What is better — a drip refrigerator or No Frost: comparisons and differences

Frost in refrig­er­a­tors is formed due to mois­ture in the air. Tiny par­ti­cles of water vapor enter the main cham­ber in a vari­ety of ways — just from the micro­cli­mate of the kitchen when the door is opened, when placed on the shelves of pots of soup or uncov­ered con­tain­ers of liq­uid, even from the sur­face of washed veg­eta­bles, fruits and herbs.

The appear­ance of ice is a com­plete­ly nat­ur­al process, due to the laws of physics. Mois­ture droplets con­dense in areas of low tem­per­a­ture, turn­ing into snow crys­tals. And avoid­ing this phys­i­cal process is almost impos­si­ble — although man­u­fac­tur­ers are try­ing to do it.

In par­tic­u­lar, man­u­fac­tur­ers have cre­at­ed two main tech­nolo­gies for auto­mat­ic defrost­ing (or rather, pre­vent­ing the appear­ance of ice) in refrig­er­a­tors — drip, known since Sovi­et times and used right now, and No Frost, also found in Eng­lish spelling No-Frost. But which one is more effi­cient? In this arti­cle we will ana­lyze which is bet­ter — a drip refrig­er­a­tor or No Frost.

Drip automatic defrost system

Drip tech­nol­o­gy is the most tra­di­tion­al and wide­spread way to avoid the appear­ance of lay­ers of ice on the walls of the refrig­er­at­ing cham­ber. It is based on sim­ple phys­i­cal laws and involves the cre­ation of two tem­per­a­ture zones in the main com­part­ment. But do not think that this some­how affects the func­tion­al­i­ty of the refrig­er­a­tor — the dif­fer­ence is lit­er­al­ly a few degrees.

A spe­cial met­al plate is placed on the back wall of the main (refrig­er­a­tion) cham­ber, inside which tubes with fre­on are locat­ed. When the refrig­er­ant cir­cu­lates, it cools much faster than the rest of the air. That is, in fact, it works like a radi­a­tor in reverse.

Mois­ture vapor from the sur­round­ing air con­dens­es on this met­al plate — just as, for exam­ple, the glass of a bus fogs up in win­ter if you exhale on it. They turn into droplets, which then flow down under the action of grav­i­ty and are tak­en out of the refrig­er­a­tion cham­ber with­out hav­ing time to freeze.

In this prin­ci­ple lies both the main advan­tage of the drip refrig­er­a­tor and the main dis­ad­van­tage. The most impor­tant advan­tage is that the per­for­mance of such a sys­tem is rel­a­tive­ly high. Even pots of hot soup can be placed in the refrig­er­a­tor (although not rec­om­mend­ed).

And the dis­ad­van­tage is that the con­densed mois­ture needs to be removed some­how. And in the air there is not only water vapor, but also volatile fats, pro­teins and oth­er organ­ic sub­stances. Over time, the flu­id out­let tube becomes clogged and becomes a place where entire colonies of bac­te­ria and even molds devel­op. It needs to be washed and cleaned.

Advan­tages of drip refrig­er­a­tors:

1. Low price. Indeed, such a sys­tem will be inex­pen­sive, so you won’t have to over­pay for it;

2. High per­for­mance. Copes even with active­ly evap­o­rat­ing sub­stances, such as hot soup or fresh­ly washed let­tuce leaves on the bot­tom shelf;

3. Easy main­te­nance and dura­bil­i­ty. Since the refrig­er­ant pan­el has no mov­ing parts, it will last exact­ly as long as the refrig­er­a­tor itself — and often have a ser­vice life of decades.

Dis­ad­van­tages of drip refrig­er­a­tors:

1. Not pro­tect­ed from ice for­ma­tion. Espe­cial­ly if any prod­ucts or con­tain­ers touch the met­al plate. At the point of con­tact, water stag­nates and freezes;

2. Reg­u­lar, at least once every few months, clean­ing of the mois­ture removal sys­tem is required. Oth­er­wise, it will become a source of devel­op­ment and spread of mold and fun­gi.

In gen­er­al, drip refrig­er­a­tors are a good bud­get option for every­day use. But it is still worth observ­ing a few rules for the oper­a­tion of such devices. First­ly, con­tain­ers, bags and uten­sils should not be placed in close prox­im­i­ty to the met­al plate on the back wall. Sec­ond­ly, it is required to reg­u­lar­ly clean the mois­ture removal sys­tem. And final­ly, it is still bet­ter to avoid plac­ing active­ly evap­o­rat­ing prod­ucts in the cham­ber. Let the soup cool down on the table first.

