Wasting precious electricity on the frig when its freezing outside!

[pertnear]

When I was sitting in my living room here in Texas I got a cell phone call from my brother saying that if power didn't come back on soon he was taking his venison out of the freezer & setting it outside. We both laughed but thinking about it later, I remember seeing an old DIY show where someone installed a vent/thermostat/fan that actually brought cold air into the refrigerator from outside when the conditions were right. I'd say not worth the trouble here, but is that something common for my Northern brothers? It seem like all refrigerators ought to have a knock-out on the back where such a scheme could be set up as an option(?)

Just wondering....

[Bulldogger]

I recall seeing an episode of Alaska the Great Frontier and their freezers are on their front porches, not plugged in. It's not impossible.
BDGR

[Texas by God]

I have two refrigerators/freezers in my shop, and all the bottled water inside both is frozen. So I’m bringing the bottles in the house as needed to thaw them out. I think that I could unplug them for a couple of days and get away with it!
We’re on boil water notice- coffee counts as boiled water, right?

[Ural Driver]

NO! Ya still need to boil the water first......it takes two minutes at a rolling boil to kill bacteria.

[Mal Paso]

Air cooled pantries used to be more common, fire regulations got a lot of them.

[Shawlerbrook]

Also, root cellars used to be common.

[John Wayne]

I've often wondered why you couldn't duct in ice cold air to the fridge with a small fan and out again.

[Scrounge]

When I was sitting in my living room here in Texas I got a cell phone call from my brother saying that if power didn't come back on soon he was taking his venison out of the freezer & setting it outside. We both laughed but thinking about it later, I remember seeing an old DIY show where someone installed a vent/thermostat/fan that actually brought cold air into the refrigerator from outside when the conditions were right. I'd say not worth the trouble here, but is that something common for my Northern brothers? It seem like all refrigerators ought to have a knock-out on the back where such a scheme could be set up as an option(?)

Just wondering....

The back room in my house (used to be a back porch) is also my workshop. We've been storing extra gallons of milk out there this week. Pulled the last gallon in last night, as it started warming up a bit yesterday, and today, it's up to 40 degrees F in there. It was around 20 a couple of days ago. Soil here is about 6" deep, at best. This is Tornado Alley, and cellars are rare here because the bedrock is tough enough to be hard to excavate in, but not tough enough to make a good shelter, or root cellar.

[BJK]

Maine here. We do that frequently if we have too much for the freezer. To cool something down rapidly, well, there's a lot more cold outside in the winter than I can make with electricity.

During a long duration power outage it's also common to get the coolers and take things out of refrigeration. Refrigerated stuff needs to be kept cool but from freezing and frozen stuff needs to be kept frozen. That can require moving coolers around day and night. Or that's what I did in years past. I'm too prepared to be bothered with that now.

For years I've thought about making an aluminum "box" upright cabinet (lockable against animals) to use as a freezer. I never have though.

[blackthorn]

You might be a red neck if----the stuff in your "freezer" actually resides in the trunk of your car.

[pertnear]

I remember a co-worker that had worked on the Alaskan pipeline saying he opened a window & set his beer outside on the ledge to get it cooled down quick. He said no more than 5 minutes or the cans would freeze solid!

[MaryB]

I set gallon jugs 3/4 full of water outside to freeze and rotate them thru the fridge during a power outage. Saves on battery draw from the solar setup. Move everything from the fridge freezer to one of the deep freezers that I rotate power to 4 times a day. I use wireless freezer thermometer so I can monitor temps and see if one needs power.

[GARD72977]

I've often wondered why you couldn't duct in ice cold air to the fridge with a small fan and out again.

That would be fine until the temp warms up to 60 degrees before you thought about it

[DocSavage]

Ages ago I suggested to one of the local gas station convenience stores that he'd be smart if he had a thermostat control on his coolers to pump cold outside air on days where the outside temp went below 32°f/0°c to keep stuff cold. Granted it would only be useful from Nov to Mar but it could save him on his electric bill.

[Hick]

Around Thanksgiving through New Years we put all the leftovers out on the table in our enclosed back porch. We just open all the windows and use it as a walk-in freezer

[CastingFool]

I usually wait till the outside temp is steady on the teens or lower. Then, move all the stuff from the freezer to our breezeway, then thaw out the freezer. Sometimes, I use a heat gun to speed things up, too.

[David2011]

I have two refrigerators/freezers in my shop, and all the bottled water inside both is frozen. So I’m bringing the bottles in the house as needed to thaw them out. I think that I could unplug them for a couple of days and get away with it!
We’re on boil water notice- coffee counts as boiled water, right?

Around Thanksgiving 2016 I was living and working away from home in a small town near Lubbock when a strong Arctic front came through. I was in the Houston area at the time. When I returned I found that everything in the fridge had frozen. The soft drinks exploded and made a huge mess. Glad I wasn’t there trying to stay warm during that!

Now that I’m retired I’m going back to personal rule #1: If I have to wear shoes it’s too danged cold. Failed that this past week but got lucky. Only one pipe break and that was in the laundry room. Had to have a plumber fix it for $195 because I couldn’t buy $3 worth of copper fittings. The entire state is sold out of 1/2” and 3/4” copper everything.

[Geezer in NH]

I feel real bad when I have to send my wife of almost 50 years to fetch a beer from the cooler (so they don't freeze) onto the below zero porch to get me a cold beer. I do tell her to wear her sweater.

[Lionel Allen]

Was talking to an electrician and as we were swapping stories he told me about o e of his customers who has a rural grocery store. He said the freezers were in an insulated garage. The heat from the freezers was keeping the garage warm enough to store other non freezable items indoors. Claimed the guy didn't need to run auxiliary heat.
No idea how it would have fared with the cold snap we just went through: couple of weeks in the -30's.

[gwpercle]

Our electricity went of for a while ... I decided it was time to leave our cold house and go anywhere with heat ... the thermometer in the refrigerator had a higher temperature than the kitchen !
I held the refrigerator door open to let some of that warmer air into the kitchen ... that's Insane !
When it's warmer in the refrigerator than in the house ... it's time to go South..or at least to a place with a working furnace !
Cajuns must not have any Eskimo DNA ... we don't tolerate the cold well at all ...
I swear I will never complain about the heat and humidity in Louisiana ever again .
Gary