Who Glues In A Refrigerator?

Yesterday, Pam and I hied ourselves to Sears and bought a new refrigerator.   We briefly considered buying a marine unit that runs on both 12 volt and 110 volt, but balked because of its lofty $1,800 price tag.   We decided a small apartment sized unit would work fine for us, and at $379 is a bargain.

Faithful readers of this blog may recall that the old one was a household unit with cold plates installed (for my landlubber friends, cold plates are rectangular metal boxes that get very, very cold and will maintain the refrigerator while underway).  While that was pretty cool, it was not frost free and a pain in the neck to defrost.  While we were debating whether or not to replace it, the refrigerator decided for us when a hinge rusted through and the door fell off.

Sears scheduled a delivery today between 10 and 12 (great service!).  So around 8 AM we decided to remove our food and yank the old one out.

I made a temporary fix to the hinge, so I unfixed it and removed the door.  Look at the iceberg in the back.  It took up half the shelf.

Once we finished unloading it, I removed the trim panels on each side.

What the...??  It's surrounded by spray in foam on all sides!  This effectively glued the refrigerator to the boat.



We scrapped out all the foam we could, and I pried the refrigerator from every direction.  It wouldn't budge.   It was time to call out the heavy artillery-  my buddy Chuck with his Sawzall.

We cut foam, we cut copper tubing, we cut electrical wires (oops), and finally, we cut the refrigerator.

Meanwhile, Sears arrived with the new refrigerator.  Seeing our predicament, they left it on the aft deck and promised to come back tomorrow to take the old one away.   What great service!

After a mere three hours of cutting, prying, and tugging, it started to move.

One more cut with the Sawzall and more prying with the crowbar and it was out.  We walked it onto a small carpet and dragged it out the back door and onto the aft deck.

On to the new one!  The first thing we needed to do was to move the hinges to the left side.  Then we moved it inside and over to the galley.  It wouldn't fit.  It's too deep.  So I took the doors back off and we got it in place.  It wouldn't go in far enough, so back out it came and I removed the foam still on the back wall.  Then back in it went.   I leveled it and put the doors back on.

Pam came home and was dismayed at the demolition debris all over.  Chuck and I were beat, and we took her offer of her cleaning while we celebrated with a victory beer.   A while later Pam called me over to the galley.  The door doesn't open all the way and there was no way for her to move the shelves, so I took the doors off again so she could adjust them where she wanted them, and then put them back on.



The new refrigerator is a huge improvement in the looks of this old boat.  I intend to buy an inverter to run it while underway.