Quote:
Originally Posted by DavGoodlin
I can no longer remain silent about this heinous baloney.
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I agree completely. Perhaps I'd better be careful, lest I really get worked up into a lather about this sort of thing.
One of the electrical utilities around here is running a "turn in your energy hog" campaign. Their plan is collect old refrigerators that are still working and give the owner a little bit of cash for them (about $30 or so).
I'm not sure what they expect someone to do with the $30, as it won't put even a minor dent into the purchase of a new refrigerator to replace the old one. That's the first problem...even the most basic new refrigerators sold at various home improvement stores around here are
eye-poppingly expensive.
Second problem...reliability. I hear lots of people who traded in an old but perfectly functional refrigerator say that they wish they hadn't as the new replacement is not as reliable.
Third...is the efficiency
really better? Though I don't have any truly hard evidence of this, I'd swear the older refrigerants remove heat better than the newer, greener ones. I know my
1974 GE refrigerator with R12 (IIRC) cools down a whole lot faster than a very similar 2001 model charged with R134A. Both share the same basic physical design, only the styling has evolved to stay with the times.
I also hear from lots of people who buy new dehumidifiers, only to have them last only about a year before the fan motor breaks or the cooling system leaks. These things aren't cheap either! My 40-year-old (sold new in late 1973) Sears Coldspot "Blotter" dehumidifier is still running
perfectly, with one replacement fan motor and a new electrical plug in all of its years. Power draw numbers between it and a newer (1995) Magic Chef unit are within a few percent of each other.
Compressor motors, thermostats, and evap/condenser coils sure don't seem to have changed much. I supppose that maybe their internals have been redesigned a little over time, but that's probably about it. Materials used to insulate the refrigerator also seem to have changed little.
As long as the door seals on an older fridge are good and the cooling system is healthy, I just can't see there being a whole lot of difference.