Keeping drinks cold

Boiler Guy

lined it with 2" styrofoam (of course mitred all the corners to fit snug), built a plywood lid lined with 2" styrofoam and placed it between the seats. Four 12 oz plastic milk cartons fit snugly in the nest and stay partially frozen all day. AND my creation doubles as a perfect chair for doing sit down jobs, a third seat in the van or an oversize lunch kit in emergencies. Easy to carry and almost indestructable.

Ken C.

Any good ideas?

I use a 1-gallon plastic bottle that orginally contained Gatorade (around here, only Wal-Mart sells Gatorade in bottles that big). For refills, I use powdered Gatorade mix, it's cheaper. Lately, I'll fill the bottle about 2/3 with mixed Gatorade, then put the bottle in the freezer overnight. The next morning, I top off the bottle.

This method makes for ice cold Gatorade. But on days when it's in the high 80s or 90s, the ice usually melts by noon, and the Gatorade is piss warm by 2:00, especially if I have to keep it in the van on days I'm doing service calls.

Anyone have a proven method that will keep a bottle of Gatorade or water cold for a full working day in that kind of heat?

kevin coppinger_4

an insulated jug....

or if you want to get one of those cheap styrofoam coolers you could put it in that..kpc

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Ken_8

Stop topping off 1/3 of

the ice with piss warm water and let the whole thing freeze over night. The melt rate should just about coincide with your thirst. By mid afternoon there should still be a small chunk of ice left in the last major gulps.

Experiment. If you have ice left at 5 p.m. and no liquid...
work more (:-o)



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Carl PE

Hmm.

Maybe your local insulators can fix you up with some scraps of armaflex..

BillW@honeywell

The TV show \"Mythbusters\"...

just did an experiment concerning which method cooled canned or bottled beverages quicker. The refrigerator was the slowest, plain ice was next, and ice mixed with table salt was the fastest. I find that the coolers made by Igloo and Rubbermaid work best and last the longest. Both are lined with food-grade plastic, so salt won't hurt them. Those insulated jugs work pretty well too, just make the gatorade a bit stronger to allow for the ice melting to dilute it. Put the jug in the freezer or fridge the night before, use cold water to mix the gatorade. Camping & military surplus stores sell canteens for only a few bucks, fill the canteen from the jug, bring it with you, and that will save a lot of trips back and forth. Be careful out there! Heat exhaustion is dangerous, heat stroke is deadly!

Chuckles_3

that sure busted a myth or two!

> just did an experiment concerning which method

> cooled canned or bottled beverages quicker. The

> refrigerator was the slowest, plain ice was next,

> and ice mixed with table salt was the fastest. I


I wonder if that is somehow connected to the fact that refrigerators are the warmest of these three (~40F), while ice is colder (32F) and ice+salt is coldest (0-20F). Also, in the last two cases the heat is conducted away through water rather than air.

Just a wild guess. I am sure the experiment was very profound and original. I don't know if they submitted it to the journal Nature.

BillW@honeywell

They also had...

some outlandish methods that they thoroughly destroyed, that I didn't mention. One involved burying the beverages in the sand, pouring gasoline on the top layer of sand and lighting it. Supposedly, the evaporation of the gasoline would cool the beverages. It didn't. The others were less spectacular, but just as ineffective. If you've ever watched that show, you KNOW they wont't be calling the Scientific American any time soon.

Carl PE

I thought..

I thought that the co2 fire extinguisher worked the best.

I'll bet the halon extinguisher in my truck would cool it off quick.

Or maybe an "accidental release" of refrigerant. Not that I would ever advise such a thing..

Scott Denny

Making ice cream with an old hand cranker was a 4th of July ritual in my household back in the 60's. Ice and rock salt was the cooling medium. One time my old man forgot to plug the cannister securely and the salt got into the mix. We 86'th that batch pronto.

Cosmo_3

My solution

Two years ago I bought a 2 gallon water cooler/dispenser from Grainger- I fill it full of ice, then as much water as it will take and this will stay cold all day, and on occasion I would only drink maybe 1/3 in one day, and the ice was still in there and stayed cold all the next day. I also keep some gatorade, and my lunch in a portable plug in cooler I bought at a truck stop. No more "how do I keep it cool" problems anymore......

Cosmo Valavanis

Dependable P.H.C. Inc.

Maine doug

super coolers

You can keep your jugs in this cooler. Used on boats, lasts a long time, a bit pricey.

http://www.alltackle.com/icey_tek_fish_coolers.htm

Unknown

Ken

That made me laugh. Thanks I needed that. Must go back to work now as there is still ice left in my thermos:-)

Stay "pure"

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Wayco Wayne_2

I just got

a cooler for mu truck for fathers day that sits between the front seats and plugs into the cigarette lighter. It even has cup holders on top. It's nice to have cold water at the end of the day.

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Wayco Wayne_2

I just got

a cooler for mu truck for fathers day that sits between the front seats and plugs into the cigarette lighter. It even has cup holders on top. It's nice to have cold water at the end of the day.

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Tony Mastroianni

use thick stryofoam box with freeze pack

chemotherapy drugs are shipped to us frozen (CA to OH) and remain frozen when shipped in 1 1/2" thick styrofoam (thicker than Igloo) containers with freeze packs. these freeze packs keep my kids' drinks cold at sports camp when placed in insulated lunch bags (they're not going to lug around a styrofoam cooler)

Eugene Silberstein 3

Two trucks?

Do you have 2 coolers or 2 trucks?

If any of you guys buy stuff from Omaha Steaks, the styrofoam coolers that they ship in are great. The lids fit very tightly and keep stuff cold forever. They ship in dry ice, but I've put a pile of ice cubes in there to keep stuff cold and it works like a charm. Like I said, the lid fits tighter than one of Ron Jr's Levittown boiler installations.