Obviously with today's electricity prices it would use more than $5 per year but even doubled it is extremely cheap.
My issue with the concept is space and convenience. My upright fridge is about this size but it would take up too much space in my kitchen on its side. Worse again that you can't keep anything on top because that's where the door is.
But more crucially, with a chest freezer you can only easily access the stuff on top. If something is a few levels down you have to move a lot of stuff to access it. I wish they came with shelves that cantilevered out like a toolbox, or a vertical lid on rails that lifted like a drawer
Plus, a horizontal fridge is just… convenient. You can’t even put things on top of a vertical fridge.
source: my lost ice pops
At least, I'm hoping that's what they meant. If they really meant horizontal and vertical in the way they used it then I've got no idea either.
"Plus, a horizontal fridge is just… convenient. You can’t even put things on top of a vertical fridge."
Don't they mean a horizontal fridge is a chest fridge? Which would make it sound like they want their whole comment to be in support of a chest fridge? Which is why none of it makes any sense to me.
I mean, I have one of these as a meat freezer, and sometimes I put things on top of it, and then my wife gets mad at me and moves that thing somewhere because otherwise nobody can open it.
Things on top of my vertical fridge on the other hand (my cat for example), can stay there indefinitely.
They are good to store something you're not accessing all the time though, like frozen berries etc.
It’s already pretty inconvenient to get something out of the back of a traditional fridge that is completely full.
They periodically live with us because they're quite old at this point, and my wife and I have already discussed replacing our fridge/freezer combo with a standalone fridge and switching solely to a chest freezer in the mudroom just so they stop doing this with the freezer, too.
The freezer is almost entirely for things already in boxes anyway. Frozen wontons, frozen ice cream cones, microwaveable meals, frozen blocks of fish. It's all easy to organize in a chest freezer.
I'd never considered a chest fridge before, and if I didn't have a wife and kids, as of today I'd be seriously considering it. As it is, can't trust kids not to make an inaccessible mess of something like that, and wife wouldn't like the kitchen arrangement becoming wonky. Though the fridge's current position makes it clear a previous owner didn't understand anything about kitchen layouts when they remodeled a MCM home.
Maybe I could put a chest fridge there with cabinetry above (gap between), and then some place we currently have cabinets all the way to the floor, remove the bottom and put in another chest fridge.
Might be something to consider once we've fixed all the supreme fuckups previous owners did.
A door that opens outwards uses space that has to be clear anyway because that's where you walk. A door that opens upwards takes space that could have been used for another appliance or storage, or the upper half of a fridge twice the size.
The only way round that would be for it to be able to slide outwards, but that's also inconvenient.
Having said all that, they are a great idea if you have the space.
No doubt that a chest fridge would be more efficient on paper, but it’s far more inconvenient for everyday use. I would question if the efficiency gains are lost by all the time you’d spend with it open digging around for stuff.
Thus, vertical refrigerators and freezers absolutely dominate.
In a city appartement where floor space is scarce, convenience is a key feature and power costs barely nothing, it is a less obvious choice.
Please note I am disputing his science on the efficacy of a vertical fridge.
That said, most of the thermal mass in the fridge is the food, and after that probably the shelving, so as long as the seals aren't blown, the turnover of air on opening isn't a huge deal.
The convenience is not as easy to quantify, but I would bet that an experiment would quickly point out that chest fridges are terrible for elderly, children, and anyone with reduced mobility. I'd hypothesise that even able bodied people would get annoyed when they are cooking — I know I would be.
The fridge is a Dometic CFX 35 which opens at the top and tends to allow for getting at things without losing a lot of cooling. At first, it was also nice to be able to set things on it or use it as a seat (horizontal surfaces are the biggest hard-to-find in a camper van) but that became annoying when needing snacks or other quick access. So I recently built a small cabinet with a pull-out slider on which the fridge lives. Then, I always have the top storage but don’t need to move anything to get at the fridge, but can also briefly use the fridge as a footrest or similar.
There is no doubt its better thermally just because cold air falls out the front of a normal fridge/freezer and huge amounts of energy are wasted everytime you open the door. A chest design looses considerably less of its cooled air but its also a lot more awkward to use and ends up less floor space efficient.
a: space.
A standup fridge freezer is floor space efficient.
How much rent is the chest freezer using per year :)
Made up numbers 10k for 1000sqft
10 per sq ft
So say $40 a year in rent. Still not too bad I guess
Even if we ignore the pain, there is no way to organize food in a chest freezer effectively. To reach items on the bottom one must remove all the food that sits above it. This wastes time and effort that could better be spent on other things. Meaning the opportunity cost is too high, even if it saves me money on electricity.
Edit: I’m actually kind of into the Bioresonant t-shirt. It’d be good for a Phish show.
If you're using the freezer for a meal, you're probably pulling out frozen fish and nothing else, or a microwaveable meal, or something. You are't pulling out carrots, bok choy, pork, milk, cheese, etc. So put it outside the kitchen. A freezer is for storage. A kitchen is for food preparation. Not the same task.
Edit: looks like a few chest freezers have a "fridge" setting, which sounds like the easiest way to do this for those interested (maybe)
Drawers.
Edit: On a reread, I'm guessing you were talking about individual refrigerated drawers? Multiple drawers in a single insulated box (as I interpreted it) could work though, as it would have less exterior surface area, use less insulation for the same thermal resistance and useable volume and have a single cooling unit, which might be more efficient. It would also fit existing fridge alcoves.
rcfox's criticism from 2009 still stands (6 points, 2 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=865991
“The pneumatic fridge works with air compression,” she says. “You step on the button and it pops up and the racks spin like a lazy Susan. Cold air is heavy so it stays cold.”" https://www.thestar.com/life/home-and-garden/paula-lishman-a...
That entire place is mind-bending.
Air doesn't have much mass, right? How much energy does it actually cost to cool the air in a fridge? (vs the solid parts of the fridge, and the food)
Looks like the OP's fridge uses 10-20x less power than a typical fridge, is that entirely due to the air not spilling out?
Their protective coating (called the bloom, I believe?) goes away when that happens, and they become susceptible to salmonella when they stay at room temperature.
Washing the egg removes the poo and the coating.
No source provided and this may just be some myth.
This includes salmonella, which may be present if your flock is infected in the poop on the outside of the shell (remember hens only have one egress port), plus any other sources of environmental pathogens, of which there are many.
When the bloom is washed off the egg, pathogens have an easier time penetrating the shell and consuming the nutritious yummy bits inside. At room temperature, they can multiply rapidly. Refrigeration slows the rate of growth.
An unwashed egg retains the barrier, and stays fresh longer without refrigeration.
YMMV on household acceptance of dirty eggs on countertops, but they are cleaner than many other items within arms' reach that we are conditioned to not think about. :)
Just as elevator doors won't crush a person due to sensors and such.
The cleaning part is an interesting question.
Also, is that a big bottle of maple syrup the fridge?