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Post by cajunlady87 on Jul 8, 2019 8:18:32 GMT -7
This may not be so new an idea but it is a sure fire way of telling if your freezer has thawed out and for how long as far as safely trusting to eat the food. Take a cup of water and freeze it. Once frozen, place a quarter on top and leave in the freezer. This way if you leave home for an unspecified amount of time, usually a few days, like I do when evacuating for a hurricane, and electrical power is disrupted, the cup and quarter will always let you know. On return, when you check your little gizmo, if the quarter is at the bottom of the cup yet the cup of water is refrozen, this tells you your freezer food items have likely completely thawed out and it should not be trusted to eat it. In other words, throw it out. If the quarter has sunk half-way down, the food items are iffy. Eat at your own discretion. Any other ideas?
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Post by olebama on Jul 8, 2019 9:31:22 GMT -7
One thing, you need to check on it periodically. Don't know about you, but in my freezer, the ice will disappear (evaporate) after a pretty long time. So I have to take the coin out and add more water to the cup and refreeze and add coin back. The ice is sublimating (going from solid to gas directly) (chemistry term).
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Post by cajunlady87 on Jul 8, 2019 10:43:21 GMT -7
Yes maintaining a certain level of water in the cup is necessary. Thanks for mentioning.
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Post by marc on Jul 8, 2019 17:36:18 GMT -7
I do the same thing using a small zip lock bag of ice cubes, sitting at the highest point of my freezers where it is likely to be the warmest. If they get deformed, I know that I have a problem.
Currently, I am on the quest to find or build a small, cheap alarm kit - cheap is the key word. They already exist, but cost too much. WiFi linked my router would be great for when I'm out, but I would settle for a simple piezzo buzzer screaming at me. I will share what I come with.
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Post by olebama on Jul 8, 2019 19:27:57 GMT -7
I do the same thing using a small zip lock bag of ice cubes, sitting at the highest point of my freezers where it is likely to be the warmest. If they get deformed, I know that I have a problem. Currently, I am on the quest to find or build a small, cheap alarm kit - cheap is the key word. They already exist, but cost too much. WiFi linked my router would be great for when I'm out, but I would settle for a simple piezzo buzzer screaming at me. I will share what I come with. I was fortunate at my last job. I got several Fisher Scientific thermos alarms. I use them in my two freezers. I just looked them up and they run about $92. The units were NIST traceable. NIST traceable devices have to be recalibrated every year, but it was cheaper to buy new ones than to get the old ones recalibrated. So I got several of the old ones.
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Post by cajunlady87 on Jul 11, 2019 14:46:03 GMT -7
More great info on a subject we hadn't covered before. Thanks all.
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Post by ColcordMama on Jul 18, 2019 17:17:47 GMT -7
These ideas are BRILLIANT!!
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