1952 Philco Refrigerator.....electricity consumption test

[austinado16]

Time to put my Kill-A-Watt meter to use testing my 1952 Philco.

The meter just measured the first cycle of the compressor since plugging the meter in, and the compressor pulls 2.8amps and burns .01kwh of power in it's 4min cycle.

It'll be interesting to see what it uses in 24hrs.

More to come!

Quick bit of history on this Fridge:

It's the very first vintage appliance that my wife and I purchased. We found it in a second hand store in Morro Bay, CA for $150. The paint and chrome were pretty bad, and it was covered in stickers. But inside it was gorgeous and completely intact, except for missing the little short shelves that are at either side, above the upper-most shelf.

I needed the door to open from the right, rather than the left, so I took the door apart, reversed the mechanism to function from the other side, cut a new hole in the door for the handle and then took the whole fridge to an autobody paint shop. They welded a plate over the old door handle hole, did the necessary bodywork, and then repainted the entire fridge white. Meanwhile, I sent away the handle, the PHILCO letter, and the front of the meat drawer, to be "show chromed" at Santa Rosa Plating in Santa Rosa, CA.

When I put the fridge back together, I installed a generic "bulk roll" door gasket, but it had the proper shape and looks original. The refrigerator was working when we purchased it, and now 17 years later, still runs the day it was built. The compressor rarely comes on, and when it does, you have to listen carefully to even hear it.

 

[austinado16]

Initial reading...

.09kwh in 3hrs, so .03/hr = .72kwh/24hrs = 21.6kwh/month = $2.81/month = $33.70/year!!

We'll see if this figure hold up over the next few days. If it does, I'm going to laugh.

 

[supersuds]

Great stuff!

I love all this factual reporting!

One thing I've noticed about old refrigerator ads is that they often include some copy about "rock bottom current consumption" or the like. Customers must have been very concerned about this in the depression and immediately after.

I have the impression that electric rates declined fairly rapidly from the 1920s to the 1950s, so maybe it didn't matter as much by the time the frost-free models came out.

 

[norgeway]

Im a FIRM believer!

All this Energy Efficiency stuff of today is just a way to sell appliances!! Just like all the stuff about aluminum cookware ..it is just to sell something, thats all. old products are better all the way around...no ifs ands or buts!

 

[austinado16]

I agree completely

That's why every appliance we own and use is vintage. I've even started collecting and using pre-WWII WagnerWare cast iron skillets/griddle/etc. Not looking to own every piece WagnerWare ever made, just the essential daily drivers for us to use during our normal cooking. I really like cooking on them.

 

[polkanut]

Todd,

Don't overlook some of the post-war Wagner Ware Magnalite. I have a 5qt. dutch oven that was my grandma's, and it is at least 60 y/o and still going strong. It is model no. 4248-M. Magnalite will out last you, your children, and grandchildren etc.

 

[combo52]

OLDER REFRIGERATOR POWER CONSUMPTION

Older single door manuel defrost refs were very cheap to run and in fact most would be awarded an Energy Star label if still produced today. It wasn't until the late 1950s-the 1970s that refs really became real power hogs. The real culprits were adding frost free freezers, two or more exterior doors, thin wall construction, and through the door ice & water dispensers. FF refs from the mid 1960s- the 1970s can use four times the power of older single door refs. I have worked on some older SxSs that had as many as 16 electric heaters in them. The good news is that new refs are very efficient and like the early refs they use about 1/4 the power of earlier FF machines and they are keeping food more evenly cold plus with the improved insulation food can remain frozen for days if a power outage occurs. A new FF ref should last 20=30 years with good care and a manual defrost upright or chest freezer could still last 25-50 years.

 

[3beltwesty]

Power consumption

Here I own about 5 Kill-A-Watt meters and several dozen glass electric co type meters.

With a freezer or refrigerator using a reading that is several weeks helps give a better picture of the consumption than as fraction of a day.

Cleaning the outside coils on the bottom or back helps, making sure a fan if there is one is working helps too.

Once the machine is in a groove the power consumption will track too with the surroundings. Thus in my unheated Katrina house still be rebuilt, the fridge "sees" about a February inside temp here of about 50F and it is more like 80F to 85F in August. The fridge here thus runs more in August than February thus the power consumed varies with the season. One bizarre thing is how a refrigerator or freezer floats up in ones house when flooded. My double door unit after Katrina was at a 30 degree angle; almost horizontal. After cleaning out all the marsh grass out of the coils and relubing the fan, the 1992 unit still works today.

In one 1920 book on electrical engineering for designing houses, farms and buildings, the electric rate was 10 cents per killowatt hour. That has to be more like 1 to 2 dollars in todays money.

Power was SOOOOO expensive that a simple house in 1920 had three 110 volt circuits. two with 6 amp fuses and one the big one for the kitchen as a 15 amp fuse. Each bedroom had a 15 watt bulb. A 25 watt was in the Kitchen, a 40 watt above the formal dining room to impress folks.

A fridge that is moved often has a door that closes not so well, the cabinet is tweaked and many folks do not level the fridge and the unit tends to run a lot more. A machine low on gas tends to run all the time too.

A 1980 Sears Whirlpool freezer here use to cost only about 4 dollars per month before Katrina. After seeing 2 feet of salt water and floating around like a cork the unit took some bumps and its power consumption went to about 10 per month. The unit would still go to anywhere between -15F to 0F with its temp dial, it just ran about 80 to 90 percent of the time, the gas must of been low or a coil pinched. As a crude test I closed the door via duct tape to rule out a bad door seal and it still ran most of the time. About a year later is was even worse, running all the time and only holding about 5F. Later I scrapped it when its gas was such that it was only barely below freezing.

Some real defrost type 1960's ? type refrigerators have the defrost coil always on when the compressor is off. A friends unit drawed 70 watts all the time, whether the compressor was on or off. My own 1992 Sears/Whirlpool double door freezer/refrig has a timer that runs its clock when the compressor is off, so many hours later the defroster coil runs. There is also another coil in the door seal area that is always on, unless I think the power mizer switch is used.

With a 1950's Westinghouse freezer/refrig we had, it counted the door openings and ran the defrost coil after so many cycles.

With a Sears Kenmore stretched Black dorm type refridge that was about 34" tall that floated up in the backyard due to Katrina, it was full of beer and wine. Since no local neighbor contacted owned it, it became mine and was used for 4 years until it ran all the time, ie gas low. It only consumed about 2 bucks per month in electricity.

 

[austinado16]

42hrs......

1.63kwh used so far = .039kwh/hr

Time to move on to testing my big aquarium.

 

[leland]

Any pictures of this door conversion

I know this is an old post but would love to see this