ROTFL!!!! John, the reason the True's ice maker, in-door water and plastic bins won't break is because IT DOESN'T HAVE ANY!!!!!! They make cheap-ass fridges without any of that stuff too. :)

As to the compressor noise, you wanted a moat, right?

Congratulations on your new purchase. I hope the rest of your kitchen will wait for you to finalize your plans before voluntarily self-demo-ing.

ironcook, [i]''The fridge looks very "steel for show" cool.''[/I]

And also very ''fingerprints for go''. I guess that restaurants haven't demanded the latest in anti-whorling finishes.

plllog, I have already had to jury-rig a support for an upper cabinet that is falling off the wall, and the above-refrigerator cabinet (aka cereal storage) is now missing, because Fridgy is 84'' while his predecessor was 70''. So things are getting more pressing.

"finally an liftgate truck pulled into our street and a friendly driver deposited a very tall, 280 lb carton onto my driveway"

This is about when you purchase a tractor with a front end loader. (Grins)

Soon, we will be finding Johnliu cooking tidbits of artistic excellence in a junkpile of assorted driftwood crosshatched on the walls, secured by found horseshoe nails, to hold the dishes, and gleaming restaurant equipment for fridge, stove and sink.

Re the fingerprints, someone posted several years ago about some kind of stainless treatment that kept them away. Unfortunately, since I don't have hardly any stainless, I didn't make note of it. At least the smears show you where to spot clean. :)

All you say is TRUE! I have the exact same fridge. Very noisy but does a great job of keeping food on temperature. There is a very strong circulating fan that runs often to move the cold around. I wanted to get one for inside and the matching freezer but Wife said "NO!".

DH works for a restaurant supply company. For years he tried to get me to agree to a True. When I finally saw and, more importantly, HEARD one, I refused. I'm noise sensitive as it is.

It looks so cool in your house though! And you've found a great way to organize all the "space" in there. Now you can go about designing the rest around that.

99% of residential fridges work as a "frostfree" and this dries things out.

I think this fridge works with high humidity passive cooling. Or, with very little of the frostfree principle.

Good idea to get two small doors.
Can the temperature inside each compartment vary by much?

It is one big compartment, with two half doors. One irritation - only the upper door triggers the interior light.

The doors self-close authoritatively. With zero clearance - the fridge could be placed right up against a side wall.

I'm wondering if there is a way to fit ''roll out shelves'' to the box. That would be awfully cool.

I cannot tell if it is damp in there. Not overtly so, anyway.

John--Thanks so much for your detailed review of your True. I write them off then am lured back a week later by the price point, simplicity, and aesthetics. The only thing that pushes me away is the noise. Our house is small and our kitchen is right in the middle of it with our dinner table a few feet from the refrigerator. Quotes to remotely locate the compressor in the garage came in around 1.5K - 2K which eats away at the savings and puts me in the $4K Liebherr range which I was trying to avoid in the first place.
I commend you for going forward with the refrigerator and then writing all about its good and bad points.

That is not unattractive!

How is its energy usage? We have tiered electricity pricing here and it can get to be brutal pretty fast. And, um, the environment and stuff.

But it's pretty! Can you stick magnets to it by any chance?

fori -

I don't have the numbers in memory, but I did look it up before buying the fridge, and IIRC it is supposed to consume about 1.5X to 2X the electricity of my old residential fridge. This model True is actually Energy Star listed, but the standards are different for commercial fridges, it does not mean the same thing as Energy Star listing for a residential fridge. I had considered getting the glass door model T-23-2G, but that consumes even more electricity which was one factor that tipped me away. We pay $0.11/kwh with no tiered pricing.

Magnets do stick to the doors. Unfortunately.

Wolfgang -

I figured that remote mounting would be a last resort. I could locate the compressor in the basement immediately below. If multiple commercial fridges in the kitchen eventually drive me over the edge, then at least remoting is an option - though at that point, I'd have to admit to making a bad choice. So far, I'm okay with Fridgy's enthusiastic whirring, and SWMBO doesn't mind either.

But we are not noise sensitive. And I don't conceive of my kitchen as an elegant place to entertain - it is a place to bang, chop, grind, fry, curse, clatter, and crank tunes, preferably alone. I do, to be quite honest, think many people would not be happy with the noise level of Fridgy. I mean, when the compressor is going, and the house is otherwise quiet, I can just hear him from the living room.

...you named it.

"him" not "it"

I thought briefly about a True fridge/freezer combo for an upcoming renovation. I called the factory and asked what they thought of residential use. You won't be surprised to hear that they don't recommend it because of noise and energy consumption.

I asked about it on this board and somebody said that the design allows you to put the compressor in your basement or garage as a remedy for noise.

I tried to figure out why it uses more power. I noticed that the combo heats it's case electrically to prevent condensation. I believe that all residential boxes circulate hot refrigerant for that. If your all-fridge is similar you might disconnect it as an experiment to see if the exterior gets wet.

It's an awesome box and I'd have one if I had the courage.

Thanks for the review.

I also considered the True for my upcoming renovation. I was lucky enough to see and hear them at my company's cafeteria where employees use them to keep their lunches and in the food area where the vendor keeps deli items for the sandwich case. Not a problem in a busy/noisy environment but maybe not for a home.

It's too bad they're so loud because they do look badass. I ended up buying the Frigidaire Pro twins. They too look badass with the trim kit.

''her'' not ''him''. She does look badass. And she's noisy! But somehow, she's frigid. Ah well, I'm married anyway.

The noise is why they started up again with stainless "pro look" residential refrigerators, much like the lack of insulation around true commercial ranges brought about commercial style or pro style residential ranges.

