freezers?

[patandchickens]

So, I am working on talking my husband into getting a smallish chest freezer this year, mostly so we can raise some meat chickens (that is, so we can have them processed all at once) but also because it would make it far easier to save larger quantities of produce for winter.

While I can certainly see the appeal of a monster unit that would hold, like, half a cow, I think we might be better off with smaller. Although I had a *tiny* one in grad school, maybe 4-5 cu.ft.?, and it was awfully darn small and made a noticeable dent in the electricity bill. I dunno.

So, any wisdom on how size vs cost trade off? I don't want unneccessarily high operating expenses, but otoh a larger unit should keep the food longer during power outages, right?

Basically I think I'm soliciting people to ramble on about what
they do/don't like about their freezers - that would be really helpful


Thanks,

Pat

 

[silkiechicken]

I would go and see the energy ratings for different units. I know that hot water heaters often have energy raitings as they are a thing that runs year round too. Figure out how many cubic feet the machine is, and then figure out, should be on there somewhere, what's it's energy use is. Then just divide to find energy use per sq foot. We have one large size upright freezer... no idea how big, but I'd say I could put 4-5 people in it standing. I'd go for manual defrost too as that should keep your food better longer. Might be more upfront cost for a more insulated freezer, but in long run may save you on energy costs.

 

[miss_thenorth]

Freezers work best if they are really full, as opposed to fridges that need air circulation to be more efficient.

A really big one is only going to be efficient if you fill itright up to the top. A full- small freezer will be more "power outage" tolerant than an empty- big freezer. and yes--chest freezers are more efficient than upright, as in cold air is "heavier" so to speak, than hot air. So it makes more sense to have the door open up as opposed to open "out"

I think my freezer is 7.5 cubic meters. It is full .

I will be getting meat chickens and a pig in the spring, not to mention my garden, so another freezer is on the list. To my way of thinking, and also my dh',s it is better to have two smallish freezers than one large one. If one becomes empty--open it up and unplug it until you need it again.

Also, technology in the last # of years, has improved energy consumption.We also keep our freezer in the garage, so it rarely goes on in the winter.

Hope this helps...

 

[silkiechicken]

Very good points... no use in getting a big "efficent" freezer if you use two shelves. Ours is filled top to bottom with foods and ice by this time of year. By summer, it gets defrosted and repacked with stuff that gets butchered and harvested and the cycle starts all over again.

 

[patandchickens]

well, one can always fill empty space with jugs o water, right?

keep it coming, am appreciating the info and viewpoints!



Pat

 

[digitS']

Whenever I've looked at the cost of running a freezer, I'm always surprised how affordable it seems, Pat. I'm not sure how it could be cheaper to do much canning rather than freezing - even with blanching. Not a canner tho' so take that analysis with a grain of salt.

Would it surprise you that the gov'ment claims that a small, manual defrost upright uses right at one-half the energy as a auto-defrost upright of twice the size? No, I don't suppose that surprises anyone. The auto-defrost is an expensive feature and as others have said, the size of the unit should meet but not exceed your requirements. In the interest of economy, there's more than one reason for this.

The gov'ment also advises putting the freezer where it is cool as in a garage. My freezer is in the garage (or shop) but against the south wall. I wish this wasn't the case but there are benches and shelving and the doors on the other walls. Right now, I bet that thing hardly runs but in the Summer the shop gets darn warm. I try to get the door open in the late afternoon on hot days and have even set up a fan to cool it a little more quickly. Surely, this is costing some to run the fan but, at least, it takes some of the strain off the more expensive freezer.

I don't know the size but it is big enuf for one-half a beef and we buy one-quarter beef every Autumn and cram the freezer with veggies and meat for the Winter. In fact, it never seems to get much below half full but we are doing a lot of cycling in there thru the Summer.

I also put a fridge in the carport so it is essentially outside. It probably hasn't come on in the last 6 weeks or longer! The freezer in this fridge is one of those tiny, tiny ones at the bottom. The fridge is spacious and gets a LOT of use during the Summer with all the veggies.

The idea of freezer in an unheated building or even outdoors makes some sense here. Even tho' the days are very warm during Summer, the overnight temps drop . . . low humidity and clear skies! If you look at average daily temperatures only during July does that make it above 70 degrees F. Of course by then, it is above 70 indoors even with some AC. So you see, a freezer (or fridge) is working harder indoors than outdoors at any but about 3 weeks out of the year here.

Steve

 

[Reinbeau]

well, one can always fill empty space with jugs o water, right?

keep it coming, am appreciating the info and viewpoints!



Pat

That's exactly what we do. We've frozen probably two dozen two-liter coke bottles full of water - we use them in the cooler when we go back and forth to Maine (we shop in NH, much cheaper than MA, and it works out for us because we try to get to the Maine house every other weekend).

I went with a medium sized freezer, but I also went by the Energy Star rating. I barely noticed a change in my electric bill, literally I think it was less than $2.00 a month. Well worth it!

 

[Rosalind]

Important note: Keep the coils clean. Position the freezer somewhere you can dust the coils. Some freezers are designed for looks, and place the coils in bad spots where you cannot get to them to clean them properly. Do not get one of these. Make sure the coils are accessible and can be cleaned. You'd be amazed what gets in there.

--Says the scientist whose -80C freezer was down for three weeks, thereby inducing panic in the lab group whose purified protein and gene constructs were archived therein.

 

[patandchickens]

Ha! Good point Rosalind, thank you.

I once had several large-fridge-sized growth chambers which we 'cleverly' installed in sort of an alcove in the room, which of course had to be emptied of cultures and pulled aaalllll the way out every time they required any servicing in their hinderparts. Nothing as serious as losing a lab freezer though!


Pat

 

[silkiechicken]

Talk about lab freezers going down. We have boxes upon boxes of antibodies that people are afraid to use after the last thaw... At least it was just one 4C freezer, and not one of the -80's! If a -80 went down, no idea where we'd take the stuff to store, at least we have a cold room to put the stuff if the 4C goes down.

What kind of lab do you all work in? I'm in biochemistry.