To turn my fridge off overnight?

[Fridgerson]

For various complicated and boring reasons, I am living with generator power only for the next few weeks.

The generator fuel tank won’t support it staying on all night. I’d have to get up every 5-6 hours to fill it.
The fridge is an expensive one and I don’t want to break it.

Do I…

Turn fridge off overnight then back on in the morning? (YABU)

or

Turn it off completely and live hand to mouth going to the shops every day? (YANBU)

Or any other solutions I may not have thought of! Thank you!

It wasn't that long ago that fridges hadn't even been invented yet! My grandparents generation just meat, milk etc. in a larder, which was generally in a cool/shady part of the house, and just bought fresh every day/every other day.

Top up the fuel before you go to bed then just let it run out when it runs out. It will only be off for a few hours and remain cool for most of it (unless you sleep 10 hours a night). Or don't buy stuff that needs to be refrigerated. Buy long-life milk. Eggs, butter, hard cheese etc can be left out. Fruit and veg can be left out. The only thing really that needs to be kept cold is meat. So just eat vegetarian for the next few weeks or buy tinned meat if you really can't live without it. There is no need to be running to the shop every day.

So you do that for a family of 4 or 5? Just go to the shops every single day?

We wouldn't have a collection enough place for milk to stay out for more than an hour or so really... And things like chicken on a warm day?

I would switch off other appliances first, microwave, TV etc.

I can't tell this story without laughing. Relevant to the story is the fact I have very bad eyesight. And at the best of times I walk round daydreaming in a world of my own.

For a few months one winter I'd been woken up regularly by a faint banging/thumping noise during bad weather. I'd assumed it was either a stray or loose aerial cable slapping against the wall next door, or maybe a meter cupboard door over the road that has come loose and was banging to and fro in bad weather. It was only really an issue in the wee small hours when it woke me up, and I would be so unbelievably shattered I'd eventually drop off back to sleep and forget out it when day dawned, until the next time I was woken up in a storm by the same thump thump thump. I was always lying in bed completely shattered and exhausted, but too tired to find the actual cause at the time, and silently cursing my neighbours for not fixing whatever was banging on their property. Obviously just totally irresponsible idiots with so little regard for others!

It was about April time, and England were playing in the EUROs or it was Royal Wedding, or Eurovision, or some such event and I've decided to hang Union Jack bunting out of my bedroom window. And as I pull the blinds up I can see something wet splattered against the glass outside. Had NO idea what it could be but it looks like damp paper or a carrier bag plastered on the outside. I just assume it's blown up high in a storm and stuck there in the rain. As I open the window I realised it's a Tesco carrier bag, but its secured by its handle being round the window catch on the inside of the window. 🤔 So I lean out and peel the bag off the outside of the window and pull it inside, and inside is....one single pork pie. I have NO idea how it got there, and obviously its been done from inside as the bag was secured outside hanging off the catch on the inside. Totally baffled by this. How the hell has it got there?! Inside the bag is also a receipt, dated late one Saturday night in December, 4 months earlier.

At this point bits started coming back to me like little fragments of a dream. I had vague recollections of buying a pack of 4 mini pork pies on the way home from my works Christmas do (don't judge me, I'm Northern, this is what we do) and vague recollections of lying in bed eating them (I SAID DON'T JUDGE ME!). Now I don't usually drink (probably better that way!) but I've obviously eaten 3 of the pork pies and then in my very very drunken state decided it was too much, and I couldn't manage the 4th. But man they were AMAZING pork pies and (very slight woolly recollection of this thought going through my head) I was too tired to walk downstairs and put the remaining pork pie in the fridge, but it was so nice it must be saved at all costs, and I couldn't possibly risk it going off when the central heating clicked on next morning. Now I can't remember ANY of this next bit, (it's purely deduction that has lead me to this conclusion) but my Mum used to tell me that when she was at Nottingham Uni back in the late 60s in their halls of residence they'd each put their milk bottles outside on the windowsill in winter, to save them being stolen from the communal fridge. So I can only conclude in my very drunken state I've just suddenly remembered my Mothers advice and used the same theory to keep my precious remaining pork pie chilled. Only I've woken up next morning with no recollection whatsoever, and never even crossing my mind that the thump thump thump waking me up every time the wind blew might be a pork pie in a carrier bag bouncing off my bedroom window.

