ARB Classic Series II Electric Cooler - Single Zone - 50 Qts

Video Transcript for ARB Classic Series II Electric Cooler Review

Hi, it's Evangeline and this is gonna be the ARB Classic Series II Fridge Freezer. This allows you to refrigerate your food and that way for your adventures you're always ready to go. ARB does have different fridge freezers for different adventures. This being the Classic Series II is going to be the more simple and sleek fridge freezer. It is available in different sizes though, so you can get this as small as a 37 quart cooler. I have the 50 quart here and you can get as big as 82 quart A fridge freezer is not for everyone though.

If you're just looking for a quick adventure throughout the day, you are gonna be relying on a simple cooler. But for those extreme adventures, and whether you're taking your little camper or you need to install this into your truck bed or you have a good overlanding rig, a fridge freezer has a lot more functionality and can fit nicely and easily into those rigs. But will this fit into your adventures Well, let's take a look at the features here. Outside, it's very sleek, not much to it until you look over at the display panel. This is where you have access to the power buttons.

You can adjust the temperature. You can even connect your phone to this. Now we have a quick release handle here, notice how that pops right back out, and this allows us to open up the lid and get access to the inside. This is a single zone freezer, but it does have two compartments. So we have our large compartment with the wire basket and the wire divider.

You can also see that there's a drain plug here at the bottom. And then in the other compartments we have our space here for our dairy. So if you wanna separate your dairy and your fruit or your other ingredients, you can do so. To make it easier to organize, you can take these baskets out. Now, when filling up the cooler, what does 50 quartz even mean Well, if you we're going to use regular 12 ounce soda cans, you could fill up the cooler with up to 84 cans with 50 quarts of space.

So if you're trying to decide between getting a smaller cooler or a larger cooler with the amount of space you have on the inside, the goal is to get as large of a cooler as can fit reasonably into your setup. If you're concerned about things like power draw or energy consumption, the difference between the different sizes is minimal. Now this does need to be plugged into a power source since it does not have an internal battery. You do get two cords with this, so you can choose to either use the 12 volt cord or the 110 AC cord. So planning out where you're gonna plug it in, you can either go into your vehicle's 12 volt or you can get a separate power system that has your other options. For power draw, the different coolers range from 0.8 amps to 1 amp of power draw. Now this does depend on the different situations like how cold it needs to be and if it just started, things like that. Now it does say watts on our go power doer cube right here, but if we translate all that to amps, here's a breakdown of how it's going to work. A larger system like this has 42 amp hours, which means it can keep your refrigerator cold for up to 52 hours. We have a bunch of different power systems here at each trailer. ARB also has the power pack which can keep your refrigerator running for up to 18 hours. That's gonna be much smaller and lighter and then can be used as an emergency backup. While you're back here plugging in your cooler is also a good time to plug in the Bluetooth module included with it. Now, this just involves a small wiring harness that goes into the back of your cooler. It is a little tricky to get that all in place and it is an extra step, but this is so that you can use your fridge freezer with the app. With the Bluetooth functionality you can then use the ARB fridge app. This is free on the play store or app store and this allows you to do things like monitor your voltage levels, change the temperature settings, and get a visual warning for the fridge is open, things like that. Now the app functionality is okay, it may not be completely reliable, so then I do always recommend double-checking the fridge freezer itself. With how this cools down to the desired temperature, what I've noticed is that when I set my target temperature, it has a consistent draw of about 50 51 watts until it reaches that temperature and then it draws almost nothing. I started at 46 degrees Fahrenheit. We've had this running for about an hour with some time in between to experiment and we're down to 29 degrees Fahrenheit, which isn't that fast, especially since this does not have a boost setting compared to the more premium coolers. This is just gonna keep working away until you reach your temperature. To make those adjustments, we have our setting button here, so press it once and then you can adjust your desired temperature. Press it again, you can switch between Fahrenheit or Celsius, press it again, and you can cycle between your battery protection mode. If you have this plugged in directly to your vehicle battery, go ahead to high. We have this connected to our power station, so we're gonna put it on low. Then we can pick which channel we want this to connect to. This is only relevant if you have the external port from ARB. And then we can adjust our display brightness, and finally, we cycle through the selections again. Personally, for a simple fridge cooler, this is gonna be good. It is straightforward, we have a nice sleek design. I personally don't like it when they have extra protrusions because when I push around inside the vehicle, whereas I'm overlanding, those can break off. This being sleek as well as having that steel body is awesome. I like the handle, but there are mixed feelings about it here at the shop since it isn't as intuitive compared to other fridge freezer designs. So when you do compare it to other options, this has a lowest temperature of zero degrees and sometimes you may need to reach sub-zero temperatures. That's when you start upgrading to things like the ARB Zero cooler, which is like this, but can be a bit more adventurous or you could take a look at the Truma cooler line. Those are gonna be more premium options with more premium features, but also a more premium price. So for something that's simple and straightforward, that's where this one shines. So if you like this cooler as well as all the other accessories that I used with it, you can find them here on our website, whether it's this cooler in different sizes or the fridge slide or our power stations. Check out our pictures, videos and descriptions, especially the measurements because that will all help you with figuring out your power system and your dimensions for your overlanding rig. But as a great addition to that overlanding adventure, this was a look at the ARB Classic Series II fridge freezer cooler, and you saw it at etrailer.com. My name's Evangeline, and I hope you enjoy the journey.