I am the recent proud owner of my first ever caravan, a 1973 Pan Familia, bought just before xmas. It's currently stored under a cover for the winter but I'm looking at overhauling the electrical wiring and checking the gas pipes to ensure all is OK before taking it out in the Spring.

The van has a SIBIR W60 Kombi 3 way fridge which looks like it might be the original unit (!). It appears to work on 220V (it doesn't seem to have a 12V function) but I've yet to try it on gas as I need to fit a new regulator and level the van first.

I understand there is often an art to getting a fridge to light up and function properly on gas, so I wonder if anyone with experience can give me any tips. For a starters, I wonder why the van needs to be level for it to work? Is this also true in electric mode? Does anyone know about these SIBIR models? Are they a valued collectors item or are they likely to be a pain in the backside and better to replace with something more recent?

Any comments welcome. Many thanks. NIck

nick13,
I can't answer all of your questions exactly but can help with a general fridge opinion/myth.

Most fridges, up until recently, were gas absorption fridges. They work by heating a gas/liquid mixture which then travels through various bits of pipework and then thanks to the laws of thermodynamics sucks warmth out of your fridge and cooling it down.

Two things are definitely true.
1. The fridge needs to be relatively level for the gas/liquid combination to travel properly through the pipework, irrespective of the heating source.

2. The fridge works by heating the gas/liquid combination in a boiler. The heat source can be a gas jet, a 230Vac element or a 12Vdc element. It doesn't matter how the heat is produced for the boiler. If the fridge works on 230Vac it should also work on a gas flame. providing the gas jet is clean and unobstructed.

Thanks Ray for this info. I wasn't sure if the levelling requirement was due to something to do with the gas burner.

Quote: nick13 wrote in post #3

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Thanks Ray for this info. I wasn't sure if the levelling requirement was due to something to do with the gas burner.

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Sibir 3 way fridges were fitted to the Lunar Clubman range in 1977. The company is based in Switzerland and is still manufacturing fridges for medical and household uses. Not sure about leisure. www.sibirgroup.de