White Hawk dorm fridge run on DC

[leoslaton]

My wife has discovered that if she turns the aux. refrigerator in the basement of our White Hawk to maximum she can freeze things or more importantly she can maintain frozen things. Now she wants me to rig it to operate while we are traveling, disconnected of course from shore power.
This is a fairly simple operation of hooking an inverter from the battery and then to the refrigerator power line, etc. However it also begs the question of how large does the inverter need be and the simple arrangement requires some plugging and unplugging. The plugging and unplugging operation is critical. I could just leave the circuit tied to the battery and let the shore power keep the battery charged just as it is now but that seems to be an unnecessary drag on the battery charger and it might not be enough power what with the usual 12 volt drag when we are parked.
Has anyone done this and what values did you use for frige power and how did you rig the relays, etc. Diagrams are always helpful. Other ideas are also helpful. Thanks

[SawBuck]

I'm interested in this too. Last week when we arrived at our CG, my wife noticed the floor beside the bed was wet. When i searched for the source I found that the basement fridge had defrosted in route (I unintentionally let the freezer portion build up with ice) and the water seeped out of the door and ran on the floor under the wall into the bedroom. The storage area was wet too.

[tnchuck100]

From a technical standpoint it could be done as you describe. This issue is really how practical would it be. Need some numbers to see how practical.
1. How much current is needed to start and run the refrigerator.
2. How long at a time do you anticipate to run the refrigerator without shorepower.
3. How many amp hours is your battery?

Even with good numbers I would install switches to control how the refrigerator is powered. Only use the inverter when no shorepower is available. Actually a relay arrangement could be done to do this switchover automatically.

[leoslaton]

Well, it turns out that it might not be completely simple to run the dorm
frige on the White Hawk. First it is sort of a bitch to get into. The frige is pretty well encased with 1/8 inch ply (I suppose) and you have to pull the staples to get to the plug. If the wiring were to be routed you would probably spend some time in the basement. You would possibly violate all sorts of code in the process.
I finally got to the 110 volt box enough to get my amp meter clamped around a wire and read 200 watts. This varies all over the place according to people who have a bit of experience.

The best source of info is the long haul truckers chat rooms and forums. They do this sort of thing all the time.

I am still undecided as to whether or not to go for it. I may just tell my wife that it can't be done. That the zigform frammus is out of round.