AC/DC Fridge Switching question

[ShaneOnYou]

Goodevening all... Hope everyone is gearing up for another fantastic season in our neck of the woods and to you southern boaters, I am jealous.. But that's for another time..

I have a question I was hoping to get some advice on..

I am getting a pool of water on the bottom drawer of my fridge... The freezer is under that so its not ice melting...

Had a tech look at it today and he told me the fridge dosent get cool enough on DC, and that's what's causing condensation to drip... He suggested I shut off the DC switch as my Genny is on when I run 90% of the time anyway and i can flip the switch on in the event I'm not running it...

Doesn't make sense to me... when I'm plugged into shore power or my Genny is on shouldn't the fridge automatically switch to AC?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated..

Thanks
- Andrew


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[av8ingtom]

Not sure about your electrical panel, but I have a rocker switch on the 12 volt DC side for the refrigerator , and a rocker switch on the 120 volt AC side. Must pick correct rocker switch on my electric panel. It is true that the refrigerator works so much better on 120 volt AC

 

[ShaneOnYou]

Yeah but shouldn't the fridge automatically take the stronger current... When I'm plugged into shore power shouldn't it use that if both rockers are on?


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[gerryb]

When you are under AC power (either at the dock or via genny) the fridge's power supply will use the AC voltage. When there is no voltage, the unit (through a relay) will switch over to DC power. Test to see if it is running at all under DC power when you are not connected dockside and no genny running, or just turn the AC switch off for the fridge at the panel. The way the power supply works, it either will be working, or not working. If the technician implied that it is not running as cold on DC voltage, that is probably NOT CORRECT INFO from him assuming your batteries are good. Had a power supply go bad like this (didn't work on DC) and it turned out to be a $ .99 rectifier that blew out.

 

[av8ingtom]

I have never tried leaving both switches turned on. I always switch to AC when on generator or shore power. You may have a switch that does it automatically, and I have really never looked,into why they would have an AC and DC switch for the refrigerator.

 

[Mike Blake]

I was told NOT to run the fridge with both power switches on.

 

[nickdcj7]

idk if it varies from one brand to another, but the norcold manuals say it will automatically switch. I always left both on with my 250da and never had any issue (other than one time draining the battery when i forgot to switch on the shore power main), and so far i've done the same for the 390.

 

[Boater420]

I have the original Norcold cockpit fridge and a new Vitrifrigo in the cabin. Both are auto switching as they sense which current is available, AC or DC. If no AC is detected they switch to DC. In the panel I leave both breakers in the ON position whether I'm in the marina or on the hook.

When leaving the marina, as soon as I disconnect shore power, the fridges both switch to battery (DC). If I fire up the Genny, they both switch back to AC.

I've had a similar situation with the new Vitrifrigo where the bottom of the fridge is wet. I believe this was due to weak batteries not being able to keep up with the draw from the fridge. The batteries were replaced and now the fridge works equally as well using AC and DC.

As a rule I would always run the fridge on AC whenever it's available, either at the marina or while the Genny is running.