is interested. I couldn't find many when I was searching the net.

[S. Heisley]

Bruce, I think I'll side with your wife. If I didn't know better, I'd say you'd gone off the deep end.

Realistically, some things just aren't about money. If the new frig makes you happy and keeps you out of trouble, it's a good thing and you can dazzle all your friends with it.

PS. You've already dazzled all of us with your Boxcar!

PSS. Got rear-ended today, on my way to get a trailer hitch on my new tow vehicle (...been mine for about 1 month). ...Gonna slow down things on the trailer.

[bdosborn]

PSS. Got rear-ended today, on my way to get a trailer hitch on my new tow vehicle (...been mine for about 1 month). ...Gonna slow down things on the trailer.

Awww crap...

[Shadow Catcher]

I do appreciate your effort in documenting power consumption.
I managed to find a CF 40 AC/DC for $300 gently used on ebay. In looking at one of the Australian caravan manufacturers web sites they feature the Waco and they are definitely made for heavy off road use. I would suspect that with the off road crowd there is a certain amount of mythology involved concerning the Waco v. Engal

Nancy is pissed off at me for spending the $346 (including shipping) but I suspect not having to mess around with food floating around in melt water will eventually change her mind.

[PaulC]

Mythology in the waco v engel comparisons. Let's see, engel was first. engel use the swing compressor. I have mates with 25-30 year old engels. Not much mythology in that. Proven product versus the cheaper copy. Metal versus plastic.

In saying that, some drive Chevrolets and the others drive whatever

Cheers
Paul

[ParTaxer]

I think you should continue testing perhaps daily. You should drink the six pack for quality control assurances and repeat testing until you are sure it is working properly. This may take weeks so be sure to stock up on " testing supplies"!

[Shadow Catcher]

PaulC
A myth is not necessarily wrong but any anecdotal information is just that. Unless you have a longitudinal study with a large enough sample to be statistically meaningful it is kind of like a Friday the 13th you will remember what happens then but not what happens on a Friday the 14th.
The Dan Foss compressor has a good reputation and is certainly quiet and vibration free.
Given a first choice I might well have chosen an Engel but the $350 vs over $800!!!

[bdosborn]

Next test results:

Trailer interior was at 80F again.
5.9 amp-hours from 8:00 pm to 7:00 am.
10.7 amp-hrs total for 24 hours.

The total usage is lower because I started with a cold fridge this run.
Once again, this isn't a realistic result since I never opened the fridge during the test. But I think I can leave the fridge plugged into the tow vehicle battery overnight without worry about starting the engine in the morning. Especially since the truck has dual batteries.

Next test I'll throw in a warm six pack at the start. That's one of the reasons I wanted a fridge, so I could throw warm items in and cool them down while on the solar panels.

First I gotta do some QA by drinking the cold six pack...
Bruce

[Rock]

Waeco makes the fridge that goes in the 2nd seat console in the Ford Edge. I used to make those consoles. There were a lot of failures of the fridges related to bad electronics.

We had to run every one of the fridges for 30 minutes to prove them out. They're supposed to freeze a 6 pack in 30 minutes. This was a serious issue but the plant manager saw me crack a smile and asked me what the hell was so funny.

I said "That's a lot of frozen beer to deal with every day!" It was luckily good for a laugh.

[bdosborn]

The last test is done. I started with a warm cooler and added 18 warm Guinness ( I know, a purist drinks it warm but I like it cold ) . That's probably as much warm beer as I'll ever add at one time. It had a pretty big impact on the amp-hr usage as it was 20.7 amp-hrs after 12 hours and 26.3 amp-hrs after 24 hours. I figured out how to log the results every minute with a laptop connected to the controller and I've graphed the results. I couldn't get Open office to show the x-axis how I wanted but every tic is a minute:



Basically, the cooler runs 7 minutes every hour after the temperature stabilized at 39F inside and 80F outside. It took an hour and 45 minutes to get to 39F with all that warm beer inside. Once again, I never opened the cooler during the test.

Bruce

[Rock]

7 minutes every hour is is only 11.6% duty cycle. That's very impressive. I have to listen to the Engel this weekend buy I think it runs a lot more - but pulling only 2.1 amps so maybe it averages out. (Differnt control methodologies?)

Eric

[bdosborn]

Oh yeah, I did get the optional transit cover for the Waeco. It has a little bit of insulation in it and a reflective liner. The Waeco cover was a bunch cheaper than the Engel offering.



Hmm, I should take it off and run another test to see if it was worth an extra $42. Gerdo is on the list and has an Engel. I might see him this weekend at the Last Gasp, if I do, I'll talk to him about testing his cooler as he lives close by.

Bruce

[Rock]

Yeah there are a couple of threads on cooler quilts/blankets on here. I plan on sewing one up with reflective bubble pack on the inside and a light colored quilt material on the outside. Can't be that difficult to make. The Engel accessories are priced just like an Engel fridge!

Eric

[bdosborn]

Ran a test without the transit case. Still full of beer and I didn't open it. Ambient temperature was 80F/27C. I logged ambient temperature as well this time.



Amp-hr usage after 8 hours was 5.6 and the total usage for 24 hours was 11.1 amp-hrs. That's 0.4 amp-hrs more than with the cover or about 4% difference. I guess the cover works (a little).

Bruce

[Shadow Catcher]

Bruce I appreciate your efforts,You might try using Astrofoil reflective bubble foil. I have been looking for a way to effectively insulate our toaster oven, which appears to not be insulated at all other than with an air gap. I had three pieces of Astrofoil and the thermocouple that attaches to my VOM one layer dropped exterior temperature by 30%, two layers an additional 30% three layers was negligible difference. Then I started to notice that the temperatures were going up and realized the plastic was melting, so much for that idea.

I plan on making a double layer cover using Astrofoil. It is inexpensive enough that I can replace it often enough when it starts looking a bit ragged. And maybe it will hide the nature of the refrigerator.
I am going to secure the handles on the cooler using security screws with a lug on one of them so they can be locked to the trailer.
I managed to pick up SS security screws to attach the solar panel that are not included in the security bit set from Harbor freight.