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!

They really do. You can hear it in the engine sound, when the tumble dryer comes on for example, and you see it in the fuel consumption.

If I want to run something thirsty (like the tumble dryer) I turn as many lights and appliances off as possible.

During the day when I am doing washes, have the heating on and using more appliances, a tank of fuel runs out much more quickly, ergo the generator works harder/produces more power when more is on in the house.

Do you have a freezer at work. Freeze several two litre bottles of water and take one home each day as an ice brick for a cooler. When they defrost take them back to work on rotation.

Yes they do.

They don't just just a flat 6 hours whether idle or on full load.

It’s currently colder outside thsn the inside of my fridge. Surely a cool box with milk and other Stuff that actually needs refrigeration will be fine for a couple of weeks?

I'd imagine it will end up using way more power overall from having to get itself back down to temperature every day.

How cold is the room your fridge is in? the colder the room the less the fridge has to work and uses less energy, also what temp do you have it set at?

Ah yours is a posh one, I’ve only had the standard continuous rate ones

Do you have a garage or shed? I'd pop food out there for now. It's certainly cold enough, and the weather forecast is looking much the same until at least Monday/Tuesday.

I Have been on a genny before. Turn the fridge off. At this time of year most things will be ok in a cool room. If you put food outside it will freeze.
A gas fridge is they way forward

Fridges have thermostats and are on/off/on/off all day anyway; do you think this would be worse?

I'm not sure how big your fridge is? Might be better to have something small, with just an icebox. The compromise would be that you'd have to shop a bit more often, but probably not every day.

I have a small freezer in an outhouse, it's made specially for temperatures outside the house where an ordinary freezer won't work. So it's kept in a cold place and presumably uses less power as the ambient temperature is lower.

Not all fridges will work in these conditions, some simply stop working when the ambient temperature is lower than the temperature at which the fridge is set to keep the inside.

This ⬆️⬆️. I knackered my fridge switching mine on and off. With the cold temperatures at the moment, you could leave stuff in a cool box in an unused room.

I know others say it won’t the harm the fridge, but a fridge engineer advised me not to do it, as it will,as you say, knacker it- something to do with the compressor.

Thermostats are adjusted , but fridges themselves surely aren’t on/off all day normally are they ?

I'm currently using mine to stop things freezing! You can easily put things in a coolbox outside at the moment. It's definitely not getting warmer than my fridge.

I grew up in a farmhouse that didn't have a fridge at all. Everything perishable was kept in the north-facing dairy, no glazing (with cheese/dairy and meat cages to keep vermin out) all year around. But we didn't expect to shop just once a week; it was every other day.

Winter temperatures in the UK depend on air mass. A switch in weather patterns from northerly to south-westerly winds will very quickly raise the outside temperature well above that of the inside of a fridge.

Not the most convenient but I leave my sons drinks for footie in the boot of my car. They stay nice and cold in this weather.

we have frequent power cuts and have a portable generator for these times. it has a continuous output of 3kw regardless of actual draw from appliances and we found that we were often running it just to power a router and screen at a few 100w so purchased a portable battery pack which is perfect- and switch between the two as needed. a battery pack would easily power your fridge over night and you could recharge it with generator during the day...also no noise/fumes.

Temperatures here haven't really got above 4 degrees over the last couple of days and the forecast suggests it's going to stay that way for a few days more. We're currently getting excited of it gets above zero to be honest.

I know, i'm a white goods engineer

The fridge will be fine if turned off overnight. Growing up in Africa, this was normal. We had a generator that started up automatically if there was any draw on the circuit, ie we got shouted at if we turned on a light switch to go to the loo after the house had gone to bed. You could hear the generator start-up in its little hut a few hundred yards away. My dad had very sharp ears! Anyway, the fridge (a gigantic, be-chromed American kelvinator) was turned off at the wall every night without fail for years and years with no apparent I’ll-effects.