On Mon, 04 Sep 2006 09:52:09 +0100, John wrote:

We got a new freezer - it's a John Lewis Frost-Free job. We keep it in
the utility. When my wife told the salesman this, he asked about the
ambient temperature of the room (which is very cool, not to say cold.)

He seemed to imply it would be better if the room that the freezer is
kept in should be warmer rather than colder. This doesn't seem to make
sense to me.

I wasn't there, and I figure it is more useful to get a consensus here
than go back and ask a random salesman in a shop (even if it is John
Lewis).

The instructions for the freezer aren't a lot of help (produced in the
same country the freezer was made: very terse as well as poor English).
However it does state preferred ambient temperature ranges ... all I
have to do is find the serial number plate to find out which grade ours
is -- I am suspecting the plate is underneath the damn thing, having
failed to find it on the back.


ANYWAY: what's the story? I would have thought that the colder the
room, the better. The thing is: this freezer seems to be running its
condenser quite as much as our ancient thing, that we swopped it for.

Cheers
John

A week or so ago Will Dean gave a respose to thread "freezer operation
at low ambiant temp"

"I suspect that one reason for the caution about extreme temperatures
is that
domestic fridges/freezers use a capiliary tube as an expansion device,
rather than the more sophisticated thermostatic devices used in
commercial
plant. Because the capiliary is just a fixed flow restriction rather
than a
proper temperature/pressure regulator, it's specified on the basis of
fairly
narrowly constrained pressure/temperature conditions throughout the
plant.

A very cold condenser will give low high-side pressures which might be
outside those for which the capiliary was designed - it can also cause
an
excessive proportion of the charge to hang around within the
condenser.

All they're really saying in the instructions is that they designed
the
freezer to perform to specification with a certain external
temperature
range, and that outside that range it may not meet the spec."