It was hanging there FOUR MONTHS. And it was PERFECT. No mold. Didn't look off. Didn't smell off. Not even a bit. Just looked like a normal perfect pork pie. Still chilled. I wished I could, but I didn't dare try eating a four month old pork pie - even I have my limits!! How the hell I'd never noticed it hanging there on my way up my garden path every day I have NO idea, and why none of my neighbours had asked about it I don't know. But the thump thump thump during anything above a breeze stopped, and I finally slept soundly again during storms. 👍🏻

Moral of this story is.....you don't need a fridge.

I come from a fairground family and we used to travel around in the caravan we lived in all year round. Often if there wasn't a permanent/dedicated electricity supply on site we would put the caravan on the generator The generator would be on from morning til night but not overnight.
All the freezer food was fine.

And the fridge food.

If you let the generator conk might it get an airlock??

How will that have an impact on fuel being used by the generator?

Because there's less load on the generator...
Albeit not a significant amount to be fair.

We RV. As a rule we turn our fridge off when traveling as it's safer. The fridge runs on propane and we turn the propane off for safety. So it can be off for up to 10 hours during the day. We've been doing this for over 20 years and have never been 'poisoned' nor lost any food.

We also live rurally and are subject to power cuts due to wildfires. We normally turn our generator off overnight which of course turns off the fridge. Same thing. We've never had spoilage from the fridge being off overnight.

The main thing in both cases is to keep the doors shut tight. If you must get something out of the fridge when the power is off then open quickly, grab it, and shut the door.

PS I'm in the US but I assume that fridges are just as insulated in the UK as they are here.

Mate, I'm not recommending anyone live without a fridge, just saying it's possible (and I'm not the person who said they don't have a fridge, I was just replying).

But yes, my Nan had 6 kids and she used to go to the butcher's every single day. Milk delivery every day.

And milk will not go off within an hour. When camping in the summer, milk can stay good for at least a day, sometimes two, when not in a fridge, if you keep it in the shade.

Because those appliances use electricity when they are on standby. The microwave uses quite a lot for the clock display.

Not worth it, leave it on.

Didn’t have a fridge in my family until I was 18. I ate food and drank milk that was off, many a time. In the summer it was horrible. In the winter at Christmas we cooked the turkey asap. When we eventually bought an old fridge I so enjoyed having cold milk and ice cream. Before the fridge we had the mesh door meat safe, and stood milk in containers in earthenware pots filled with water. Although we managed, it was wonderful when the fridge arrived!

My car is currently like a mobile fridge freezer. A bottle of water sitting in the cup holder turned into a bottle of ice 5 days ago and it still hasn’t melted 🥶

if you are just turning it off overnight then leave it shut to stay cold. If you decide to stop using it completely then you leave it open to stop it going mouldy but also tie it open (e.g. with something solid preventing the door shutting) if you have children or pets so that they can't accidentally get stuck inside.

@Fridgerson

I live off grid with a generator that only runs to 10pm. Our large Bosch fridge with freezer top box stay perfectly cold overnight and have done for 2years. The generator goes on for 2hrs at 6am, then at 12 for 2hrs and again at 4- 10pm. We run 2 generators so swop after 3hrs to give one a rest.

Your food will be fine. No need to shop every day.

A bigger worry for me would be attracting rats if storing food outside.🐀🐹🐭🐁

The fridge is housed in the kitchen just off the open sitting room, where a log burner runs day and night so a constant temperature of at least 21c and this doesn't impact coldness of food stored in the fridge.

You'll be fine!

Or...moral of the story is that pork pies are full of preservatives 🤣

The fuller the fridge is the better it will keep cool when off. If you have the ability to freeze cool packs when the generator is on I'd do that and put them in before it turns off. Think the temperature would stay fairly low unless it's a tiny fridge with lots of empty space in it.

That isn’t how a generator works

That isn’t how household generators work, portable back up generators don’t alter their supply depending on whats being used in the home.

Thanks this is really helpful! And you haven’t found that being on/off/on/off has damaged your fridge?

It is. The generator runs the electric, so the more electric things are on, the harder it works and the faster it burns through the fuel in the tank.