New Fridge, got it under $275

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

Unboxed my EBay purchased Costway fridge last night and from what I can tell it was brand new, still had the clear film covering the display and all the cables and AC charger were in their original plastic. The only problem I see with it so far after a good inspection of it is a tiny puncture in one corner of the lid, pic makes it look bigger than it really is, just looking at the fridge it's hard to notice. I'll most likely power it up this weekend to test functionality.

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Great but !! Where will you carry it in hour rig ?

 

[Viking1204]

It will sit under my Diamondback cover at the back of the bed with easy access to it from the tailgate. My long term plan is to build a slide for that area of my bed so I can slide the fridge in and out as needed. My plan is to build two slides at the back of the bed so I can slide out the fridge on one slide and then my grill on the other. My goal is to have my build complete by October. My next two projects are a pressurized water system and the slides, should be able to get those done in the next several weeks.

Update, looks like when I build the slides in my truck I'll build 3, didn't realize how wide my bed is. As you can see from the picture my fridge slides in just fine where it is at but if I'm to put it on a slide it will need to sit in the center of my bed due to clearance with the locking mechanism of my Diamondback. I'll have to take a closer look, since the back portion of my Diamondback cover no longer opens I may be able to lock the cover down another way and remove the sliding locking bars that you see above the fridge now. This way I can mount the fridge to the side like I originally planned. With a 3 slide system I could put the fridge on one side, have a table/shelf slide out the middle and have the grill on the other side keeping the grill and fridge separated since one runs hot and the other runs cold!

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

It will sit under my Diamondback cover at the back of the bed with easy access to it from the tailgate. My long term plan is to build a slide for that area of my bed so I can slide the fridge in and out as needed. My plan is to build two slides at the back of the bed so I can slide out the fridge on one slide and then my grill on the other. My goal is to have my build complete by October. My next two projects are a pressurized water system and the slides, should be able to get those done in the next several weeks.

Update, looks like when I build the slides in my truck I'll build 3, didn't realize how wide my bed is. As you can see from the picture my fridge slides in just fine where it is at but if I'm to put it on a slide it will need to sit in the center of my bed due to clearance with the locking mechanism of my Diamondback. I'll have to take a closer look, since the back portion of my Diamondback cover no longer opens I may be able to lock the cover down another way and remove the sliding locking bars that you see above the fridge now. This way I can mount the fridge to the side like I originally planned. With a 3 slide system I could put the fridge on one side, have a table/shelf slide out the middle and have the grill on the other side keeping the grill and fridge separated since one runs hot and the other runs cold!

View attachment 104399

Good plan. I haven't installed it yet but I have a wood two drawer stacking drawer slide out that stands 30" high x 30" wide and 24" deep.. I plan a platform for it with another slide out below the drawers for the stove and table combo. To the right of that will be the ref. on a platform about 8" up off the floor for storage of a Jack and other tow items. Also another 8" shelf storage compartment above the ref....see diagram ..

 

[Viking1204]

Wow, that's a pretty complex plan, can't wait to see they progress when you start building it! Mine will be much simpler!

 

[Jim SoG]

The only problem I see with it so far after a good inspection of it is a tiny puncture in one corner of the lid, pic makes it look bigger than it really is,

Not a defect, I think it is for the hinge, one on each side and mine has exact same thing.....

Jim

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

Wow, that's a pretty complex plan, can't wait to see they progress when you start building it! Mine will be much simpler!

Mine will be simple too because I only have one drawer to build (maybe) and the exterior frame that holds everything together. Ill buy the ref slider and the cook drawer slider from amazon. The drawer unit I bought for $10 at Habitat, It's a filing cabinet and heavy duty. If I can buy more drawers at Habitat, I will if for no other reason than the drawer slides.

Wow, that's a pretty complex plan, can't wait to see they progress when you start building it! Mine will be much simpler!
QUOTE:
This is my 10$ filing cabinet purchase for my lrd2 rear build.

 

[Boostpowered]

This costway brand is getting bigger than i thought it would , ive had their 13000lb winch for a couple months now and it works just as well as any other name brand winch ive had.

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

This costway brand is getting bigger than i thought it would , ive had their 13000lb winch for a couple months now and it works just as well as any other name brand winch ive had.

I think a lot of the name brands are
Overpriced and over rated. For years I only had a 3000 # hitch ball portable winch, properly hooked up could pull 6000 #.
I never needed more and pulled many friends out of bad situations successfully. I mostly used it to load cars on my car trailer. I think I have used it for nearly 40 years now without any major problems.

