We’d like to get a chest freezer to put in the garage mainly for storage of our dog food (we feed a commercially prepared raw diet to our dogs that comes frozen).

I’m seeing a lot of freezers are not meant for garage use, so I’m just wondering if anyone here can give me some suggestions of what they use. Not looking for anything huge (7 cubic feet should be plenty big) and would like to keep the price reasonable.

We just want to have the ability to store more food for the dogs and hopefully free up some space in our freezer in our refrigerator.

We sell butchered beef that we raise. We have three chest freezers in the garage, and one in the house. They are the "Holiday" brand from Home Depot and cost like $189. We have had them for several years and they work fine. The garage is partially heated, it gets down to 40 degrees in the winter.

Chest or top open freezers suck. Best is an upright.
Unless you *like* removing everything when you want to add an item, it’s a PITA.
First in, first out with a chest freezer is a nightmare.

Upright may seem like overkill for what you want or bigger than what you want but you’ll thank me later.

quote:

Originally posted by KMitch200:
Chest or top open freezers suck. Best is an upright.
Unless you *like* removing everything when you want to add an item, it’s a PITA.
First in, first out with a chest freezer is a nightmare.

Upright may seem like overkill for what you want or bigger than what you want but you’ll thank me later.

It's like these words came out of my own brain.

Space limitations in the garage are the main reason we are looking at chest freezers. A door that swings out would be more difficult.

I agree with going with the upright freezer instead of chest if you can. I’ve had good luck with Frigidaire and Whirlpool freezers.

Whirlpool, get one with an LED power light on the exterior of it. Or plug a small light bulb in the same outlet it is, so you know if it loses power.

Upon Appliance Brad advising me a few years ago I purchased a Maytag upright.

quote:

Originally posted by jimmy123x:
Whirlpool, get one with an LED power light on the exterior of it. Or plug a small light bulb in the same outlet it is, so you know if it loses power.

CDN TA20 Audio Visual Refrigerator Freezer Alarm https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000..._api_i_tSBrDb9C5N6KN

Freezer Alarm better than the LED.

My kid accidentally turned the knob all the way down.
LED on the front was still on and so was the power. Was not cooling inside.

I have 2 GEs chests in the garage.
I’ll be replacing with one stand up. But for your use the chest will be fine.

I know 4 people w/ chest freezers in their garage's, ( here in the quad cities )

you are not going to have a problem , other than running a bunch in the summer

Yeah, an alarm of some kind would be a good idea. I have a GE chest freezer in the garage that decided to take a shit last week. The light's on but it quit cooling. We got lucky in that we went out there to get something and realized the problem before too much stuff got ruined. I'll probably get an upright to replace it.

An upright freezer is really the way to go in my opinion.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by KMitch200:
Chest or top open freezers suck. Best is an upright.

i own both and totally disagree. I love my little chest freezer. Prefer it to the upright all day every day. They both do the same thing.

Each have their pro's and con's. A chest freezer is a good appliance to own and use imho.

No recommendation on brand. Not sure what ours is. Works fine and is in the shop.

When I last shopped for a freezer (about 15 years ago) the chest freezers were quite a bit more energy efficient. We went with one, it has been very satisfactory. A Kenmore from Sears. Just keeps chugging along.

If you are only filling the freezer with 1 thing, and the space is suited for a chest, a chest is superior. They use less energy, stay frozen longer in a power outage, are cheaper, and tend to last longer. I think a chest full of dogfood in the garage makes perfect sense. Don't over think it, go to your local appliance store and pick one out.

One thing to keep in mind is that if your house is less than about 20 years old there’s a good chance that the garage outlets are on a GFI circuit which are notorious for popping which will result in a loss of your dog food.

If you can have it wired without a GFCI you’ll be much better off/

 
Aren't most uprights "frost free"? Meaning they have a defrost cycle that warms the freezer compartment to melt ice build up on the cooling fins. We prefer a chest type because it does not have that cycle, and keeps the food solidly frozen all the time. And they are not difficult to defrost once a year, in a short period of time.

If you want to come to Georgia, I'll give you one.

Been running two chest freezers for decades.
The secret to them not running is to fill it .
This is if only putting square cat litter buckets of water in the bottom.
Had the up right frostless as well as the non frostless uprights,they both were not satisfactory
They ran all the time and costing me energy.
Several years back power was out for four days or so [ice storm] they were still a block of ice when it was over,refrigerator [s/s ]not so much.

get some of the fabric collapsible cube storage things that are all the rage with wimmens now due to fucking HGTV - when you put new stuff in, pull the old bin to the top.
The 'buried for years' surprise food is the only headache I've had with a chest freezer.
That said, I prefer an upright, non-frost free. Frost-free causes freezer burn.
But mine's in a basement. If it was in a garage, I'd prefer chest due to the better sealing.