I have a 24 year old mini fridge that’s still alive and kicking. It’s a model that actually also has a freezer compartment.
I’ve been thinking about replacing it - especially since the freezer portion no longer works. But I was also curious how much more energy efficient fridge tech has gotten in the past 20 years? Like would I make up the cost of a new mini fridge pretty quickly based off the less power consumption?
I actually have one of those electricity monitors hooked up to it logging the data and I’m still kinda researching - but thought hey I’ll just ask c/nostupidquestions and maybe someone here might know right off the dome! Thanks in advance
I don’t have answer for you, but Alec over at Technology Connections made a video few days ago related to the topic. That might not have the answer for you either, but as his videos (and there’s a ton of those, even for refridgerators) are among of the best at youtube that is worth cheking out.
But as a rule of thumb, new materials and hardware are better on pretty much every metric. And if your current one doesn’t work properly anymore it’ll most likely uses way more power than it should, as coolant flow/insulation/something isn’t in fully working condition and thus compressor needs to run more often than on a new unit.
His videos have some good points but damn I hate his aloof presentation style.
I actually watched that a few days ago, main takeaway I got from it was NEVER use a mini fridge with a thermoelectric cooler rather than one with a real compressor.
Legally, those aren’t mini fridges.
Where do you live that they can’t be called mini fridges? I’m in California and Home Depot sells them here as mini fridges. It does say that it’s thermoelectric, but you have to look for it.
Most places have pretty strong requirements for things calling themselves refrigerators to be able to create and maintain a cold environment at food-safe temperatures.
TECs have a durability problem. They really want to be energized and left on at that power level. If you try to start cycling them to get different temperatures out of them they break down pretty quickly.
The difficulty in this is that refrigerators often need to step up for a while when you put something warm in the fridge. They really need to be able to run it different power levels which is not great for a single element TEC. So most little crappy for just can’t handle that. You could easily put multiple elements in a fridge and use that to create different power levels. I’m not sure if that’s what they’re doing but it would be one approach that would probably work. Then again maybe they just have poor durability in don’t care.
They are talking about those cheap “can coolers”. Usually holds a 6pack or so and fits on a desk. The small “dorm style” fridges in HD and lowes are actual fridges with coolant.
Difference between the manufacturer and some seller making a sign. If the Manufacturer is calling them “Mini-Fridge” on the packaging they are asking for a lawsuit