 

[Viking1204]

This costway brand is getting bigger than i thought it would , ive had their 13000lb winch for a couple months now and it works just as well as any other name brand winch ive had.

To be honest, my Costway fridge looks a lot like the Dometic fridge and others I've seen out there. I personally think the companies are duping the buyers, sell the high priced products to those who will buy those and then rebrand and drop the price to sell to those who won't buy the high priced ones. The Yeti Lithium 12V Regulated Cable comes to mind, at $40 it seems way over priced IMO but a cheaper version can't be found, I bet over time one will magically appear under a different brand name!

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

To be honest, my Costway fridge looks a lot like the Dometic fridge and others I've seen out there. I personally think the companies are duping the buyers, sell the high priced products to those who will buy those and then rebrand and drop the price to sell to those who won't buy the high priced ones. The Yeti Lithium 12V Regulated Cable comes to mind, at $40 it seems way over priced IMO but a cheaper version can't be found, I bet over time one will magically appear under a different brand name!

THOSE TRICKY BASTARDS, how dare they !! LOL

 

[OtherOrb]

Took my Costway out for its first 5-day adventure near the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.
It performed wonderfully. The thermal control wasn't wonderful so we got more freezing than intended.
But other than that it worked just fine.

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

Took my Costway out for its first 5-day adventure near the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.
It performed wonderfully. The thermal control wasn't wonderful so we got more freezing than intended.
But other than that it worked just fine.

Do you think it's just an adjustment of some sort or maybe it just wasn't being opened enough to keep the ice level down. I guess it's better to be colder than you'd like than warmer. Did you use solar at all or just battery.

 

[OtherOrb]

Do you think it's just an adjustment of some sort or maybe it just wasn't being opened enough to keep the ice level down. I guess it's better to be colder than you'd like than warmer. Did you use solar at all or just battery.

I think the thermostat is poorly programmed. If I set it at 34 or below, it would freeze. If I set it above 34, it would creep up too close to 40 for my comfort.

I have a 100 Ah AGM battery that was left over from a solar project I did for my father a few years ago. I used that and a 100W solar panel. I don't think I needed the solar, but I'm paranoid about food and didn't want to wake up to the knowledge that my fridge shut off sometime during the night.

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

I think the thermostat is poorly programmed. If I set it at 34 or below, it would freeze. If I set it above 34, it would creep up too close to 40 for my comfort.

I have a 100 Ah AGM battery that was left over from a solar project I did for my father a few years ago. I used that and a 100W solar panel. I don't think I needed the solar, but I'm paranoid about food and didn't want to wake up to the knowledge that my fridge shut off sometime during the night.

I'm hearing you, I've never checked my frig at home to see what kind of temp it takes to keep food safe. I just go by feel, whatever that is, but it's probably colder than it has to be ! As your frig ages do you think it will get any better ? Do you think that the amount of food you had in it had anything to do with it. I have been told the more food you keep in one the less the ref has to work to keep things cold.

 

[OtherOrb]

I'm hearing you, I've never checked my frig at home to see what kind of temp it takes to keep food safe. I just go by feel, whatever that is, but it's probably colder than it has to be ! As your frig ages do you think it will get any better ? Do you think that the amount of food you had in it had anything to do with it. I have been told the more food you keep in one the less the ref has to work to keep things cold.

Food safety standards are 40-F or below for refrigerated foods.
The more high heat capacity foods you have in the fridge, the less the fridge has to work...once it's reached temperature. We had it plugged into our house power overnight before the trip so it was at temperature. And we had the fridge pretty well-packed. It wasn't working hard per-se, just not going to exactly the temp as set on the panel. Actually, it wasn't working very hard at all.

I will probably eventually open up the thermostat and see if it can be changed out for a higher quality unit...someday. But for now, it's working as expected, if not as perfectly as I'd like.

 

[Viking1204]

THOSE TRICKY BASTARDS, how dare they !! LOL

This is one of the reasons I've never purchased a Yeti, not long after Yeti came out with their overpriced coolers RTIC produced the same style coolers for half the price of a Yeti. Now everyone is making them, half the companies that make them sell at sky high prices and the other half of the companies sell them at a reasonable prices. I'm a bargain shopper, not going to over pay for something and old enough to know the value of something and whether or not a company is overcharging the consumer. This is something I've been trying to teach my oldest, he's 21, in college and a Yeti fan boy simply for the name. He's doesn't care that he can get coolers just as good as a Yeti for half the price! Like Yeti these portable refrigerators for example, they are just a portion the size of a regular kitchen fridge so why should you pay the same price tag approaching $1,000. I didn't, I shopped around until a good Ebay deal was posted here and ended up with a good portable fridge for under $300! Reminds me, time to test it now that I have all the cables I need to test it properly!

