Thursday, 4 February 2010
Wheeled Cooler - camping, chest coolers
This was a fantastic buy! My friends and I went camping a few weekends ago and all had to buy coolers. All of their coolers were full of water with barely any ice left by the morning of the second day! (Saturday). Meanwhile, our cooler (Coleman 62-Quart) was still full of ice on Sunday when we were packing to come back home. I highly recommend this cooler!! I couldn't have been happier with it! :) Coleman 62-Quart Xtreme Wheeled Cooler (Blue)
We no longer have to worry about buying ice evry other day. This cooler is the best, it DOES keep ice for 5 (or more days) we have come home with some of the ice we started with. (camping usually 7-10 days and will buy ice once more) We purchased the larger ( 82 qt.?)one, now going to buy the smaller (62 qt) one too, and throw our other "non-xtreme" away.
I love this cooler; I load it with one or two 10lb blocks of ice and two 10lb bags of ice, go out for three or four days, and I end up coming home with ice for the next trip! It is the perfect size if you want big but still want to (barely) lift it yourself. I don't know why anyone buys a cooler without wheels anymore. You do have to treat the handles and hinges with a reasonable amount of care but this thing rocks. I couldn't be happier. People sit on it and it still rolls and works. By design, the wheels are ever so slightly lifted off the ground when you sit on it which saves the axle from bending! The bungee cord option is cool. There is a lot of experience wrapped up into the design of this cooler. The Ulimate Extreme cooler a step up from this loses a LOT of capacity inside for the thickness of it's walls. I definitely prefer this model line.
We were looking for a cooler to start camping with, and the features and reviews convinced us to go with this one, though we actually wound up purchasing it at Kmart. Since I always go to Amazon to get product reviews, I try to always leave one as well--even if we dont end up buying from Amazon.
The features on this cooler are atractive, especially for 2 person camping. It is a nice size, and can hold 4 days worth of food for 2, which means you spend more time on vacation, and less in the supermarket. The handle & wheels are nice, and seemed like it could handle decent usage. As others have said, do make sure you drain the water periodically, so as to avoid additional strain when moving the cooler. The one feature it is missing is a shelf to keep things like cold cuts, that cant get wet, out of the water. However, tupperware can also serve this purpose--just not as convienently as a removable shelf would have.
Now to the negatives. First, I understand when they do these tests they have "optimal" conditions. They leave the cooler in the shade, they dont open it at all (this is a big one) and they put one giagantic block of ice in there, with no food and as one solid mass. All these things enable it to stay ice longer, so at the end of 5 days they can say it keeps ice for 5 days.
That said, even taking those conditions into account, I am not sure how they got ice to last 5 days in this. We were camping in September, and the temprature ranged from 40-85, with it only being 85 one day, we were also camping in the deep shade. We had pretty solid 50% ice meltage every day. We were also 2 adults, so we weren't contantly opening the cooler for sodas and things like kids would have. Also, the way we store meat is to freeze it in tupperware in our freezer at home, and put it in the bottom of the cooler; thus, some of the food is actually acting as additional ice. Now, I do want to say that we had 4 days of meat in there, had no spoilage, and the meat didn't defrost until we wanted it to--but, we did have to add ice every day. Not a huge thing, but it would have been better if we could have gone at least 2 days.
Love this cooler and can't imagine ever buying a different brand again! We hardly had to buy any ice on our 8-day camping/road-trip - great not to have to worry about our food going bad! However, it is available for $40 at Kmart - $25 savings!
I must admit that I didn't get this cooler from Amazon, it was given to me. I live in Florida and we just had a close brush with Tropical Storm Fay. On Monday morning, I put two 20lb bags of ice cubes in along with some pre-chilled milk, OJ and other items just in case. At worst I figured that I'd find out if the cooler was any good. As I write this, it is 10 o'clock Sunday evening and there is still three to four lbs of ice and a good deal of ice water in there. I added NO ice and there was NO leakage. So, does the cooler do what it says I'll do? You betcha! Do I recommend it? Yes I do!
My girlfriend and I purchased this cooler before going out to Burning Man. We were looking for a cooler that could withstand 90+ degree temperatures during the day. I'm happy to say the Coleman Xtreme passed the test.
We had a non-Extreme cooler on hand as well which had drinks while the Extreme had food in it. After 1 day the ice in the older cooler had mostly melted. While there was some melting in the Extreme every bag of ice we put in still had ice in it. Even after 5 days one of the bags we put in that was near the bottom still had ice in it.
None of our food spoiled and the cooler was noticeably colder than the older cooler we had. Next year I'll be buying another Extreme cooler so our drinks can stay just as cold.
The Coleman 62-Quart is the perfect size. It arrived quickly, initially I was worried, it seemed a cheap cooler. The hinges are so scary in that they are like a Tupperware Lid the hinges are plastic, I can see how a great deal of hard use might bend them through. However, with that being said. I found it really GREAT! I put it to use the very first day. Two bags of ice, items from the frig, and off for a three day trip to AZ. Never took it out of the SUV, it sat in over 100 degree weather in the vehicle! Didn't leak either, the 3rd day ice was still in it, 50 percent melted, but I never replaced the ice, and it was still nice and cold by the time I got home. I really was surprised how long it kept the ice. I think it's excellent. It's nice to know it lasts so long, so well. Never needed to pull it, the handles worked fine to place it in the SUV, never removed it once it was full, filled it while it was inside the vehicle. Roomy enough for us. It is worth it's price, plus being delivered to my door versus driving to the nearest department store 35 miles away! Very pleased. I do recommend this product. Just wish the company had given more thought to the hinges! - Wheeled Cooler - Camping - Chest Coolers - Coleman'
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