Any Servel survivors ?

[cfz2882]

Gas absorption refrigerators made from ~1932-56 under some Swedish patents. sometime around late 1990s, there was a cash bounty on these because after decades of operaton with no maintenance burner would burn "dirty" and emit excess CO ... I stayed at an old rental cabin for a couple days in 1981 and there was a Servel from around 1950 operating there Anyone here have one of these in collection or working order ? Company made commercial absorption chillers for a while after quitting fridges.

 

[thatwasherguy]

Fellow AW member Turbokinetic featured a working one on his YouTube channel a while back. He wound up temporarily converting it to electric heat due to not having natural gas at his warehouse. Here’s a link to the thread on the monitor top fridge forum about it.

https://monitortop.freeforums.net/thread/1803/servel-gas-refrigerator

 

[pstehle]

There were a good many sold out here (AZ) for cabins that were beyond the grid, they come up on CL from time to time. I've been wanting to add one to my collection for a good while, but never seem to have the time to drive wherever they're being offered... I have a Perfection kerosene model "from 1917", according to the seller. The only internet photos I can find are of a much newer art-deco style model from the 1920's or so, it may well be mine is actually as old as stated. It does have a nickel plated exposed latch mechanism on the door... And a rubber ice tray and the original thermometer that indicated how much kero to fill the burners with based upon the internal temperature. Tried it once, it made a good bit of percolating noises from the bottom of the boiler, but no cold. I suspect the 400psi ammonia charge has made it's escape over the years.

 

[jamiel]

Recently was going through old Consumer Reports from the late 40s when they reviewed gas refrigerators alongside electric refrigerators, and with his video could definitely see the criticisms of the Servels that CU had (limited reserve capacity/barely capable refrigeration in a hot environment)

Has anyone seen any of the newer ones (the Norge/Whirlpool double-door units advertised in the shelter magazines in the very late 50s/early 60s)? The advertising seemed always to be co-sponsored by the American Gas Association.

Did they have anything going on to make them more satisfactory? Were they both sourced from Servel/Evansville and just rebadged?

 

[circlew]

Servel was bought by Whirlpool in 1958, partially to get their automatic ice maker. They continued making gas refrigerators for several years after. The kitchen on the "Beverly Hillbillies" featured all gas appliances, including Whirlpool refrigerators, as American Gas Association was a sponsor. They also made Sears Coldspot gas refrigerators. As for Norge, I don't know where theirs came from.

 

[combo52]

Absorption gas refrigerators for home use

Servel was the big builder and seller of these in the United States, about the only advantage of them is they were quiet in operation.

They lost out because they didn’t have the reserve capacity to keep up with really hot weather, and they actually cost more to run in most cases because the absorption cycle is not as efficient at moving heat.

The recall that is still in effect mainly came from the fact that people were taking old home refrigerators designed for natural gas and trying to convert them to LP gas to use a hunting cabins, etc. quite a few people were killed by the carbon monoxide they produced. This happened because they weren’t converted properly and they weren’t really designed to be converted at all. Plus they were being used to confined space.

The one that David Allen has we gave him. I almost turned it in for the thousand dollar bounty on it, but I figured it should be preserved.

Later, frost free models that whirlpool built such as the ones that were in the Beverly hillbilly show had more cooling capacity. They were able to get them to work a little better by adding condenser fans, etc. so they worked in warmer weather, it was interesting the frost free models they didn’t even have to turn off the cooling when they wanted to defrost the evaporator they simply turned on the electric heat and it quickly overpowered the cooling effect of the gas refrigeration melted the ice, and then they just turned the heater off, and it went back to cooling.

I had a funny warranty call on a whirlpool refrigerator about 35 years ago. The customer complained it was Noisy and whirlpool refrigerators in the early 80s were about the quietest refrigerator You could get on the market because of their very efficient Segger designed rotary compressor.

When I couldn’t find anything wrong with the refrigerator except the slight hum of the compressor, I asked the customer what kind of refrigerator did you have before and she said it was another whirlpool , I moved the new whirlpool refrigerator away from the wall just to check and make sure nothing was lose rattling, etc. and I noticed a gas line behind the refrigerator that had recently been capped, I asked the customer was your old refrigerator gas she said yes it was a gas whirlpool which I guess was the reason they were not accustomed to any noise at all associated with the refrigerator, lol I guess they just had to get used to the new whirlpool.

John L

 

[jamiel]

That's exactly what I was curious about. It seemed clearly like past about 1955 or so they only survived on American Gas Association subsidies/research grants and the last "modern" cabinet style/double door/sheer look was about the last gasp. Doubt that they sold them to anyone except at the gas company showrooms (which still were a thing----

seen this one before
doesn't speak to refrigerators but to utilities selling appliances

 

[pstehle]

I'd be interested in knowing how many people actually died from the CO fumes from a little gas flame. They must have been in extremely tight, well sealed, small spaces. At least out here in AZ, most were/are used in drafty old uninsulated cabins. Efficiency is quite low when compared to a decent rankine cycle fridge, but if you don't have any other option, it was good enough...

 

[ea56]

The first refrigerator that I can recall my family having was a small Servel that was probably a late 1930’s model. When I was a teenager and we moved to the Sonoma County Coast our neighbors 3 miles up the road in Seaview, Calif, had an old Servel out on the back porch and it ran off of Propane as there was no natural gas service. Back in the 60’s we had some very bad storms and the power was sometimes off for up to a week. The Hanson’s were the only folks up on the ridge that had a working refrigerator during these outages.

The Servel had originally belonged to Mrs. Hanson’s parents Henry and Mabel Dinucci who owned Dinucci’s Italian Restaurant in Valley Ford, Calif. they bought the Servel in 1939 when they opened the restaurant. When Stan and Bev bought the old Seaview Hotel (it originally was a Stage Coach Stop in the 1800’s) in 1952 her parents gave them the Servel which they used in the house for several years until they got a larger electric fridge. When my Mom died in 2004 after the funeral we all went to the Hanson’s and that little Servel was still chugging along out on the back porch. And when Stan died in 2008 the Servel was still going strong. After Bev died in 2015 the family sold the old Seaview Hotel and it was sadly torn down. As far as I know that old Servel was still running and went to Oregon with their oldest son Rick who is my age. Those Servel’s were virtually indestructible.

Eddie