Update: GE Under Counter Freezer usage report

[cfz2882]

sounds like the freezer is working just fine,draw of around 2A not bad at
all-might be a little higher in hot weather when there is more load on the
compressor.

 

[mattl]

With those readings it looks like about 1kwh a day, not too bad.  Around here it's $.10 kwh so if your rates are similar it shouldn't be too costly to run.

 

[austinado16]

12hrs.....

Well, it's been a little over 12hrs and the meter is at .80KWH. We'll see how it does overnight.

I noticed as the day wore on, it ran more frequently and the 40-45min became 20-25min...at least on one of the times I caught it running.

I've been leaving the left door of the shed opened, about 3-4" wide, and that's directly in front of the exhaust air outlet side of the bottom grill. So it's getting plenty of ventilation, not only when running, but the shed is also being vented so it's not really building up the heat of the day.

According to my current PG&E bill, our baseline charge is about .11877 cents per kilowatt, and then tiers up from there to .13502 cents and then .29062 cents. The base line level is ridiculously low, so everyone's bill is always beyond that, and the excess being billed out in the 2nd and even 3rd tier price ranges.

In looking over the bill, it shows we use 505KWH this past billing cycle, and this time last year 488, with one less day in the billing cycle. They calculate that last year we were using 15.2KWH per day and this past billing cycle, 16.3. So maybe the freezer is only burning about 1.1KWH per day....I guess I'll see in the morning when I check the Kill-A-Watt meter.

Can't wait to try it on the 1952 Philco and then the aquarium.

 

[austinado16]

The moment we've all been waiting for...

Well, it's been just about 24hrs and the meter is sitting at 1.38KWH. So I'm going to call it; 1.4KWH per day (24hrs). Multiply by 12 cents is .17 cents per day and times 30 days is $5.

Of course the actual real world dollar amount is much higher because we aren't billed at that baseline Kilowatt price. So realistically, it's probably being billed out at .29 cents per, so that's .40 cents a day and $12 per month......$144 per year.

So how does this useage compare with modern stuff? Looks like I'm at just over double what a couple of posters from Italy and Oz state their freezers use.

I'm going to turn the dial lower than setting #1, as in warmer, and take some temp measurements in a day or 2 to make sure things are still frozen at the correct temp range. I'll continue to watch the meter and see if useage improves slightly.

Watched the KWH reading while it was running this morning and it increased by .02KWH for the 6 minute run time. Geez, that means it comes on about 70 times in a 24hr period! That seems like a lot to me, especially since I haven't opened the door in 3 or 4 days. Makes me think it's not insulated very weil, maybe because it's designed to be sandwiched under a counter-top and in between kitchen cabinets.......rather than being exposed to air on all sides.

Guess I could also insulate the outside of it on the top and sides, and see if that makes a difference in the afternoon when it wants to run more frequently.[this post was last edited: 2/10/2011-15:05]

 

[mattl]

I have different rates, and it's hard to determine what rate to use.  I decided the best option is to take the total electric bill and divide it by the total usage and get an average cost per hour, probably a better reflection of costs.

 

[austinado16]

Test day #3

4kwh as of 72hrs, so turning the dial a bit "warmer" than #1 setting has cut down on the number of cycles per 24hrs. It's still plenty cold inside, so I'll leave it like this for now and see what the next electric bill looks like. I think in the last 24hrs it only used 1.27kwh.

And what pops up on CL yesterday for free? A fantastic little Philco chest style freezer from probably the early 50's. Still working. It's about the size of this GE, sort of a giant cube, but with a top door only. Very cool. If I didn't already have this GE, I'd be all over it.

If someone hear wants it, I'd be happy to pick it up and hold it for you or your shipping service.

http://slo.craigslist.org/zip/2209937670.html

 

[austinado16]

Test Day #4

5.25kwh as of today, so the useage has dropped to 1.25kwh per day. That's 62 cycles per day, down from 70. Roughly $4.87 per month down from $5/mo.

 

[dj-gabriele]

Hey, that's not terrible for a 50+ year old appliance! But still a modern one uses half that amount of power! Anyway, being the things the way they are, I wouldn't change it to save 3 USD a month!

