Blackie replied:

I could be mistaken but I thought the larger compartment on the waeco was the freezer section. I could be wrong.

Weddy replied:

When it comes to storage capacity I am very sceptical of the litreages quoted. I recently looked at both brands of fridge and thought that the 40 litre Engel appeared (visually, not measured) to have more storage room than the same sized Waeco, while both seemed to have storage space well below the quoted number of litres.
Are the manufacturers quoting on something other than storage capacity, or is it just an optical illusion?

Alex replied:

Thanks Blackie and Weddy for your responses. Somewhere in my internet travels I read about the freezer compartment being ten litres, but this is certainly something that I will need to confirm.
As far as the alleged capacity goes, you are quite right Weddy, the CFF 40 Waeco is actually only 37 l, whereas I believe the Engel is the true 40l capacity. On the other hand, I think the CF 50 is in actual fact 52 l in capacity.

Ken replied:

Does the Waeco have substantial carry handles and a means uf tying it down to the floor of your vehicle.Australian 4WD Monthly sept 2001 edition did a comprehensive comparison of portable fridges and I think this was one of their main criticisms of this fridge. Regards Ken

Jeremy replied:

The 52lt Waeco fridge does have good tie down handles, one of the improvment with this late model. as for the frezer compartment........waeco likes us to say that there is not a freezer compartment due to the fact that it is hard to keep ice cream etc frozen depending on ambiant temp and batery power and so on..........the larger compartment is the colder section so........ when you freeze down meats etc in the cooler section you can keep your milk butter and other items in the seprate section.......hence not freeze while your meats etc will stay at a colder temprature. as for reliability the waeco fridge's they run Danfos compressor gear which is world renownd for being the best not only in waeco fridges but anything to do with refrigerstion........hence any refrigeration mecanic in the world can repair them if required..........you will find now that all the elgle service centres are now also waeco service centres............. Good luck.

Porl replied:

For a true freezer and fridge with a small freezer and larger fridge and with the freezer having a separate thermostat and its own internal lid (will not be flooded with hot air when you want to access the fridge) try the Explorer fridge/freezer, for details ring them at 07 4122 2246 - they use the Danfoss BD35, same as the Waeco CF50 dicusses in this section. I am saving up for the D45 - 30L fridge and 15L freezer that does actually freeze.

Michael replied:

We have a 40L Engel and the wife (in charge of food for family during long trips) uses it as a freezer. We also have a normal eski with the thinks we like to keep cold and rotate icee bricks between the engel and eski a couple of times a day. We also put cans in the Engel (freezer mode) about half hour before we want them cold (eg cans of drink). Seems to work well, though not sure of the power requirements of doing such.