Oct. 8 - Refrigerator Replacement

Lamb's Yacht Center

The refrigerator replacement became an even bigger job than we expected and we can see why the previous owners just used the nasty, smelly, rusty, energy sucking one. On Monday we moved the boat to a face dock near the parking lot, so the refrigerators would be easier to exchange. Stan removed the windows and handrail and we hired help to lift the old (very heavy) refrigerator out. The old one was exactly the size of the window opening, which made the job more difficult. Lowes arrived a short time later with the new refrigerator and the smaller refrigerator was a little easier to man handle into the boat. We were so excited to have this job behind us and be rid of the worn out dirty old one. The excitement lasted for the 3-4 hours we waited to plug it in…then we found out it wouldn't cool. We called the manufacturer to ask a few questions and they told us to give it a little time and it should begin to cool. Well by morning it was actually a little warmer inside than it was the night before, we were definitely disappointed.

We spent Tuesday morning on the phone finding out we had several options for taking care of this issue...all would end up costing us more money (of course, what would you expect...we live on a boat). I won't bore you with the options, but we decided our best choice was to have Lowes bring out a new one...an easy fix if you lived in a house.

So...here it is Wednesday and we are repeating the same steps we had to do on Monday. At least this time both refrigerators are small and everyone has become experts at the procedure. We also decided to test this one out on the dock before lifting it into the boat. We could tell it was better right away, it sounded different and began blowing cool air immediately. We have refrigeration...life is good!

The original refrigerator was placed in the boat when it was being built.

Just enough space to lift it out of the galley

with the help of four men

Out through the port window

The first new smaller refrigerator being placed in the galley

Here we go again...this time we plugged it in on the dock to make sure it worked.

Our new frig is smaller, leaving room for a wine rack and storage on the right side. It's not that pretty right now but once we get home, replace the flooring and build the storage it will be better.