 

[norgeway]

1/2 power???

Not when you factor in the defrost cycle...not only running an electric heater inside your fridge..but then running the compressor to drop the temp back...I still say a vintage unit is more economical...especially in the long run, it will outlast 3 or 4 new units!

 

[dj-gabriele]

I still say a vintage unit is more economical...

NOT REALLY!

A modern, completely frost-free freezer/refrigerator at 100 L freezer and 200 L refrigerator, in energy class A+, uses less than 300 kWh per year!
And if you get an A++ or A+++ fridge, the figures are 15% and 30% lower than that!

 

[austinado16]

Well, it's worth it to me right now, to save it from the landfill, to own and use yet an other cool/unique vintage appliance, and I have to admit, I like the functionality of the two pull out drawers.

 

[rp2813]

Any chance we can see some pix of the freezer?  It sounds interesting.

 

[austinado16]

Sure, here you go.....

I think originally it was the Salmon color, and someone painted the door and the interior frame face harvest gold, and then the door was taken apart and professionally painted white with what appears to be automotive grade paint.

These were taken the day I bought it home, and prior to the Rubbermaid Shed installation.

 

[austinado16]

End of testing

Time to end my testing. Over the past 5 or so days it's averaged .055kwh per hour......so 1.32kwh per 24hr period.

Time to start a new thread and test the 1952 Philco!

 

[appliguy]

I think originally it was the Salmon color

The correct name is Petal Pink, which was introduced by GE in January 1955 along with Canary Yellow, Turqouise Green, Woodtone Brown and Cadet Blue....you have an awesome freezer Austin...I would love to have one the same color as Edna since her freezer is so small....if you ever see a pink one let me know ok?....PAT

 

[austinado16]

Woohoo.....go petal pink!!

Thanks for that info Pat.

Would love to turn you on to one of these, trouble is, it appears they are so non-existant, I'll probably never see one again. But, you never know. I mean this appeared out of thin air, with one quick search of the local CL, and right at the time I was sitting here with a fresh arrival of 20lbs of wild caught silver salmon from Alaska....what are the odds of that? That, and it was a mile from me.

I will definately keep an eye out.

 

[rp2813]

Todd, that is a beautiful freezer.  It's no older than 1957.  The lettering and the front grille at the bottom are exactly like what's on my '57 Combination.

 

[austinado16]

Good to finally have more of an idea about the date. Unfortunately, the wiring diagram paper glued to the back is only partially there, so any date stamp (that I've seen in photos of similar era wall refrigerators) is long gone.

I'd love to play around with the yellow paint and see if it would come off and give me back the pink plastic and pink paint job on the interior face frame, but I'm affraid I'll screw up the plastic. I'm okay with the white front, and its extremely well done, so I'll leave that.

 

[austinado16]

The latest electric bill arrived

So it's confirmed; the GE will stay and live on. My latest PG&E bill is $59, so that's pretty much back to what I would expect.

 

[rp2813]

Yay!

 

Here's a pic of my '57 Combo fridge with brightwork.  Looks just like what's on your freezer, and pink was GE's interior color for '57.  You can see a bit of pink between the two doors.

 

 

 

[austinado16]

Whoa.........

Hang on a minute!! You mean my door and front upper trim fascia might be their original colors? No wonder they look like they've been professionally painted.

Thanks for posting that photo. It's great to get some history to put toward mine.

 

[rp2813]

The white does look original, but why would somebody only paint the cabinet's facing harvest gold, including the pink plastic part?  If the door was painted harvest and then switched back to white, that was a lot of work -- both times.  The brightwork would have had to be removed, which was no small task.  This is an interesting mystery!

 

Here's a shot of the pink insides on my Combo.  As you can see, only the plastic parts are pink.  The rest should be white.

 

 

 

[austinado16]

It's a mystery wrapped in an inigma....

Who knows what happened to mine.