John I'd be interested to know your experience all these years later. Is there an update? Did you do the kitchen renovation and are you still loving commercial refrigeration? We are about to purchase a True fridge as well as a true freezer for our rebuild with an open floor plan kitchen. Noise is a big concern for me but I haven't found an option that I like better.

I also have a true, much larger than the one in the picture, it has 2 compressors. How do I relocate them?

We bought a True fridge (about 54" wide, double door, all fridge) twenty years ago. We moved the compressor into the basement. The floor in the area is concrete so you can't hear it at all. It has worked without repair throughout the years. When the swim team came over, there was room for everything. During summer bar-b-qs, its easy to pack in a few cases of beer AND a few cases of pop AND a whole turkey AND a huge salad bowl AND... you get the picture.

'

I bought a Turbo Air JRF-19 two years ago and just before the two year warranty was up, I had their factory tech come out to my house to replace the compressor and the proportioning valve that routes the coolant between the upper and lower compartments. Yes it's loud, and the unit was delivered already half broken since the proportioning valve was not working up to spec straight from the factory, so the fridge and freezer compartments never remained in their proper temperature right from day one. It took an almost failing compressor just before the end of the warranty period to convince their factory service tech to come out, and fortunately they agreed to a compressor replacement. I called them again a month ago due to some low frequency rattle that had just started, and they totally disowned the unit and tells me I am on my own. I still have it, and I am still on the lookout for a very quiet commercial style fridge. I like the lack of racks in this commercial fridge. That's so handy compared to all the drawers and shelves in home fridges. Maybe a commercial fridge with an external compressor based on heat pump technology is the best of all worlds?

We purchased a Hoshizaki R1A-FS fridge recently. Overall, I love the fridge. It is brutal and totally dominates all the weak residential fridges.

Pros:

1. R1A-FS maintains the temperature much better than the older Kenmore (rebranded Whirpool). The Kenmore fridge does not keep the temperature well when we open the door frequently (I kept a stand alone thermometer inside the Kenmore fridge to check the temp. the fridge does not report the actual temperature itself). The commercial fridges are designed much better to maintain the temperature and to deal with frequent door openings. Thanks to the powerful compressor and for strong forced air circulation inside the fridge.

2. All stainless steel interior and exterior. Stainless interior does no absorb smells and easy to disinfect. Plastic is porous and absorbs smells over time. The residential fridges with stainless steel interior cost beyond $10k. That's crazy. Most of the cheaper residential fridges do not have real stainless anywhere (the front door is regular coated steel).

3. Hoshizaki gives full 3y warranty (the compressor is under 5y warrarny). Warranty for the most of residential Fridges is 1 year. For comparison, True commercial does not give ANY warranty for residential use. That's why I excluded them.

4. Parts are heavy duty. The steel is heavy gauge. The condenser motor is Morrill with 12years of design life (of non-stop use). The compressor is Copeland. Everything is easy to access if repair is needed.

5. Ease of maintenance. The condenser cleaning is very easily. You can access everything by removing 6 screws on top of the unit. you do not need to move the fridge anywhere. In comparison, vacuuming of the Kenmore fridge is hell. The condenser is at the bottom and you can not vacuum all of it easily. The condenser is a dust magnet and the only way to clean it well is to use a strong leaf blower. The compressor is also at the bottom of the fridge and it i hard to access.

6. The delivery guy helped me move the fridge into the house. R1A-FS is more than 300 lbs and it's hard to lift it alone.

7. There is alot of space inside.

8. Price. It is below $3k and much cheaper than comparable residential fridges (e.g. Blue Star, Hestan, True residential, etc).

Cons:

1. The noise when the compressor and condenser fan are on is about 60-62 dB (I measured it with my cell phone). It is not hat bad, comparable to a window A/C or a room fan on high setting. The noise is mostly from the condenser fan. The compressor and the evaporator fan do not make much noise. The noise could be reduced by using a larger condenser and a different blower design. Of course, that would make it more expensive. The blower motor for the condenser runs at 1550 rpm. I am not sure it it has to run that fast.

2. The power consumption could be lower. They could use PSC or EC blower motors instead of the shaded pole motors. That would increase the price.

Thank you thank you thank you you stopped me from making a very costly mistake

It’s been over a decade since this was posted but I’m so glad I found it! We just inherited a double True set: two door single space fridge on the right and two door divided fridge/freezer on the left. The industrial grade kitchen was a huge selling point for my husband and we love that everything just WORKS. Only downside has been the humming, because the kitchen is semi open format and I can hear it anywhere on the first floor. But I had no idea we could move the compressor, and it happens to sit right above our basement utility room, so it sounds like I have a solution for sometime down the road if I cant ultimately get used to it. Hooray! Also, I’ll add a tip of my own for organization - I use a giant lazy susan on a low shelf for my kids snacks and we all love it, makes it a sinch to reach things without pulling out a whole tub.

We used Hoshizaki R1A-FS for a year and I would like to follow up.

1. Food stays fresh much longer in Hoshizaki than in our older Kenmore thanks to the temperature and humidity control in Hoshizaki. Also, food does not develop any "refrigerator" smell in Hoshizaki.

2. The power consumption is unnoticeable. Hoshizaki has much better insulation (thick walls) and more efficient refrigeration system than Kenmore.

3. R1A-FS is a "small" commercial fridge but it has so much more room than the 2-door Kenmore. I can not imagine us using the Kenmore again.

4. We got used to the noise in a few days. In Europe you can get quiet commercial fridges but not in the US, unfortunately.

5. It is so much easier to vacuum than Kenmore. Kenmore has condenser at the bottom and it is impossible to access. Hoshizaki's condenser is on the top and the filter can be cleaned easily.