Orientation of fridges

[greenstar]

My rather nasty fridge freezer has died, and I am returning to a lovely Astral fridge I've stored, with undercounter freezer, which I collect tomorrow.
My girlfriend had impressed upon me the importance of keeping the new freezer upright in transit, which will be most inconvenient.
In the past my Astral has been working, but not sufficiently cool in warm weather, and I last attempted a fix found on the net, involving turning it upside for 24 hrs. It's a methane fridge, so possibly different to modern things. It's also likely the seal will need renewing, which follows the rounded outline, so may be difficult to find a replacement.
Any comments appreciated! Apologies for any vertigo resulting from this post.

[mark pirate]

You can move a fridge horizontally but when upright again it must stand for a few hours before applying power. This gives time for the refrigerant to drain back to the compressor.

Mark

[Peter.N.]

If its absorbtion type fridge it does them good to be turned upside down, we often used to do this when they stopped working, it unclogged the pipes and restored full function.

Peter

Years ago we had a new fridge delivered and the old one taken away. Bloke said 'leave it for 24 hours before turning it on'. Bit of a pain as the food would defrost, I threw caution to the wind and just turned it on (well if it failed soon the guarantee would get me a new one), it is still going strong after (8?) years.

I would think if the compressor doesn't stall on power up all will be well.

[richrussell]

I too was under the impression that it was just to ensure that there was enough of the liquid refrigerant in the compressor to avoid damage when it starts up. A couple of hours should be perfectly sufficient.

[Tractorfan]

Hi,
is it just the refrigerant that needs time to run back to the compressor, or is it the oil as well?
Cheers, Pete

[richrussell]

Probably the oil thinking about it.

[greenstar]

I assume my Morphy Richards Astral is an absorbtion type. I'll turn it the usual way around so it has a few hours to settle.
I'm so glad I can lay my replacement freezer down in the car. I recklessly offered at one point to move one for my friend, and she insisted it be kept vertical from seller to home. This involved enormous convolutions and effort getting it into and out of the car - couldn't slide it - nearly did myself in. She won't be there tomorrow - while the cat's away!

[kalee20]

Originally Posted by greenstar

I assume my Morphy Richards Astral is an absorbtion type.

Possibly - although most electric fridges are the compressor type, low-voltage caravan types may be absorption type. Absorption types often use ammonia as refrigerant. Methane I've not heard of - could be a refrigerant in a compressor-type fridge, but CFC's were much more common.

As far as I know, the idea of keeping right-way-up is indeed to let the fluids drain back to where they should be. The refrigerant is runny like water, so should sort itself out pretty quickly, but oil for the motor is much more gloopy. We need it to drain back out of the rotor - oil between rotor and stator will cause a lot of drag! And even if it starts, there will be some flung off the rotor surfaces - better to let as much as possible drain off first.

[Radio Wrangler]

Wow that took me back!

We had a Morphy Richards Astral back in the 1960s. I was just a small sprog and the thing looked somewhat larger to me than one now does.

It is an absorption type. There is no motor, no compressor, just a heater and some clever plumbing. No moving solid parts at all.

Very, very reliable and the heaters in absorption fridges can be fixed. The last absorption jobs were for caravans, and used electric or gas heat as available.

If they got vapourlocked and stopped, turning them on their side or upside down was a well known fix.

David

[McMurdo]

In a compressor driven fridge the cooling system can lock up past a point of no return if you dont let it stand. The oil must be at the bottom and the refrigerant at the top which is its natural state until it's tipped!

[mike_newcomb]

In my gasfitter days, when repairing fridges we would first turn upside down, by:-

facing it
then turning left side over right (1/2 turn clockwise)
return by right side over left. (1/2 turn anti-clockwise)

This agitated the gas/liquid inside, which you could hear gurgling down.
Generally giving it a further lease of life.

Would think if a unit were left in the wrong position for some time, it might be wise to leave in the correct position for while before turning on, as advised by others above.

Good Luck - Mike

[Tractorfan]

Hi,
One of our caravans had an Electrolux absorption type fridge that was very critical about how level it was. I thought it had stopped working until I noticed that one of the wheels had settled into some soft ground overnight. Later Electrolux fridges were more tolerant of being on a slight slope.
Cheers, Pete

[mickash]

When we delivered fridges we had either a Marina, Ital or Escort van so they had to be laid on their side.
If you look in the area of the compressor you will see a short stub of a pipe, about 2 - 3" long. We were told that this pipe should face upwards when the fridge was on it's side.
We delivered many fridges like this and as far as I know we never had any problems.
From loading the fridge at the shop to unloading at the customer's house would only take a few minutes. We would advise the new owner to clean the interior with a bicarb solution before plugging in and using the fridge so maybe this delay in powering up also helped any fluids to drain back to where they belonged.

Michael.

[Peter.N.]

Absorbtion fridges were commonplace in the '50s, mostly Electrolux but also Morphy Richards. If you lived in a 'PreFab' they had Electrolux absorbtion types built in. You do generally only see them in caravans now, as they used a heating element to circulate the refrigerant it was easy to make a 12 volt version, they drew about 5 amps while running so you needed a good battery but they also ran on LPG so they could be on 12 volts while travelling and gas when stationary.

Some of the early domestic fridges ran on mains gas.

Peter

[broadgage]

Compressor type fridges should be transported upright if possible, or alternatively if transported otherwise, should be stood the correct way up for some hours before use. This is indeed to ensure that that the refrigerant and/or oil is in the correct place.

Absorbtion fridges can with advantage be turned upside down if they cease to work correctly, this may improve matters.
Absorbtion fridges are usually heated by mains or bottled gas, but some use an electric heating element.

[beamcurrent]

One point that has not been mentioned, or if it has I missed it, is that as well as the oil and refrigerant running back to the compressor, the oil is a lubricant, and the refrigerant is used as a coolant, the motor windings being immersed in it. This applies to all units that use the common sealed "pot" type compressors.

brian

[Tractorfan]

Hi,
Yes, I remember one of our neighbours having a gas powered domestic fridge! I think it may have been a "Prestcold".
My parents were given an "Astral" fridge, their first one, which was an absorption type. It sat on the worktop and had very thick insulation so that the usable room inside was about a cubic foot! There was a four way switch for three "coolness" settings plus 'off'. Setting no. two didn't work, one wasn't enough and three was too much and froze the milk!
Our caravan fridge was a 'three way' one; mains, 12volts & gas. I only ever had to replace one mains element in all the years we had it.
Cheers, Pete

[lesmw0sec]

The best fridge we had was a kerosene job (living in the Australian bush) This was a very efficient absorption type and the heat source was just a little nite-light type of burner feeding into a chimney. The freezer box would produce copious amounts of ice. I think it dated from the 50's and was built like the Queen Mary.

[Herald1360]

I don't think absorption types can match compressor ones for efficiency, if they did they'd be the latest whizzo A+++ energy rated gizmo. Effectiveness of course is another matter.

Their "killer app" is to be usable in locations where a compressor type isn't practical and dead quiet to boot.