Good chest freezers for basement? Ones to avoid?
ideagirl2
13 years ago
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hendricus
13 years agomaryland_irisman
13 years agoRelated Discussions
Should I get a chest freezer?
Comments (67)I've had chest freezers for most of my life and never had any issues with finding food (nor do I hate a chest freezer). I use boxes to organize my frozen veggies (one box per type). I have sections for meat and other frozen stuff. I use baskets for butter and stock. Anything else is labeled with a marker. I rotate the contents with each shopping trip (quarterly or so) or when I make stock/soup/chili etc. I've never lost anything nor have I had mystery product. I also put bottled water in there for storage and to fill up space. I defrost once a year, usually in the fall or early winter. Everyone is entitled to their personal opinion and should use what works best. If you are planning on long term storage, a manual defrost is the best option. The frost free (or self defrosting) units cycle heat to keep frost from building up inside. That seriously diminishes the life of any product you store in the freezer. In terms of size, go with larger. In terms of brands, well, that's personal opinion. You can buy the same products pretty much any where. That's personal preference too. The freezer we had when I was a kid conked out at 40 years old. In the past 22 years, I've had two. The current one is about 10 years old and has spent it's life mostly in an unheated garage (in TN). Having said that, note that manufacturing of appliances has gone the way of everything lately; seems like they are disposable and it's cheaper to replace than fix. Stick with a brand name you're comfortable with and purchase from a store you feel good about. Just keep dead bodies out of there....See Moresmall commercial chest freezer?
Comments (3)I know nothing about commercial chest freezers, but we just bought a small residential (5 cu ft) chest freezer (though we're actually using it as a fridge). DH looked at almost all of them in person and was convinced that with one or two exceptions, they were all manufactured by the same maker and simply rebranded and trimmed out differently. (He was looking at the guts and measuring everything, and found it all very consistent, from sizes to materials.) I want to say Samsung and one of the European makers were the exceptions. So we got the cheapest one (Frigidaire, I think). It's been fine so far, but we've only had it a month. Not sure if that helps much......See MoreChest Freezer
Comments (12)Piaa, I have had both a chest freezer and an upright. My current freezer is an upright freezer. My chest freezer (manual defrost) kept frozen foods solidly frozen and rarely did I defrost an item that had freezer burn. My upright freezer (auto defrost) also keeps food solidly frozen but I frequently defrost an item that has freezer burn. Live_wire_oak is right, it is much easier to organize and locate food in an upright freezer than in a chest type. I always felt that I spent a lot of time moving the wire baskets around to get to the basket that held what I needed. My upright has been stored in our unheated garage for 21 years - in summer heat and winter temperatures that can drop below 0 degrees fahrenheit. Prior to that it was stored in an unheated wooden storage area in the southern heat and humidity. The freezer has never had a problem or needed a service call in the 33 years we have owned it. Whatever freezer you select will be fine. Get the freezer that has the best footprint for your storage area and fits your needs....See MoreWhat is a good brand for a small chest freezer
Comments (8)A 5 cu. ft. chest freezer should handle a hog. A whole hog can be too much for a couple to eat all by themselves in a year, but, OTOH, having more meat can be a reason for socializing with friends and neighbors. Maybe some entertainment value in curing hams and shoulders and/or bacon. (Assuming time and interest.) Roasted pork belly has become trendy, too. As for makes, there many brands but only three manufacturers currently producing small chest freezers for sale in the U.S. Pretty much all go for close to the same price. The makers are: Frigidaire/Electrolux, Woods (a Whirlpool subsidiary with a factory in Canada), and Haier (the Chinese conglomerate). Anything with a GE brand is by Haier. Beyond that, though, it can be hard to tell who made it. I discovered that when I helped a friend buy chest freezer last year. Turned out that there were very minor differences between brands and models (one will have a digital touchpad for temp control where another will use a dial ; one will have an LED to show it is running, another won't; some have one or more baskets, some have none; etc.). The prices were all within a few dollars of each other with the cheapest varying from week to week depending on who was having a sale. Those with recognized major brand names (Frigidaire, Amana, GE) tended to be higher priced unless they were on sale, which was often. I don't recall seeing any models with Energy Star tags, which may say something else about how similar they all are. What I recall from Consumer Reports (who did measure and report on energy consumption) was that there was one Frigidaire model that they believed would cost $5 or $10 less per year to run than others in that class. My friend wound up with one of the Haier models (sold at Costco.). As for getting a freezer off Craig's List, that might not be a bad idea. Just be aware that really old small chest freezers are going to be relatively large and very heavy, making them awkward to move. They also tend to be much noisier than models made within the last couple of decades, something that would be an issue for putting one in a bedroom as you indicated might be done. (In contrast, my friend with the Haier has his in his bedroom while doing some home renovation and never hears it running). Older Small capacity models seem to be pretty rare around here (on the times that I've looked, all of older models listed here were 14 and 28 cu. ft models). Newer ones (that is, ones made since the turn of the century) are considerably lighter, much quieter and pretty efficient . I had a vintage 2000 five-cubic-foot Fridgiaire in a pantry for a while and barely heard it run. (I have since replaced it with a larger capacity upright in the basement and that model is louder and a lot more noticeable when running). The small Frigidaire was light and roughly square in shape (about 24 x 24, IIRC). It was easily moved on a handtruck. (It is now the basement of the house of friends.) The newest 5 and 7 cu. ft. chest freezers are more rectangular in shape and seem to be even lighter. IIRC, the 5 cu , is more like 20 inches by 30 inches or 22 by 28 and the 7 cu. foot models are more like 36" wide. Something to bear in mind when planning to move one in to a house or apartment....See Moreweedmeister
13 years agohendricus
13 years agohelenab
13 years agocaptsmethwick
13 years agochris8796
13 years agoideagirl2
13 years agomaryland_irisman
13 years agohendricus
13 years agoweedmeister
13 years agonerdyshopper
13 years agoHU-64482306
3 years ago
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