Refrigeration Condenser In Steel Boat Solution

[Silver]

I am trying to improve the efficiency and lessen power consumption of my air cooled electric fridge. Sea temperature in my area is around 25oC.

As the compressor is sitting in the hot engine room I was thinking about fitting a water cooled condenser without replacing the whole system. I looked at some systems on the market and the sellers on boatshows always want to sell a complete set including the compressor. That would maybe improve the performance. Who has tried this?

Since I have a steel boat another thought was to just weld a length of pipe to the hull interior and use it as a condenser since the hull is cooled by the surrounding seawater. In other words a keel cooler/heat exchanger without through-hulls. I am wondering if the existing compressor could be used with this simple "hullcondenser" ?

Has anybody tried this yet?

[Istioploos]

I converted my electrical refrigerator this way several years ago. My boat is plastic so I bought a heat-sink which had to be installed through the hull. I did not get a new compressor but modified the old one by adding tubing to the heat-sink and back. Although I had originally disabled the fan motor I re-enabled it after few months. This way I get maximum cooling.

Good luck in your project. It should work.