Going green broke my fridge!

[Woody girl]

Well, I've made the swop to using glass for storage instead of plastic.
I make a lot of my food, instead of buying plastic wrapped stuff, and if I do, I transfer to either waxed cotton wraps( for cheese)
Or glass jars and containers for humous butter bacon etc
Last night I heard a great thump, as if something had tumbled something outside the back door where my garden tools are stored.....rats or cats I thought... then maybe a burglar, so, armed with a can of spray deep heat in case of humans, I opened the back door to find everything in order.
Puzzled I checked the house for anything such as fallen ceilings or book cases. All was fine. So I went to bed puzzled but feeling that I'd possibly imagined it, or it was something on the radio.
This morning, I went to make a cup of tea...opened the fridge door, only for everything to fall out, smashing jars of pickled beetroot, amongst other things at my bare feet.
I managed to extricate myself unharmed, got cleaned up and started to put things right. It took several hours, and I found that the weight of all my containers and jars had made the plastic lugs on the glass shelves give way on the top shelf, collapsed it all onto the second shelf, which also gave way, so when I opened the door, the whole lot cascaded out onto the floor.
Aaargh!
Anyway, I've temporarily fixed the shelf supports using garden canes to support the glass shelves. Not ideal, and the shelves are a bit wobbly, as canes are not the same diameter all along , so new fridge? Or can anyone come up with a better fix that will hold the weight of all my glass containers..when I get some more new ones next week. ?

 

[Herman30]

Try and find oven grates that are of suitable size for the fridge.

 

[Pattree]

Did the glass shelves survive?
If not then I agree with the grill idea ^^^^^

Look out - brain fart!

Whether wire or glass:
I am presuming that you don’t want to drill the walls of the fridge and for two pairs of stainless steel rods to replace your canes.
It’s what I’d do before I bought a new fridge. I’d drill then fit silicon grommets.

However:

Do you know anyone with a 3D printer?.

I’m supposing that it was the supports in the side walls that proved inadequate.

Think of the slotted side panels that support shelves in an oven.

You could make/print a pair of narrow panels or bridges that sit close to the side walls of your fridge. I’m imagining something 6mm thick but with 12 - 15mm ledges to replace your existing shelf supports.

The stainless steel rods could then run from bridge to bridge and leave the fridge walls and your insulation intact.

 

[Keith_Beef]

plastic lugs on the glass shelves

This makes me think that the ridges moulded into the inside of the fridge are still ok... I'd get pieces of aluminium bar, perhaps 3mm thick and about 12mm to 20mm wide, put those side to side and then put the glass shelves resting on the bars.

 

[johnnytheboy]

Go to the dump, loads of old fridges and ovens to get parts from!

 

[Toddy]

I had a friend who kept 'all' of her food in her fridge....even cans of soup
The fridge broke as it tried to cope with the weight of a family's weekly shop.

Heather had to learn what could really do with not being refrigerated, and what most definitely needed to be so.

Jars of pickled beetroot do very well in a cold pantry......I think you need to re-think not the glass storage dishes, but the storage of the glass holding stuff that doesn't need the fridge.

My own fridge and freezer is stowed, but the only jars in it are pesto, ginger paste, roasted peppers, mushrooms, pumpkin seed butter, and the glass jug for the fruit juice. I do use washed out jars to store left overs, just now there's veggie mince for spaghetti, but that's pretty much it.

It's a plastic cupboard, it won't take the weight. They're just injection moulded these days, I doubt they're even fibreglass reinforced.

 

[Nice65]

Go to the dump, loads of old fridges and ovens to get parts from!

No way anything leaves the West Sussex tips, once it's there it's there.

Mate of mine who's handy with a multimeter and soldering iron spotted a really nice, immaculate Samsung flat screen and tried to buy it. Not a chance, even £20 in the back pocket and back the car up to stash it in quick and they were having none of it.

 

[Nice65]

think you need to re-think not the glass storage dishes, but the storage of the glass holding stuff that doesn't need the fridge.

I've just decanted a big pot of coleslaw, a jar of olives and same of sun-dried tomatoes into a 3 tier tiffin. Very light stainless steel pots that fit on a shelf or in the door. It won't keep food airtight like a jar though I think there must be sealed ones available.

