WonderFridge

[JimiQ]

I don't really know where to put this and I didn't want to start a new thread, so there it goes.

I stumbled upon an article about cooling fridge compressor by condensation drip from freezer coils.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...14157X17300813

I thought it would interest someone. They managed to loweer the consumption by nearly 10%

[ecomodded]

That is interesting it has me thinking could increase the gains by using a heat sink fitted compressor shell so it never gets hot in the first place increasing the cooling efficiency.

Ideally the hot air should be vented away from the fridge straight from the compressor and condenser

[Piwoslaw]

Originally Posted by ecomodded

Ideally the hot air should be vented away from the fridge straight from the compressor and condenser

I once thought about using a small fan to blow air over the coils and/or compressor, but I guess the improved efficiency would hardly outweigh the fan's power consumption.

[JimiQ]

Originally Posted by Piwoslaw

I once thought about using a small fan to blow air over the coils and/or compressor, but I guess the improved efficiency would hardly outweigh the fan's power consumption.

If you'd be able to start/stop the fan in sync with compressor running, it wouldn't consume as much as running nonstop. Also, depends on the fan

I had laptop cooling pad blowing air on coils, but it got dirty from dust and cat hair (stupid animals ). The consumption of whole system basically didn't change (the cooling pad ran of USB-outlet - like phone charger)

[u3b3rg33k]

Originally Posted by JimiQ

I don't really know where to put this and I didn't want to start a new thread, so there it goes.

I stumbled upon an article about cooling fridge compressor by condensation drip from freezer coils.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...14157X17300813

I thought it would interest someone. They managed to loweer the consumption by nearly 10%

AFAIK virtually all modern (American) frost-free fridges/freezers dump the condensate to a drip pan with some condenser piping in said pan. this serves to mange condensate without a pump/drain, and also boosts the efficiency of the system (notwithstanding poorly managed evaporator defrost strategies).

[JimiQ]

Originally Posted by u3b3rg33k

AFAIK virtually all modern (American) frost-free fridges/freezers dump the condensate to a drip pan with some condenser piping in said pan. this serves to mange condensate without a pump/drain, and also boosts the efficiency of the system (notwithstanding poorly managed evaporator defrost strategies).

but is said drip pan thermally connected to compressor/coils? Because mine was plastic with only 1cm squared direct connection to compressor, otherwise there was like 2mm air gap. So I removed the pan completely - even if something drips, it won't touch electric wiring, and I put different collector under the fridge, so nothing spill on the floor

[u3b3rg33k]

for example:


i've also seen it where the tubing "U"s down into the drip pan area. i don't think they used to do it for added efficiency, i think it purely for condensate management.

[JimiQ]

I finally got around to tuning my fridge a bit more:
1) I have installed two old PC fans (free, I haven't used them anymore) connected to molex-PC fan reduction ($1-$2) connected to USB-molex reduction ($0,6), connected to outlet-USB adapter (free with old cell phone)
2) installed insulated box around outlet of evaporator from freezer and inlet of evaporator (before expansion valve). It should work as subcooling heat exchanger (albeit the heat is exchanged by air, so not a big deal)
First measure lowered consumption from 0,7kWh/day (fridge is 8 years old, long are gone times when it consumed around 0,54kWh/day) to 0,53kWh/day
Second measure is on edge of rounding error of 0,03kWh/day (to just barely under 0,5kWh/day) so it's probably not working as intended. Unfortunately there is no way to connect the two pipes that I'm trying to cool/heat by each other

[Piwoslaw]

Nice reduction!

Would you have any pictures?

[JimiQ]

Sure, but it’s ugly as hell


I’m sorry if the pics are too large