Automatic defrosting system “No Frost”

“No Frost” (aka No-Frost) is the lat­est tech­nol­o­gy to pro­tect against the appear­ance of frost and con­den­sa­tion of water vapor on the walls of the refrig­er­a­tor com­part­ment. True, it is based on the same clas­si­cal phys­i­cal laws.

“No-Frost” means mix­ing the air inside the work­ing cham­ber of the device. To do this, a fan is installed on one of the walls, which, when rotat­ed, pro­vides con­vec­tion of the mass­es. As a result, mois­ture con­den­sa­tion points do not form on the walls, droplets do not appear and do not freeze.

The No Frost tech­nol­o­gy appeared in refrig­er­a­tors rel­a­tive­ly recent­ly, just a few years ago. To this day, house­hold appli­ances equipped with this par­tic­u­lar method of anti-icing belong to the mid­dle or pre­mi­um price seg­ment. This is explained not only by the struc­tur­al com­plex­i­ty of the device, but also by the need to pro­tect the fan from pre­ma­ture wear or short cir­cuit.

The fact is that stan­dard cool­ers are not suit­able for use in a humid envi­ron­ment — in which, more­over, volatile fats can be found. They quick­ly “clog” with pol­lu­tion and burn out. There­fore, spe­cial fans are installed in refrig­er­a­tors, pro­tect­ed from such dam­age, often tak­ing the elec­tric motor out­side the work­ing com­part­ment.

The fan itself usu­al­ly runs at low speeds. Its task is to ensure the con­vec­tion of air mass­es, and not to cool the prod­ucts. The clas­sic fre­on does a good job with the lat­ter. There­fore, the noise from the blades is prac­ti­cal­ly inaudi­ble, and the ener­gy con­sump­tion increas­es so slight­ly that it can be com­plete­ly neglect­ed when cal­cu­lat­ing the con­sump­tion of kilo­watt-hours.

Advan­tages of No Frost refrig­er­a­tors:

1. High san­i­tary clean­li­ness. Mois­ture does not accu­mu­late any­where, does not grow moldy and does not become a source of germs. This is espe­cial­ly impor­tant for peo­ple with sen­si­tive diges­tion, res­pi­ra­to­ry prob­lems like asth­ma, or those with a ten­den­cy to aller­gies;

2. No dry­ing effect. Ready-made meals can be placed in con­tain­ers with­out a lid, since mois­ture prac­ti­cal­ly does not evap­o­rate from their sur­face. Thanks to this, even prod­ucts such as fish or meat are not cov­ered with an unpleas­ant dry “crust”;

3. Uni­form tem­per­a­ture dis­tri­b­u­tion. There are no cold­er or warmer parts inside the cham­ber — unless, of course, they are pro­vid­ed by the man­u­fac­tur­er (like the “fresh­ness zone”, which can also be called “zero”).

Dis­ad­van­tages of No Frost refrig­er­a­tors:

1. Rel­a­tive­ly high price. Such house­hold appli­ances are more expen­sive than ana­logues with oth­er cam­era anti-icing sys­tems;

2. Unpre­dictable oper­at­ing peri­od. If used incor­rect­ly, the con­vec­tion fan may fail, after which urgent repair of the equip­ment will be required.

The main rule for the oper­a­tion of No-Frost refrig­er­a­tors with defrost­ing is not to place active­ly evap­o­rat­ing prod­ucts in them. A pot of hot, still “smok­ing” soup may well dam­age the fan or sim­ply reduce its dura­bil­i­ty. In gen­er­al, liq­uid prod­ucts in such refrig­er­a­tors are best placed in closed, air­tight con­tain­ers.

Which is better — a drip refrigerator or No Frost? Comparison

Let’s com­pare these auto­mat­ic defrost tech­nolo­gies and choose the one that is best suit­ed for every­day use.

So, the No Frost refrig­er­a­tor is more of a solu­tion for healthy food lovers who want to store food in a place with high san­i­tary clean­li­ness and are wor­ried about keep­ing them fresh. But it is worth con­sid­er­ing that such house­hold appli­ances are rel­a­tive­ly expen­sive, and due to the pres­ence of mov­ing parts in the main cham­ber, the ser­vice life is unpre­dictable.

If you decide to get a refrig­er­a­tor equipped with a drip anti-frost sys­tem, try to keep it clean. At least once every 1–2 weeks, wash and dry the inside of the cham­ber (espe­cial­ly the rear met­al pan­el), and every few months, clean the drain tube.