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BennieH · 07-17-2016, 12:50 PM

Give them a call and leave a message. They are good at getting back to you and you can see when he has times.
Phone: 260-768-4067

SCVJeff · 09-05-2016, 02:19 PM

Late to the thread so hopefully the OP is done by now. I replaced the 1200 cooling unit with a Pines RV Helium unit sold through David Force. I had two friends help pull it onto a prebuilt platform the sale height as the installed height. It came out reasonably fast, but we took our time removing the old unit and installing the new one. Once in and sealed, they left me to my apparently painfully slow and perfectly methodical rewire and neatening up of the wiring. I also installed an ARP at the same time, replaced the fans with IP55 rated quieter fans, etc. they came back 2 days later to reinstall. If you're not as anal as I'm accused of being then I would say 5 medium slow hours start to finish, including lunch.

So far this Helium is great. It is WAY better built than the factory, which is amazing they they haven't learned anything. It cools faster, stays colder in hotter external temps, and it's juice won't burn. I still say if Norcold haven't been such knuckleheads about their design and Helium was around as a refrigerant 15 years ago, there would be no such thing as a residential fridge in an RV

BennieH · 09-05-2016, 03:30 PM

SCVJeff,
Glad to hear you are happy with it. Ours has been great since the replacement. You are right that its too bad Norcold and Dometic haven't gotten their acts together.

Tom Lopez · 09-06-2016, 07:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SCVJeff

Late to the thread so hopefully the OP is done by now. I replaced the 1200 cooling unit with a Pines RV Helium unit sold through David Force. I had two friends help pull it onto a prebuilt platform the sale height as the installed height. It came out reasonably fast, but we took our time removing the old unit and installing the new one. Once in and sealed, they left me to my apparently painfully slow and perfectly methodical rewire and neatening up of the wiring. I also installed an ARP at the same time, replaced the fans with IP55 rated quieter fans, etc. they came back 2 days later to reinstall. If you're not as anal as I'm accused of being then I would say 5 medium slow hours start to finish, including lunch.

So far this Helium is great. It is WAY better built than the factory, which is amazing they they haven't learned anything. It cools faster, stays colder in hotter external temps, and it's juice won't burn. I still say if Norcold haven't been such knuckleheads about their design and Helium was around as a refrigerant 15 years ago, there would be no such thing as a residential fridge in an RV

Why did you feel the arp system was necessary since the helium will not burn?

MSHappyCampers · 09-06-2016, 10:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tom Lopez

Why did you feel the arp system was necessary since the helium will not burn?

Tom, I just talked with Junior at JC Refrigeration who manufacturers the unit about your question. He says that even though there is no fire danger with the helium-filled units, you still need the ARP to prevent the cooling unit from being damaged from overheating if the RV is bad out of level!

SCVJeff · 09-06-2016, 11:22 AM

What Joe said..

As I mentioned in the other thread where you asked this question, the ARP was never designed to be a failsafe for these fridges and they repeat that over and over again for obvious legal reasons. This thing started life according to them because they were wiping out their own refridgators when parking in unlevel areas. How sensitive Helium is to parking unlevel I have no idea, but I got this to protect the fridge from its owner and to have secondary fan control of aux fans when the primary fans cannot keep up, as well as the temp display.

The ARP controls the fans shown in the picture. I turn them at 50% max speed so they are completely dead silent and draw very little current, moving a lot of air. Drawing air OUT is way better than trying to force air IN from the bottom

LVJ58 · 09-06-2016, 11:45 AM

In August 2012, had the cooling unit in our 1200LRIM replaced with an Amish unit while in Birch Bay WA by a mobile technician who charged $375. Of course I helped him get it in and out of the enclosure. Gave him $400 for his service which I thought was well worth it.

The cooling unit cost was $1,090.00 which included shipping to Birch Bay. New unit works great...