Summer’s been and gone for another year, and over the past couple of months you may have noticed your 12v portable fridge struggled on really hot days. There may be one of a hundred different reasons for that – everything from quality of the fridge to the size of your battery – but one of the most common is something known as voltage drop. It’s a serious issue with 12v systems but thankfully there’s a way around the problem. If you’ve got a portable camping fridge then you need to read this article!

Voltage drop is exactly what the name suggests – when the voltage that goes into one end of a cable comes out a lot less at the other end. One thing in particular causes voltage drop, and that’s under-sized wiring. Electrical wiring that can’t stand up to the task of transporting the amps required from the battery to the load (such as your 12v fridge) will simply over-heat to the point where the wiring may even melt in the worst-case scenario. In less extreme scenarios, that heat will cause the voltage from your deep cycle battery to severely drop before it makes its way down the cabling to the fridge. This is a serious issue because many fridges like the Adventure Kings 60L and 80L fridge/freezers have selectable low-voltage cut-outs to prevent you from running your battery dead flat. In many cases the fridge will turn off unexpectedly, and because the voltage at the battery end is fine you’ll think the fridge is faulty when it is entirely caused by voltage drop.

So what’s the solution? The ideal situation is to mount your auxiliary deep cycle battery as close to your fridge as possible, and in fact to mount your battery charger or smart isolator as close to the deep-cycle battery as you can. For maximum performance from your 12v fridge, that means mounting the battery and the charger in the back of your 4WD where your fridge is. However you can’t just mount any battery inside a vehicle, as traditional wet-cell batteries emit toxic, potentially-flammable gases when they’re charging and discharging.

Thankfully, the solution is easy, thanks to 4WD Supacentre! The new Adventure Kings range of Absorbed Glass Matt AGM batteries are perfectly safe to run inside a vehicle’s cabin or canopy thanks to their completely sealed design. With no vents or caps, there’s no way for gases to escape into the cabin. At the same time, the CTEK range of DC/DC chargers like the CTEK D250SA and CTEK Smartpass 120 are perfectly suited to running inside the vehicle.

You can get around the issue of voltage drop by using large-diameter, high-current electrical cabling to run from your crank battery all the way to the back of the vehicle. Pass the cabling from the crank battery through a minimum 100A fuse or ideally a circuit breaker, and any voltage drop that occurs, happens before it gets to the charger. The CTEK D250SA and Smartpass 120 can handle a range of voltage inputs, and in turn will supercharge that electrical power before putting out a nice healthy voltage and current to power the battery. You may find you only need a metre of cabling between your battery and your charger, and another metre or less of cabling between your charger and your 12v camping fridge. It’s a much better idea than trying to run six or more metres of smaller-diameter cabling all the way from an under-bonnet mounted auxiliary battery to your fridge.

Before you start cursing your fridge for not running properly, have a think about whether the entirety of your 12v system is up to the task of running your portable fridge. It may seem like a lot to take in, but in reality it’s all about ensuring every component is up to spec and won’t let the rest of the system down. If in doubt, your local auto electrician will be able to handle the install of any 12v gear you purchase through 4WD Supacentre.

And remember that 4WD Supacentre have a price-match guarantee on the range of CTEK gear that we stock. That means if you can find a better price on Aussie stock anywhere in the country, we’ll match it! Terms and conditions apply, visit https://www.4wdsupacentre.com.au/terms#ctek