Tuesday, August 27, 2019

Unboxing the Knox Electric Cooler/Warmer 48 quart/ 45 Liter

So I will now post a lot of photos since this is an official "unboxing" - not my usual Goodwill run.

First of all I did an earlier post on why I chose to buy this cooler. This is definitely a "business" investment, meaning also a deduction.

Hint: I've got the cooler "running" now off my off-grid lithium battery Chafon rechargeable generator. So I'll see how cool it gets in a couple hours.

So here's the box. Fridge (as it says on the outside packing box) may be "over-stating" their case. I'll give it 4 hours to get down to 40 degrees Fahrenheit. Still it should be below 40 to really be a "fridge" I think.



So first thing I did out of the box was try out the "wheeling" and it was ok. No immediate sensation of discomfort! So that was a good sign.


Now a bit of fore-shadowing. Hidden in this photo is the power switch and light.... but they DON'T TELL YOU WHERE!!

oops.



It's actually not "as big" as a standard cooler. But it's definitely big enough and bigger than most of these thermoelectric "chillers."

You'll notice that it uses less power through direct DC. So it must then have a DC motor but Alas - my 3 amp DC inputs did not power this device. You can do the math - it's 4 amps to run it. My 3 amp plug ins - I thought they go higher. But apparently that's just their fuse limit as 4 amps. oops. I will need then to double check the DC plug on the car battery to make sure it works. For now I'm just running it on AC power.

The instructions are just a couple pages - saying don't turn the cooler upside down. Also to make sure the power is off before plugging it in. Luckily it was as I just plugged it in before I checked the power switch. And here's the real kicker - the instructions neglect to say precisely WHERE the power switch is!! Turns out you have to make sure to "turn" the cheap cover that hides the cord - ALL the way to the "open" to then reveal the hiding power switch. And you think you're gonna break the cheap cover off (and maybe you are in short order).

And voila!! Power. Green means cooling. To switch to heating  you have to leave it in the "off" mode for 30 minutes or something. Yeah says wait at least 30 minutes. So that's about it for the directions.

So now it's running off the generator. The fan is loud enough to have me convinced that this thing will really get cool. It feels like it's cranking out cool temperature into the cooler. The lid does not have any latch so you just have to trust that the weight of the fan-cooler motor is keeping the lid down (and it seems to be securely shut). Makes me wanna double check to be sure. But I don't see how it could be open as the motor is pretty heavy. The lid "latches" in - there's a clicking sound as you push the plastic in....

So I DO have a temperature gauge that fits into the cooler and it's been a half hour. So now I will check to see what the reading is.....Wow - an impressive 55 degrees Fahrenheit! That means it cooled down almost 20 degrees in a half hour. Now down to 51 degrees in less than an hour!! Pretty amazing. So in an hour it got down to 47 degrees from a room temperature of 74 degrees. I had left the battery on for the temperature gauge - forgetting that the cold would drain the battery! Oops. So now the gauge is out - and I'll wait for it to heat up while the cooler keeps going down. We're NOW at 47 degrees and it's been an hour 15 minutes. So at two hours I've been at a steady 45 to 44 degrees Fahrenheit, although opening up the cooler immediately kicks hit in. I put in some food to make it more efficient - pre-chilled from the frig. It didn't bring it down to 40. Maybe if I filled it with pre-chilled food then I could hit 40.
If the fridge is still at or below 40 °F, or the food has been above 40 °F for only 2 hours or less, it should be safe to eat.
So I'll have to put an ice pack in there to get it below 40.

Also says don't drop it and don't obstruct the fan opening on the top.

So far I'm very impressed with this device even though I have not done a temperature check. Not sure I have a thermometer that will work for this. But at least I can just do a subjective hand test between the actual refrigerator and this "fridge" as the shipping box called it.

This cooler will hold POUNDS of mushrooms. I'm very happy with this size - as it should be big enough for a decent harvest delivery.


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