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

This is one of the reasons I've never purchased a Yeti, not long after Yeti came out with their overpriced coolers RTIC produced the same style coolers for half the price of a Yeti. Now everyone is making them, half the companies that make them sell at sky high prices and the other half of the companies sell them at a reasonable prices. I'm a bargain shopper, not going to over pay for something and old enough to know the value of something and whether or not a company is overcharging the consumer. This is something I've been trying to teach my oldest, he's 21, in college and a Yeti fan boy simply for the name. He's doesn't care that he can get coolers just as good as a Yeti for half the price! Like Yeti these portable refrigerators for example, they are just a portion the size of a regular kitchen fridge so why should you pay the same price tag approaching $1,000. I didn't, I shopped around until a good Ebay deal was posted here and ended up with a good portable fridge for under $300! Reminds me, time to test it now that I have all the cables I need to test it properly!

I'm in total agreement. That's why I will never go to an expo. Everything there is overpriced, example is the small tear drop trailers that sell for $17,000 or more. Expo's are for the rich, not for me. It's kinda like going to a Sema auto show. I cant afford to buy any new car and a custom car at Sema would cost 10 times what a new car will cost. The industry is pricing me out of the off road scene. The other day I was going to buy a solar panel from a company in Tucson AZ. The panel cost $60.00. I asked him to check out the shipping cost and he came back and told me it would be $185.00 for a 200 mile distance. I told him to forget it. I could have driven over there and back for $60.00. Everyone has gone nut's at overpricing their products and services. I did get a good deal the other day on a set of !" wheel spacers from a outfit in Tucson AZ. I paid $150.00 for four made for my LRD2 which included shipping. If it had been Ford, Chey or Toyota, the cost would have been only $100.00 for 4.

 

[Viking1204]

I'm in total agreement. That's why I will never go to an expo. Everything there is overpriced, example is the small tear drop trailers that sell for $17,000 or more. Expo's are for the rich, not for me. It's kinda like going to a Sema auto show. I cant afford to buy any new car and a custom car at Sema would cost 10 times what a new car will cost. The industry is pricing me out of the off road scene. The other day I was going to buy a solar panel from a company in Tucson AZ. The panel cost $60.00. I asked him to check out the shipping cost and he came back and told me it would be $185.00 for a 200 mile distance. I told him to forget it. I could have driven over there and back for $60.00. Everyone has gone nut's at overpricing their products and services. I did get a good deal the other day on a set of !" wheel spacers from a outfit in Tucson AZ. I paid $150.00 for four made for my LRD2 which included shipping. If it had been Ford, Chey or Toyota, the cost would have been only $100.00 for 4.

Have you seen this Rich Solar panel on Amazon? Only $82 and ships free! This is probably the one I'll be going with, just have to wait and see when I have the free cash to order it! Too hot here right now really to go camping, most of my camping will be from October through April or May!

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

Have you seen this Rich Solar panel on Amazon? Only $82 and ships free! This is probably the one I'll be going with, just have to wait and see when I have the free cash to order it! Too hot here right now really to go camping, most of my camping will be from October through April or May!

I have already bought the 100w Harbor Freight Kit which comes with everything needed except the battery and an inverter. I bought the Inverter this week (1000 w Modified Sine way 2000w surge) for $89 and two cables ($20 from Amazon) to hook up my two batteries (135ah each Walmart Marine batteries @$69 each). I think I have all I need now to produce electricity. I bought that kit because of the superior solar panels that are more light sensitive than other panels on the market. There are four panels in the kit but it only takes 1-25w panel to keep a battery charged for a ref. If I plan to use more wattage I just add more panels. They each have their own built in stand. It's a good kit. I only need the inverter if I use an appliance that has a 110v cord. The inverter give me two 110v outlets and 2 USB outlets without having to buy any additional outlet boxes. I may do that later if I feel the need for more outlets. Total investment for 100w kit, inverter, cables, and batteries was $400.00. I don't think you can do much better than that.

 

[RoarinRow]

Have you seen this Rich Solar panel on Amazon? Only $82 and ships free! This is probably the one I'll be going with, just have to wait and see when I have the free cash to order it! Too hot here right now really to go camping, most of my camping will be from October through April or May!

Before you buy the Rich Solar, check out this video. It's because of this Will's review I went with the Renogy instead.