Freezer question, your experience.

[john hamilton]

We need to buy a freezer. The *chest* type is what we want with the lid on the top.

'Which' magazine recommends the Miele GT263 and for a hundred pounds less the Zanussi ZFC 321 which comes in at £260.

The Miela has this feature which is suppose to expel the air inside, after the lid is closed. With less air trapped the theory is that it will not need defrosting as often as normal.

Knowing that its just not easy to get an airtight seal, the suspicion is that it might draw the air out but; it will creep back in again anyway.

Would anyone with experience of the Miele freezer know if its worth paying the extra £100 for this 'de-frost' feature. In other words does it work as a means of cutting out defrosting? Thanks for any advice.

[Smitty Two]

You could answer that question readily enough. Does the unit have a vacuum relief valve that you activate in order to get the lid open again? If not, then I'd say your suspicion is correct.

Do you really need to post this to six groups? (My newsreader won't even allow me to respond to that many, so I beheaded two of them.)

[NT]

It never pumps air out to begin with sounds more realistic

NT

[Jim K]

4pint plastic jugs don;t....

[Man at B&Q]

Never had *any* size milk carton burst in the freezer.

MBQ

[Jim K]

I've only ever frozen 4 pinters (didn't want to upset the edantic police....err....)

Jim K

[h]

Never had *any* size milk carton burst in the freezer.

Why would you ever want to freeze milk?

[h]

Who buys milk in plastic jugs? ALWAYS buy milk in cartons. It lasts longer and tastes better.

[Kyle]

On Jun 2, 7:30=A0am, "h" wrote: [snip]

When milk costs $1-2US LESS in the gallon plastic jug than for 2 1/2- gallon cartons, you bet your bippy I'm buying the jug. It's not going bad on me either way=85

[Roy]

t actually does.

=3D=3D I'll go along with that conclusion as well. =3D=3D

[dpb]

h wrote: ...

So have one on hand just in case, primarily....

Always have at least one gallon in the freezer.

--

[salty]

I haven't done it in awhile, but I used to freeze half gallon cartons of milk regularly. They would bulge slightly, but I never had one burst.

I'm not sure the results would be identical if you filled a milk carton with water.

[Jim K]

who said anything about cardboard milk cartons?

frozen coke cans just pop out the inverted base if yyou freeze them (over here anyways ;>))

Jim K

[ARWadsworth]

The coke cans do but I can assure you that cans of Stella pop the ring pulls if left in a freezer.

Adam

[hrhofmann]

That still doesn't make sense. how do they expel the frost, scrape it off and then toss it out somehowwww??? They might mean a self- defrosting freezer, that would make some sense at least.

[Rod Speed]

hr(bob) [e-mail] wrote

the lid is closed.

It does actually, tho its been dumbed down like with so many sales speils.

Just replace the new air that has just entered when the lid was opened with dry air that has been passed over the chiller coils so the frost doesnt form inside the freezer where it gets deposited on the food etc.

Thats how the frost free system works.

They arent self defrosting, they just ensure that the frost never forms inside the freezer, the air deposits the mosture outside the freezer before it gets into the freezer.

Thats how any frost free system works.

[Jeßus]

Both types have pros and cons - I've always been under the impression that the upright types allow a lot of coldness to 'escape' when the door is open compared to chest freezers.

Just how this impacts on electricity usage in the real world, I don't know. *If* it does at all...

The big downside with chest freezers you've already mentioned :) OTOH, if you have a need to put something large in a freezer (the neighbours body... or whatever) - then the chest freezer would be ideal.

I currently have a chest freezer, but am considering an upright as a future replacement.

[h]

Anyone who uses more than a quart of dairy products in one week deserves to be PLONKED!

[h]

Umm, so how is that useful? Especially since frozen dairy products are inedible once thawed. PLONK!

[Roy]

=3D=3D h must be about 11 years old and hates milk. =3D=3D