Advice for replacing Dometic RM3862 8 cuft Fridge

[Peter Surprenant]

I have  2000 Mobil Scout/Sunnybrook with a Dometic RM3862 fridge, now 22 years old.. I have been told by my RV shop that replacements are hard to come by, are poorly made now and cost $700+ more. Thoughts on this? I know a replacement electric compressor is an option. Are there new compressor based/12 v replacements vs the old tech I have now? Thoughts on Dometic replacements? Fridge still works well, but planning for the day when it does not. Any other thoughts or advice?

[Kirk W]

RV refrigerators have finally begun to change but the same is true of home refrigerators. Many newer RVs come with a house type refrigerator, powered by an inverter when not connected to shore power while recently some are coming new with 12V compressor refrigerators, most of which use the Danfoss compressors. Several of the RV appliance companies now build them and if I were to replace mine today I would take a hard look at them. The Dometic DMC4101 is an example of them. Norcold has the Polar 10DC – 10 cu. ft. DC Compressor RV. I have recently become aware of the Everchill line of 12V compressor refrigerators for the RV. 

The house type of refrigerators are far more power efficient than they used to be and that plays a major role in the increasing number of them found in RVs today. One major advantage to either of the compressor designs is that the compressor is much smaller than the absorption cooling units and so the same physical size refrigerator will home much more. The compressor refrigerators are much less impacted by ambient temperatures as well. Of course, any of the compressor refrigerators will require battery power when you are not connected to shore power, where the absorption units use very little 12V power with the main energy from propane. 

If you are up to replacing the cooling unit yourself, you can save some serious money by replacing it as opposed to buying a new one. Several of the sellers propose that they are Amish remanufactured, but I have not seen documentation of that claim. Two such sellers are the RV Cooling Unit Warehouse, and JC Refrigeration. There may be others and there are some on the forums who have used them. A product that I do use and have for quite some time is the Arp, Fridge Defend and I would not operate an RV absorption refrigerator without it. I might add that Mark Nemeth the tech director also uses and recommends it.

Edited February 5, 2022 by Kirk W

[D&J]

28 minutes ago, Kirk W said:

RV refrigerators have finally begun to change but the same is true of home refrigerators. Many newer RVs come with a house type refrigerator, powered by an inverter when not connected to shore power while recently some are coming new with 12V compressor refrigerators, most of which use the Danfoss compressors. Several of the RV appliance companies now build them and if I were to replace mine today I would take a hard look at them. The Dometic DMC4101 is an example of them. Norcold has the Polar 10DC – 10 cu. ft. DC Compressor RV. I have recently become aware of the Everchill line of 12V compressor refrigerators for the RV. 

The house type of refrigerators are far more power efficient than they used to be and that plays a major role in the increasing number of them found in RVs today. One major advantage to either of the compressor designs is that the compressor is much smaller than the absorption cooling units and so the same physical size refrigerator will home much more. 

Yes they do run on 12volts DC but for the price I would go with a residential running on a dedicated inverter because the 12vdc units are 120 volt ac compressors with a inverter mounted to the compressor. The residential would also be cheaper.

As far as your 20 year old RV frig if it fails I would replace the cooling unit with a Amish replacement, they cool faster and have less run time and you won't have to worry about keeping your batteries charged. We have the same unit and replaced the cooling unit with a Amish cooling unit 5 years ago. I put a new Domitic frig in a friend's MH last week and it was a cheaply made piece of junk IMO.

Denny