Two/Zone

Duncs,
I've seen those and I agree with you that it is a bit pricey. It looks like it should cost $59.99 - but I guess eveyone wants to be a milionaire. I would buy one, and I guess every one who owns an Engel would too, but at that price- no way. If the marketer had half a brain they would lower the price to a realistic level and sell 20 times the volume.

If something is designed to hold a 40 litre volume and operate efficiently how is it that you can then double its volume and expect it to operate to the same capacity without having a detremental effect???????

Just thinking out loud!

Where have ya been Duncs, they have been out for about 18mth to 2yrs now. If you have any ingenuity you can screw/nail 4 pieces of timber (30mm thick) together to achieve the same at a fraction of the cost. And yes it does work.

i'm glad you asked that question Duncs cos i was going to ask the same question a while ago but didn't want the snide remarks for asking a normal sort of question ..(which this forum IS supposed to be all about..helping people and not making them look like idiots.. and thats why i haven't become a member yet).. i don't see the value for money in the dual zone either.. maybe they are trying to cost it to a new engel.. dunno.. anyway my way of thinking was if you really was keen on getting one, then use a small fan on a solar panel or on battery to circulate the air inside the compartment to use the colder air in the bottom to keep the upper stuff cold.. just my thought pal.. hope it helps..

Cheers.. Dodgy..

keep your whistle wet and your powder dry.. ;-)

Duncs,

I am dubious. I reckon cold falls, it doesn't rise. Therefore it has to be bloody cold in the bottom for it to get even remotely cold in the uncooled top. Simple physics I feel.

You may consider what I did. Sold my old Engel 39L for $650, put $350 to that and got a Waeco CF80 from The Fridgeshop for $990 delivered. Now I've got a fair dinkhum 82 litre fridge for the cost of a 39L with a 21L plastic "box" sitting on top of it.

Just an option.

Goos Luck,

Jim.

duncs,
Are you aware if the Engle 40 Litre and the 60? litre use the _Exact_ same size compressor ??
If they don't, ask yourself why not, and that may give you a few answers.....

I also don't believe it is realistic to add another 20ltr fridge capacity without adding any extra cooling capacity, remember all the cooling is at the bottom of the fridge and the new area has no cooling at all, as cool air sinks and hot air rises, to turn the cooling up will only cost you heaps of battery power.
Engel made the fridge to work as it is, without any extra capacity added on, they did not make extra cooling allowment for an add on 20 litre capacity, just my own thoughts.

Hi Duncs,

Well we'll put our hand up, we have got one. Yes we thought the price was a bit high, but at the end of the day it just clips on and is a done and finished job.

This is where we are at to this stage.

When we first got it we found that it wasnt stacking the cold, so I rung Arron at 2 zone ( couldn't meet a more helpful person)

We then discovered that the 2 zone wasnt sealing where it attached to the engel, arron offered to send another on over, but I told him, rather than go through the pain I would fix it here(which I did)

From there we did a little testing, firstly without the 2 zone on the engel.

To have the 2 zone compartment cold (0-2 deg) our engel has to be set at about -12.5

At the moment here we are having temperatures of 35 degrees (we in NQ)

The engel without the 2 zone on it was running 14 minutes and off for 4 minutes.
(give or take 10 secs)

When we cliped on the 2 zone we found the fridge after about an hour was running nearly the same as it was without the 2 zone, if anything it run approx 10 the 15 secs longer. the engel was -12.5 deg and the 2 zone was 2 deg

Ok I dont want to get into a debate with any of these legends kicking around.

From info that we had available to us the 40 ltr and 60 ltr have the same compressor.
The 60 ltr draws a bit more current because of more capacity.

With the 2 zone it is similar,its going to draw more because you have to set the engel a bit lower in cooling to get the 2 zone area down.

The principle of the 2 zone is that it relies on the cold air stacking as the temp comes down.

We have found it to be a great thing, if we want to take a 60ltre fridge bush we clip on the 2 zone, if we are not going for as long we just take the engel.

We run it off a second battery Cranking one (shock horror) N70zz or something like that and one of those dreaded redarc systems hahahahaha. It will run the fridge with the 2 zone on it for 24 hours in 30-35deg temp before the battery is down to 11.8 volts.

We have only got one 40watt solar at the moment and we havent tried it with the 2 zone yet, ( still trying to desifer the info thats out there on solar panels) it is more than likely we will need another 40 watt panel to maintain the battery.

When we never had the 2 zone, and travelling around the gulf country up here we would get approx 2 days (11.4) without starting the vehicle.

but as I said before it because your asking the fridge to run colder its going to draw more.

We except that because with the outside temp being 35 and the fridge at -12.5 that is getting close to maximising the fridges capabilities ie 50 below ambient temp.

I hope this helps a bit as before we got one, we asked in the forums and it was hard to get any info from people who actually had one.

Its easy to say get a 60 ltr one, but these fridges are a big investment to start with, so we had to make do with what we got. The other thing is our vehicle is setup to how we want it and going a bigger fridge was going to upset our floor plan, with the 2 zone we were able to go upwards without any probs.

Cheers

Please note this is our actual experience not taken from written literature.

The 40 litre engel can only draw a maximum of 2.7 amps an hour regardless of what you stick on it,or even if you leave the lid right off.
Still not to bad when the 60 litre engel can suck around 4.5 maximum amps per hour, but l would think that it would rarely run to its maximum ?
Thats the way l see it duncs but l may be wrong as i'm only hacker.
I reckon though that any product that can keep my fish frozen on the bottom and my beer at 2 degrees on top has to be a good thing .

Hi Duncs

I've gotta agree with Nebster on all counts the 2zone works bloody well mate. I thought the $$ was exe so i spoke to one of there guys at a show last year he showed me a cut away and some pics the shi#%$#%#% its made of is bullet proof not just some cheap chinese Cra#%$#%$ that lasts 2 second.

Anyway I love mine and so does me missus.

Cheers

Freeexplorer69 still on the road..

Thanks to all who replied, especially Nebster.

It is nice to hear from someone who uses the product and is satisfied. The fact that no one who owns one has replied in the negative suggests that tehy are OK.

As to where I've been for the last couple of years the answer is simple Broken Hill. The guy in the shop who had it on display said he has been trying to find them for about 18 months following an enquiry from some one passing through town.

Duncs