mkl000

I was interested in buying a mini refridgerator that would fit my son's dorm room requirements. It needs to only use 3 amps to start it up and 1.5 amps to run it. I was going to buy the Black & Decker one at Walmart for $79 but I found out that it uses 6.5 amps to start up. If anyone has any advice as to where I could find an alternative one can you please let me know because we are running out of time before he has to move in and I cannot find any ones that fit the specifications.

Thanks in advance!

advicemom2016

i gave up on looking for fridge with 3 amps to start it up and 1.5 amps to run. its near impossible to find one! so i decide and bought Black & Decker one at Walmart for $79 and have them ship to home for free, now i just need to figure out how to bring this to the dorm... i just hope that my dd don't use hair dryer in her dorm room. and many students are using the fridge with higher watt and had no issue,so i think it should be fine.

mdmomfromli

I have emailed 4 manufacturers of mini fridges and will post back here if I find a fridge that works.

Just got this email from Magic Chef "All of our small refrigerators are going to run at 1-1.6A, and have a 80-120W draw. However, it is normal for a compressor to have an amperage spike of 6-8 times it's running amps when starting up. We do not have specific specs on the startup draw for any of them though."

So forget that brand.

mkl000

Thanks a lot!
I also think I'll buy Black & Decker one at Walmart for $79 and have them ship to the dorm (hope it will work). Plus what I found out is that rental one uses 7.4 amps! to start, so looks like it should be fine.
I was told that it should be no more then 2 days before we arrive to have a delivery. Will see how this will work

galen0805

Last year, we received a brochure along with our housing information about renting or buying an approved mini fridge. We did purchase one, and it was in our son's dorm room when he arrived on campus. It is the kind with a small microwave on top. It was more expensive, but we decided to do it because it was college approved and because he could use it for several years. I will ask him about what other kinds of fridges kids had on his hall. There was also a kitchen down the hall.

mlbrown

Do they check the specs? If the refrigerator is in the room, will anyone look at it to see the amps?

cormom15

I guess we didn't know anything about these requirements and we just purchased a small Emerson at the local Target in Ithaca/Lansing and plugged it in! It passed fire inspection and dorm inspection so it must have been okay.

oldfort

We decided to rent a fridge through a service referred by school. It is most likely my kid is not going to live on campus after freshman year. We were stuck with our older daughter's fridge freshman year (gave it away) few years ago. If a kid lives in a Greek housing there would be no need or room for a fridge. If a kid lives in an apartment or house off campus there is often a full size fridge.

The cost of of a fridge is 100. They'll deliver and pick up to/from your kid's dorm room.

awdude

I was also looking for a mini fridge to use in my dorm, the best place i found was amazon. I found a site with a lot of detailed info on different mini fridges / coolers and what not ( didn't even know you could write that much about a simple mini fridge lol ) anyways, this is the site www.minicoolerhq.com