I've had the upper fascia panel off, because it was loose on the brackets and the hardware was missing or wrong. The letters and GE badge appear to have been removed at one time because some of their push through tabs are broken off, and there is yellow glue holding what's left of the good tabs and the broken tabs, to the panel. So that had me thinking the lettering had been removed, and the panel, along with the door, repainted. But there is not another color on the back side of the panel...it's just the normal looking factory overspray from being painted white, and the paint is hard and glossy, like I'd expect from the original paint.

The whole interior is pink, except for the metal porcelain enamel drawers, which are their original white as you see in the photo.

The outside appears now to have been painted pink, in order to match the interior color? At least that's my latest guess. There's pink overspray on the back where the original paper electrical wiring label is still stuck on, and I don't think a factory paint job would have looked like that.

No guess why the harvest gold paint just for the surround area, but that's definately a rattle can job.

My freezer has the same door gasket shape and lower grill as your combo, and the same plastic surround trim, and interior door panel shapes. I was going to ask if you'd show off your interior, but didn't want to be a PIA. Thanks for posting the photo because your fridge is in fantastic condition!

 

[rp2813]

Well Todd, it sounds like they did go to the trouble of repainting yours at some point.

 

You must have missed the original threads involving my Combo.  RCD saved it from the crusher but it was a diamond in the rough and in serious need of elbow grease and TLC.  Here's a shot of it after being rescued by Andy.

 

[rp2813]

It was missing one adjusting foot and another was bent.  I got replacements off of a 70's GE fridge that was on the pile at Andy's shop.  Gaskets on both doors were shot on the handle side.  I cleaned both, then removed them and flipped them around so the bad sections were on the hinged side.  I have NOS replacement gaskets but haven't tackled that operation yet.  The old ones seal OK, and honestly it's a case of the torn areas of the gaskets now being out of sight and out of mind.

 

The most tedious part of the clean-up was taking a toothpick to the grooves in the sides of the handles that run from top to bottom.

 

[austinado16]

Definately missed thread and wow....nice job, both on the save, and on cleaning it up! My door gasket was similarly "goopy" but not torn. It'd be cool to find a new gasket for mine though.

 

[rp2813]

I got my replacement gaskets from Modern Parts.  I gave Larry the model number of the fridge and he went right to them.  They weren't cheap, though.  Unless your gasket is in worse shape than the ones on my fridge, I wouldn't be too concerned.

 

Here's the "after" pic once the gasket had been cleaned and flipped.

 

[austinado16]

Yeah, I hit my gasket with 3M adheasive cleaner, and followed that up with Simple Green. Came out like yours. FWIW, I would have used a tooth brush and simple green on your handle grooves.

Can you post the # for Modern Parts. If he has a gasket, I'd buy it as I plan to keep this freezer indefinatley......like all the other appliances we have.

 

[3beltwesty]

Here I have measured the power consumption on devices for many decades. I have dial type meters like that are on one's house; and the newer kill a watt grey devices too.

With a refidge or freezer; the power consumption varies with its surroundings. Thus if the freezer is in the garage and it is 50F here in Feb and 80F in Septemeber; the unis rusn a higher duty cycle when in a hotter area. The unit uses more KWHR per month when it is in a hotter area.

It is real common that an older unit that works well degrades when moved.

One has two main issues; the doors do not seal as whell and the unit gets bumped and is loosing gas.

The tweaked chassis or unlevel unit often has the doors not sealing as well and the units runs more and consumes more KWHR in one month.

With a modern unit one should really collect data for a week or two. You want to capture is actual usage and see all its defrost cycles too.

Post Katrina a early 1980's freezer would still go anywhere from 0 to -20F depending one the setting; *BUT* it had to run about *ALL* the time. It had really three issues; water trapped in the insulation, low gas and a poorer door seal to.. It got scrapped not due to that it did not cool; it just consumed double the consumption after Katrina

 

[rp2813]

Modern's Number

Here you go Todd:

 

(216) 661-6966

 

If a man answers, there's a 99.9% chance it's Larry.

 

And yeah, I don't know why I opted for a toothpick instead of a toothbrush.  Simple Green!  I haven't had that handy for years.  I need to pick some up next time I see it.