See full version: This Simple Trick will Make the Ice in your Cooler Last Longer
The other obvious way to keep your ice frozen is to open your ice chest as little as possible. You know when your dad yells at you for "air conditioning the whole neighborhood?" Well, the same is true for your ice chest. Keeping the lid closed keeps the coldness inside, so only open it when you need something! here
Don't drain your cooler as the ice melts! Keeping the water inside the cooler means that air won't get between the ice, reducing melting. If possible, add more ice halfway through the day.
You can either add rock salt to a cooler full of ice, or you can actually make ice by freezing salt water. Either can help reduce the freezing point so that the ice lasts longer. However, this will only help if you follow a few other tips as well.
Summer is the ideal time of year for family outings, beach days, picnics, adventures in the park and so on. You probably bring along an ice chest to keep your drinks and a few snacks cold, but in the hot sun, that ice will be melted in no time. One sure-fire way to make the ice in your ice chest last longer is to add a simple household item. salt. Rock salt, to be exact. Much like salt helps freeze ice cream as it churns, it can help the ice in your cooler last longer because salt lowers the freezing point. Here's how this technique and several others can help the ice in your ice chest last longer! more
Avoid having the ice chest directly on hot ground if you can. Raise it to encourage airflow underneath or bury it into the sand at the beach (where it's cooler).
If you combine these three tricks, your ice will (hopefully) last all day or for the length of your event. Remember, the quality of your ice chest also makes a difference! The more insulated and high-end the cooler, the better it will cool your food and drinks, so don't skimp if you really need something that will last. You can also help your cause by purchasing a lighter colored ice chest as it will reflect the light rather than absorb it. Personally, my mini cooler works perfectly for me, and as long as it's kept in a cool place, my ice lasts more than a full day!
In our test, the ice lasted a little over two and a half days. We were surprised that in performed only slightly better than a regular Coleman but we suspect this was partially due to the fact that it is bigger at 54 QT compared to 45 QT. Also, at the two and a half day mark, there was some ice left but only enough for 3-4 more hours. The water temperature was still sitting at 35 degrees. more
In our test, the ice lasted right around four and a half days. We got about two more days out of this cooler at a cost of $100 more. This cooler has good size and will get close to 5 days in hot weather. Use some of our tips further down in this article to extend the time up at least two more days. more
What this test has shown me is that for if you are only going camping for a couple of days or if you have access to ice every couple of days, a lower price cooler can get the job done. However, if you don’t want to get ice every two days or your trip is more than two days, a higher end cooler may be the right choice for you. more
We tried to find the information on how long ice actually lasts in coolers, but we were out of luck. The only answer was for us to go out and buy several coolers at different price levels and test them ourselves. It is important that you know how these tests were run so that you can make the best choice for you. We decided to test five types of coolers, a cheap styrofoam cooler Unknown QT ( $10-$20 ), A Coleman chest from the dollar store 45QT (unknown model $40), a Coleman Steel Cooler 54 QT ( $95 – $125 ), an Pelican Elite 50 QT ( $195 – $220) and a Yeti Tundra 45 ( $300 – $329 ).
No, salt water does not (in that situation) seem to melt slower. In more detail:
Would a layman-friendly answer not be: [links]
If it is well over 21 degrees, say room temperature, there may well be a difference, in either direction, in part dependant on the volume and shape of the ice, in part dependant on the specific solution being frozen and temperature respective solutions are frozen at, but it could be relatively insignificant as it is well over the freezing/melting points of both "pure" water and salt water. Therefore, here, they could melt seemingly at the same rate or either/or depending on other factors.
Salt water will only freeze if it gets cold enough. For water as salty as it can get, that�s -21�C. When you put salt on ice it will melt some of the ice but only if the temperature is above -21�C. So at any temperature where fully salty water will freeze, salt won�t melt any ice.
Now if you have slightly salty water, it will start to freeze just a little below 0�C. It won�t completely freeze until it�s down at -21�C. Let�s say you have some slightly salty water cooled to -10�C, so some of it is frozen leaving some saltier water as liquid. If you dumped a little salt on ice sitting at -10�C, it would melt just enough ice to leave salt water at the same level of saltiness reached in freezing. Whether you�re melting or freezing, the equilibrium at some temperature is reached at the same salt concentration in the liquid.
Both the freezing point depression and the boiling point elevation are driven by the same basic physics. To a good approximation they're just proportional to each other.
That freezing point would correspond to an initial boiling point of about 100.32�C. Again, as the water boils away, that leaves more concentrated sugars and salts in the remaining liquid. That raises its boiling point. I bet you'll have to heat it to very roughly 105�C to get rid of all the liquid. (Some water molecules would still be left, but bound into crystals with the sugar etc.) [links]
1. Directly have some scrambled-up arrangement with lots of states,
2. Find a low-energy arrangement that dumps energy to the surroundings, letting them reach lots of different states.