Upright Compressor fridges

Personally i would go with the compressor fridge. More efficient and safer. With our previous old caravan, we removed the three way and put in a 12/240 compressor fridge and used an 80 w solar panel as a portable when we stopped. It was an Engel (they don't seem to make uprights any more), and i could hear it at night. We were bush camping and rarely on mains power and it worked well.

Our present van has a Vitrifrigo (Danfoss compressor same as Waeco use), and you can't hear it working at all.

Even when we had a gas only fridge in a van, we would not light it.

Is the model you are considering one or two door? Our present Vitrifrigo fridge and the Engel in the previous camper both have an internal freezer box. We had no choice due to size of the model and where is has to fit. It is not a good substitute for a freezer and it is flimsy. If you possibly can, get the smallest model that has a separate door freezer.

Motherhen

Hi Wombat,
We had a three way fridge in our Phoenix and it was hopeless in the tropics. Replaced it with a Vitrifrigo, 150lt. two door, fitted three 130w. solar panels and have cold beer no matter what the outside temp. is.
Cheers, Nev.

A second vote for the Vitrifrigo, they also use the Danfoss compressor. Ours is a 120 litre 2 door unit. Make sure you ask about the Tropical rated model, they are more suited to our climate.

In the size fridge you are looking at Dometic do a "T" rated 3 way. They are brilliant. I have seen one hold 0 degrees in the fridge section on a day of 43.

Jim.

We have a 150L Virifrigo 2 door - seems an overall winner to date. Freezer section is top shelf - we have ordered a small battery powered fan that sits inside the fridge section - it is free standing - can be placed anywhere - helps to avoid warm/cold spots in there - ours did struggle a bit while mobile on the Nullabor at 43C but any fridge would I think. I would buy one again.
Re the 3 ways - as mentioned, there are devotees who swear that properly installed T rated models will handle the worst hot weather - many are not properly installed, and that may be where the poor reputation in hot weather has come from. I had to pick one - even though an extra s panel and a battery was required, the compressor won.

I have a 220l Waeco and have put insulation batts around between fridge and paneling. Makes a lot of difference to the efficiency. Had no trouble keeping cool before but reduced the power use by around 20% with the extra insulation.
Actually what i did was fix the batts to the paneling and put sisal insulation over that so that I had a surface to slide the fridge into place. Stuck it all place with duct tape.
Without the sisal was too difficult to get the fridge into place. The fridge is quite a tight fit.

Neil

We installed a 130L Victrofrigo with a remote compressor. That means there is no issue putting an extra 50mm of insulation all around the cabinet to reduce the power consumption.
It is also totally sealed within the vehicle - no external vent to let the dust in. You can NOT do that with a gas fridge.
Only way to go, provided you also have power to run it.

Cheers,
Peter

Hi
We gave up on 3 way fridges after having tried 3 of them in our previous caravans!
We now have a Waeco HDC 190ltr 2 door in our current van, and it just "works" as a fridge /freezer should, no levelling, no gas fumes, it just does the job effortlessly and quietly.

Could never go back to the old (or new) 3 way !

Yes you do need the battery capacity to power it, if, off road over night, but we have full solar so no worries there.

Hi Wombat,
Heres my personal experience with both types.

Contrary to most people on here we replaced the waeco 2 door 190 litre fridge/freezer which came with the van new because of its power consumption. We did have 2 x 64 watt solar panels and 2 x 100ah batteries but that was not enough for more than a couple of nights off road. the fridge made lots of noise as the battery level dropped, kept us awake, and we had to buy a gennie to charge the batteries and keep it running.

We had a a Dometic 3 way 184 litre 2 door installed as soon as we returned home which runs beautifully on all three power sourses but as yet havent tested it in the tropics. The temp inside is around zero in fridge cavity at all times. It is just the same as having our big domestic fridge/freezer at home.

We have had a wire put directly from car to fridge to use when travelling.
We use a 9kg gas bottle every 11 or 12 days (anywhere from $22 to $38 to refill or swap, depending where we are) but do use the gas oven, hot water and cooktop quite a lot too. For us it is perfect as we have freedom as to where we can stay now, but it may not suit you.

Which ever way you go, ensure that there is adequate insulation around the fridge and it is installed correctly as the person who did ours did a hopeless job despite being an authorised Dometic agent. We only discovered this recently when I asked our local RV repair place to check it because the cupboard next to it got hot. Have yet to follow this up with the person involved and Dometic.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Heather G