When we moved aboard our sailboat, we understood that we had to give up certain luxuries in life. We gave up personal space, microwaves, square beds, roomy showers, and other nice things found in the typical suburban home. One thing we did not want to give up was our refrigerator. Andiamo came equipped with a nice Isotherm sea-water cooled refrigeration unit that did a great job of cooling our built-in icebox. The little unit worked every day for us for well over a year. Although it wouldn't freeze ice or keep icecream frozen, it did a good job of keeping dairy fresh and beer cold. It was all going great until about 2 months ago when it gave up the ghost.

I was preparing for my last trip to Afghanistan when the refer broke so I only had a few days to help Tami diagnose the problem. Needless to say, after I left, the problem fell square in her lap. With an already full schedule, Tami found time to contact a repairman and make a valiant attempt to get the little guy fixed. On a side note here, we found out the hard way that these little buggers have small zinc anodes in the water lines to keep them from corroding. Our boat and all through-hulls are bonded (or so I thought) to help with this corrosion problem - all through hulls except the water intake for the fridge. So after a year of neglect, the little zincs were long gone and corrosion had set in all through the system to include the compressor, condenser, and evaporator. It was ruined. The repairman thought he could repair it, and after 2 weeks of working on it and replacing parts, we had it back in the boat...it still didn't work.

Once again, we pulled the dang thing out and took it up to Boat Electric in Seattle to see if their refrigeration guys could do any better. After a day or so, they said it was a lost cause and that we should go ahead and purchase a new fridge - OUCH! So, after $1,000 bucks already spent trying to save the old one, we began our search for a new one. We wanted a similar model because of the mounting configuration and reputation of Isotherm among a few other reasons. After some research and price comparison, we settle on a new Isotherm ASU 4701 sea-water cooled unit with holding plate for the cool price of $2,200. (Excuse me, I just threw up a little in my mouth!) Defender.com had the best price, no sales tax, and an overnight shipping option - we took it! I'll save my customer service experience with Defender for another blog, but it wasn't fun. In short, if you are buying anything from Defender, don't trust the website. Call in your order and talk to a human to make sure the person who is supposed to be watching the web orders does his/her job!

Finally, after 2 months, $3,200, and a lot of headaches we have a new fridge. The installation was a breeze (yes, I read the instructions) and the new holding plate is a much better fit in our icebox than the bulky aluminum evaporator from the old unit. We still have some clean-up to do, but the holding plate froze quickly and the icebox is cooling nicely. I think (hope) we are going to be happy with it. If not, you will certainly hear about it.