ENGEL MD14 15 Quart Portable Top Opening 12/24V DC Only Fridge-Freezer

I have just returned from a month cruising the Florida Keys this summer. This was a last minute purchase before setting sail and am so glad I made it. I am a traditionalist in many ways and my sailboat has a large icebox in the galley,but I decided I did not want to plan my itinerary around stops for ice every few days. I also did not have the time or money to do a full ice box to refrigerator conversion, nor did I want the large power draw from a full refrigerator unit.I stowed the Engel 14 F under the companionway ladder, where it was out of the way, but easy to reach into. I used the main icebox for dry storage of beverages and transfered items into the Engel for the day and the next. Always had cold water and soft drinks during the day and a cold beer at the end of the day, plus an entree for dinner or leftovers.The Engel 14 F cooled the contents very well, even on the first setting, despite an air temperature of 90 + degrees F during the day (heat index 100 F) and 80 + F over night, every day of the cruise.The amp draw was low and compatible with my Odyssey house bank batteries and solar charging panels. I had no issues with managing our electrical power supply with the Engel 14 F operating 24/7.Yes, it is expensive, but it's quality engineering and high performance in a demanding environment are worth it.

I bought it from amazon on 22 Feb 2014.The best portable cooler-freezer in the market as far as my knowledge.I used it for eight or nine times when I travel, it was perfect and I loved it so much.I think it is very expensive and a little bit heavy.The last time I used it was yesterday 24 Apr 2014.Unfortunately it didn't work as before, it cooled the first time when I turned it on then stopped cooling .Now it needs maintenance.I am now disappointed.

The unit refused to cycle back on and begin cooling. The unit would eventually become room temperature which made it completely useless. The problem was intermittent and when it worked, it worked fine. This happened after about a year and a half of continuous use. I was abroad at the time so unable to pursue the warranty route and instead enlisted the aid of local appliance technicians. This is what was learned. Engel will sell parts but there are only two! The cold side and the power side. The power side is pretty much the circuit board and it was 250 dollars in Oct of 2016. When the unit did cycle on, it worked normally which indicated that it was a matter of triggering the unit to cycle on. The temperature sensor was the first item looked at. This sensor is almost impossible to replace as it would require destroying part of the case to access. We bypassed the sensor and substituted it with a variable resistor to mimic it and found that the unit would still not cycle back on. The only analog parts on the circuit board that were responsible for restarting the unit to cycle on were some larger capacitors. These were identified by the technician as being of cheaper quality. Chinese made knockoffs of a reputable Japanese brand. All the larger capacitors were replaced with quality ones and where space permitted, with larger ones as well. It has been eight months since the capacitor replacement and the unit has been functioning flawlessly. The capacitors were less than ten dollars....

Stop working well after 1 year of use, consistently

I bought this specific model partly due to Engel's excellent reputation, but even more because it was the only 12-volt compressor-fridge I could find that would fit under the bed in my very cramped cargo-trailer camper conversion. It holds about eight or ten plastic sixteen-ounce bottles of whatever lying their sides (depending on specific bottle diameter), which is more than I expected, and draws very little power. My primary complaint is that something inside it runs 24/7-- I'm not sure if it's just the fan, or both the fan and compressor-- and does so louder than I'd ideally like. It's not so terrible that I can't sleep, but also isn't all that pleasant, either. With only one or two bottles in it there's a terrible, resonant vibration that _is_ loud enough to prevent sleep. The best fix I've found is to simply keep it full or near to it, but that won't be practical if I ever run low on drinks, etc. I also worry that the problem will grow worse with time, as I've only used it a cumulative total of two weeks or so to date. This unit froze its contents hard and solid when tested, though in practice I use it only as a fridge. I also wish Engel offered an alternative wiring setup to the standard 12-volt "cigarette lighter" style plug. Mine grows warm under sustained usage, and once after driving on a rough road the plug vibrated completely out of its socket, leaving me with warm soda to drink despite spending so much on this pricey item. I'm reluctant to cut my plug off and hard-wire everything in case I want to use the fridge elsewhere, and also because the other end of the wiring has a proprietary plug (yuck!) that would be both difficult and pricey to replace. But eventually I may yet be forced to go there.This is purely speculation and I may have this part wrong, but it appears to me that the rest of Engel's line has received an upgrade that this unit has not yet benefited from. The temperature setting is still non-digital, for example, whereas the others have nice, precise readouts. So, this may perhaps be a model about to go obsolete. I'd certainly have bought something larger and more modern if I'd had room to accommodate it. But this model seems to have a long, mostly-successful history and exceeds my capacity expectations.Someone above asked if several two-liters would fit in this model Engel. Dream on! It's not even close to long enough.Overall I'm happy (so long as it doesn't die before its time) despite the high price and minor irritations. Indeed, to my knowledge there's nothing else on the market that could serve my specific needs, so I'm grateful that this model was available at all. But Engel could, and in my opinion should, make this a significantly better product without even breaking a sweat.