Just occurred to me while getting a beer tonight and looking at my fridge magnet collection. Why are fridges made of metal - isn’t metal a poor insulator?
They aren’t made of solid metal. The actual insulation is between the outer and inner metal walls, and may be styrofoam or fiberglass.
The frame is made of metal for sturdiness and durability.
They’re not made of metal, they’re encased in metal. Steel or aluminum doors and casings maintain the integrity of the insulating material better and cheaper than anything else I can imagine. The best insulators have very little strength, and are useless as structural materials.
many appliances have large volumes enclosed in a small mass amount of sheet metal. the outer skin and maybe inner skin is very light weight.
Handcrafted wood icebox fitted with hidden modern refrigeration would be pretty damn awesome.
I thought Andy Rooney died.
If they were made of plastic, your refrigerator magnets wouldn’t stick to them.
This does exist. Sorry I don’t have a link, but I once saw a page for a builder who does this, either putting the guts of the fridge in a freestanding wooden cabinet or built-in to a wall unit.
My favorite magnet reads, “Stainless steel refrigerators suck.”
It wouldn’t surprise me if this were an actual design constraint at this point. Even if there are (now, or in the future) better fridge materials, they’re going to put a ferromagnetic metal into the doors because people expect to be able to stick things to their fridge with magnets.
There are plenty of fridges made today that magnets won’t stick to. If it’s a design constraint, lots of manufacturers are ignoring it already.
Such as stainless steel. My fridge door is stainless steel which magnets do not stick to. The side is steel, though… so all magnets go on the exposed side.
Oops. I meant consideration, not constraint.
You poor thing. Of course they would. Regular magnets wouldn’t, but refrigerator magnets stick to refrigerators. That’s why they’re called “refrigerator magnets”!
Now, then: the insulation layers all add up their thermal resistances and this total needs to be high enough for the refrigerator to run fairly efficiently. If you count the metal skin as an insulation layer, then, it contributes very little resistance. But it also takes up so little room. While it is practically no help in the insulation department, it doesn’t do any harm either. It is there for other reasons.
I’ve always wanted to start an appliance company. My dream is to be a refrigerator magnate. Naturally I will use my position to support art.
The door of my fridge certainly feels like plastic, but magnets still stick to it. I suppose there must be a steel layer in there somewhere.
Magnets do not stick to my stainless steel fridge’s door. It’s an inconvenience.
There are lots of fridges which you can customize the doors to match your kitchen cabinets. It is a fairly common thing to do in upscale kitchens. I didn’t do that in my kitchen remodel because it was a few thousand dollars and I wouldn’t be able to have a water and ice dispenser in the fridge door.