Classical Clip Designs

Welcome to the Indian-Tiffin Revolution! In 2003 we took a stand against using plastic and replaced it with stainless steel Indian Tiffin-Boxes. We loved them so much we shared them online and have since become the World's largest seller!

indian-tiffin.com

Mine is a medium, it's very small, about 12cm across.

Doesn't solve your problem though. If the original shelves were at the right height, a careful cleaning of the surfaces and a glue might be a good solution. There are CA type glues that allow for flex rather than the typical glasslike hardness of standard CA glue.

 

[HillBill]

My fridge has gone FUBAR a few times. I have a lot of 6mm stainless rod, I just kinda fix it with that. Drill a 6mm ole on both side... cut the bar slightly longer than it needs to be... gently flex it and fit into the holes. What i fixed, hasnt broke since.

 

[johnnytheboy]

No way anything leaves the West Sussex tips, once it's there it's there.

Mate of mine who's handy with a multimeter and soldering iron spotted a really nice, immaculate Samsung flat screen and tried to buy it. Not a chance, even £20 in the back pocket and back the car up to stash it in quick and they were having none of it.

Not like Scotland, they are easily corrupted, even just with ice cream!

 

[slowworm]

That one of the good things they do down in Devon, the tips sell reusable goods.

Reuse - Waste and Recycling

Reusable goods are set aside/salvaged for re-use at all recycling centres (excluding Totnes). All such goods are offered for sale by the contractors/site operators, and any money made contributes towards site operating costs

www.devon.gov.uk

 

[Nice65]

That one of the good things they do down in Devon, the tips sell reusable goods.

Reuse - Waste and Recycling

Reusable goods are set aside/salvaged for re-use at all recycling centres (excluding Totnes). All such goods are offered for sale by the contractors/site operators, and any money made contributes towards site operating costs

www.devon.gov.uk

Just a few miles down the road, in Hampshire, they do the same.

 

[Pattree]

Veolia (Contractors to T&W Council) are ultra strict. Some years ago I dumped a load of tape cassettes. I put two boxes on the parapet and tipped one. An attendant picked up the other, looked at the top ones and asked if he could have them. I pointed out that he could reach most of the others too but he said “No - they are in the system.”

 

[ged]

If you'd really gone green you'd have ditched the fridge.

It never ceases to irritate me that refrigeration accounts for more than half of my electricity usage, and this despite the fact that the fridge/freezer is in an unheated shed outside.

 

[Toddy]

When I was little our fridge was gas powered. In those days folks plugged into the gas lines just as we do with electric plugs now....sort of bayonet fitting things.

Anyway, I mind my Dad complaining that the fridge burnt more gas than the cooker did.

 

[slowworm]

It never ceases to irritate me that refrigeration accounts for more than half of my electricity usage, and this despite the fact that the fridge/freezer is in an unheated shed outside.

I assume you don't use much electricity rather than have a a very inefficient appliance?

I think we would save energy if we replaced our aging appliances, the freezer door seal isn't great and I had to evict a mouse from the insulator the other year. But a decent one is very expensive...

 

[ged]

I assume you don't use much electricity rather than have a very inefficient appliance? ...

I think it's a bit of both. An upright fridge/freezer isn't very efficient I suppose.

I keep thinking I should invest in some solar panels, I could be selling electricity instead of buying it.

 

[ged]

... I mind my Dad complaining that the fridge burnt more gas than the cooker did.

Back in the '80s my girlfriend (now wife) got some temporary work at a stately home. While she was working there she lived in the grounds in a caravan some way from the house. The caravan had gas for heating/cooking and for the 'fridge. She used to get through about one bottle of gas a week if she used the 'fridge, and about one a month if she didn't.

 

[Toddy]

Not like Scotland, they are easily corrupted, even just with ice cream!

Our local coup has a very comfortable office/staff room inside two ports-cabins....all furnished with 'too good to waste' stuff.
They have containers for electronics that go to specialist recycling, and the same with old 'white goods'.

 

[TLM]

The problem with the fridge is not that it is particularly inefficient (yes could have better insulation and seals) but that it is a stand alone one. One could use the heat pumped out of it to heat the water if we had even rudimentary integrated energy systems in ordinary households but no we do not.

That also shows the thermodynamic truth that heat is a very concentrated form of energy.