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Old 12-01-2012, 06:47 AM   #1
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Did you swap your Norcold 1200 for residential fridge?

These questions are for all the people who have swapped the Norcold or a residential fridge.

1. How much have you "traveled" with the new fridge and how is it holding up mechanically? Information available questions the longevity of residential fridges (welds, components, etc.), as they are not designed for the vibrations encountered while traveling down the road.

2. How is the residential fridge working out for you while boondocking? How long do you normally boondock? We boondock for two weeks at a time, and I'm concerned about the impact on my electrical system/needs.

3. What other changes are required to the coach (larger battery bank, etc) to support a residential fridge?

4. What did you do with your old fridge - in particular, the fridge doors? People sticking with the Norcold could use the old doors, as the seals on the doors are not replaceable.

Thanks for your feedback!
Heinz
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Old 12-01-2012, 07:03 AM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by H.Huester View Post
These questions are for all the people who have swapped the Norcold or a residential fridge.

1. How much have you "traveled" with the new fridge and how is it holding up mechanically? Information available questions the longevity of residential fridges (welds, components, etc.), as they are not designed for the vibrations encountered while traveling down the road.

2. How is the residential fridge working out for you while boondocking? How long do you normally boondock? We boondock for two weeks at a time, and I'm concerned about the impact on my electrical system/needs.

3. What other changes are required to the coach (larger battery bank, etc) to support a residential fridge?

4. What did you do with your old fridge - in particular, the fridge doors? People sticking with the Norcold could use the old doors, as the seals on the doors are not replaceable.

Thanks for your feedback!
Heinz
Swapped ours for a Samsung RF217.
1. It has traveled from central NY to the Florida Keys, about 3200 miles round trip twice with no problem other than the ice maker had to be replaced due to cubes knocking off a wire. Warranty replacement n/c. Nothing to do with traveling.
2. We don't boondock other than a night or two while in route and just leave it closed overnight and turn it off so I'm not much help with that.
3. Didn't change a thing. It will run fine on the 2000W inverter and 3 house batteries for the short periods we have tried. While the engine is running it will run all day.
4. The Norcold is in my garage for sale. It has a new cooling unit, fans, right hand door and the recall done. The problem is unless someone close by wants it the shipping would be tough to swallow.
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Old 12-01-2012, 07:19 AM   #3
paz
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Quote:
Originally Posted by H.Huester View Post
These questions are for all the people who have swapped the Norcold or a residential fridge.

1. How much have you "traveled" with the new fridge and how is it holding up mechanically? Information available questions the longevity of residential fridges (welds, components, etc.), as they are not designed for the vibrations encountered while traveling down the road.

2. How is the residential fridge working out for you while boondocking? How long do you normally boondock? We boondock for two weeks at a time, and I'm concerned about the impact on my electrical system/needs.

3. What other changes are required to the coach (larger battery bank, etc) to support a residential fridge?

4. What did you do with your old fridge - in particular, the fridge doors? People sticking with the Norcold could use the old doors, as the seals on the doors are not replaceable.

Thanks for your feedback!
Heinz
I swapped out our Norcold for a Samsung RF197 last February. The fridge is still working great.

1. We have traveled full-time for about 9 or 10 months now over 5,000 miles.

2. We don't boondock. We have a gasser with only two 6V batteries. Those batteries will run the fridge a couple of hours without shore power and without the engine running. The MH alternator will keep the batteries charged indefinitely while we're on the road.

3. Since we don't boondock, I chose not to add extra batteries. Adding batteries to a gasser is more difficult than most diesel pushers, but I could do it if I really wanted to. The only thing I did was run a line from our existing 1000W MSW inverter to the fridge. The Samsung will run on MSW.

4. I tried to sell the old fridge intact, and I actually found a buyer. However, he was not local, and like HD4Mark we found the shipping costs (especially since I would have had to pay someone to build a crate) to be prohibitive. I ended up selling the smaller parts (circuit board, heaters, ice maker, burner and valve, etc. to the guy who originally wanted to buy the whole thing. I cut the rest up and put it in the dumpster at the campground.
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Old 12-01-2012, 07:38 AM   #4
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We swapped the Norcold 1201 for a Samsung RF197 in February of 2011. Since then we've put on about 17,000 miles. The only electrical upgrade we did was change from three 12v house to four 6v house batteries. The reefer will run for about 25 - 26 hours and the battery bank is not below 50% SOC at that time. The four 6v bank has approx. 440AH. So we use an average of around 8.5amps DC per hour. We do turn the ice maker off to reduce amp draw.
We only boondock a night or two at a time so a daily recharge of the batteries is not a big issue for us.
Changing the reefer to residential has turned out to be a really great move for us.
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Old 12-01-2012, 10:16 AM   #5
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Swapped mine out 2 years ago. Works great after 16,000 miles and 340 days of use.
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