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Freezers and Generators

For those who take a chest freezer and generator on your hunts, curious what size freezer you use for a bull moose and what size generator you use to power it?

I’m going back to Newfoundland this fall and thinking about going this route. Looking at bringing a 21 cf chest freezer. Looks like a 2000w generator will power it, but I not 100% sure on that. Would like some advise from those who have done it.

Thanks Rob

Brought home a boned out northern BC moose....big critter that had a 4' wide rack in a Maytag chest freezer that was smaller than 21 CF......would have to measure to be sure of size but I'd guess 16 or 18 CF. Ran the freezer off my Honda EU2000i generator. Note that the Maytag freezer pulled the generator down less on starting than an old 6 CF freezer I had years ago. The Maytag is already about 15 yrs old. Good luck....hope you need the freezer!

Good luck.

Check the tag on the freezer, It should tell you how many amps it draws. Multiply the amps by 120 volts that will give you the watts that's required to run it. Example: if it draws 8 amps, multiply that by 120 volts = 960 watts. Your generator would need to provide at least 960 watts plus there will be a surge when the freezer motor starts up, it's not a lot but it's there. The generators usually have a rating listed for a surge.

If you plan on bringing the cape back, it takes up about 5cf of the freezer. We take a 5cf freezer full of food with us on our moose hunts. Once the moose is down we empty what's left of the food into a cooler and then put the cape in freezer. You'll have plenty of room for a full moose and hide in the 21cf. We run the freezer and all lights and everything off a 1000 watt Yamaha generator.

Honda 2000 generator is plenty.

just got back from AK moose hunt. Took 2, 7 cubic feet freezers in my RV. 53" bull fit fine with cape in 14 cf. with room to spare. If you have everything in the freezer for a couple of days before traveling you can go a couple of days before needing to plug in again. Motel every other night should cover it unless you are going south into the desert. Mine came home fine from anchorage to WY in 5 days..

Been to NL 8 times in the last ten years. We have had our meat processed there, vacuum packed and frozen and we put it in coolers when we leave. My buddy lives in NNY and I in OK. My meat is still frozen solid after a 6-day trip back.

We went from Maine to Ohio. One 4x6 chest freezer. All the meat was in vacuumed sealed bags. If we would have removed the cape from the skull it would of fit in the freezer. My bull was 896 lbs. dressed. It filled the freezer about 3/4 to 7/8 full. We ran a generator all the way home. Then for the next three days it was plugged in. It took my dad three days to go from Ohio to Wyoming with his half of the bull. It was all froze solid only ran freezer for about 7 hours.

My 2 cents. I used a small chest freezer. No bones and decent trimming a 5cf will hold an mature bull elk. Temperature means a LOT. My tacoma had a plug and I plugged it in as needed. Again outside temp dependent. It required little time plugged in - so I THINK any generator would work. Lets say outside temps of 50's daytime and 30's at night. Plugging in a couple hours a day or very other day we definitely enough once meat was cold.

It was fairly easy to keep meat cold - easier then I expected. I took out my passenger seat - the freezer was my passenger.

Keep in mind what a freezer can hold and what it can hold and let you rotate it. Packed solid once frozen you are NOT moving things unless you can set raw meat in perfect sizes that can change. My guess is 10cf will hold most bull moose - a little more for an Alaskan moose but not much.

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