Blue Alpine Freeze Dryer review

hey everyone it's Donald I'm going to do the review on the blue Alpine freeze dryer so I know this is much needed however there was some stuff I really needed to kind of do research on so um that being said this color here was actually custom done for me I paid them to have this done uh looking at the outside of the machine for one I love the color however there's like I don't know I know you guys can't see it but there's like a lip here that's not like even and flesh um kind of have it so that's the only spot on the front but we do have it on the side walls I did take the sidewalls off because I wanted to make sure that we could kind of go over that as well in this review but the sidewalls are the same like little bow and stuff so I wasn't too impressed with that and then the first thing that really came though they did package the machine extremely extremely well and I'm sorry if you guys hear my dogs running but um there's a actual quality control checklist I think they did an extremely well job uh putting this checklist together making sure the latest software is installed extra little Cruiser correct the one thing that really turned me off on this checklist uh let's be honest is when we talk about the mtors and them testing the mentors out right so run a test with the vacuum um making sure the vacuum's down and then their test is as long as it's less than 11.25 it's a passing score right um you guys know me for a long long time if you've been watching this channel uh below 500 has always been the industry standard on these home freeze dryers uh stay fresh and um Harvest Right both have that as their standard until stay fresh recently supposedly changed it but I haven't seen anything really official in writing but they do say you can do a higher um that being said it looks like there's is 11 25. now this machine here tested at 831 684 for the first vacuum test and then they do a refrigeration test and then they so first ones with ambient temperature before testing and then this other one's with a cold temperature so the thing about it though what makes me somewhat worried is yes the first temperature or the first test on cold was lower than the first test up here however the second test was the highest ever tour we actually had of all four testing so not a fan of maybe the standards that are actually done in the machine heating test they heated to 120 as we look at freeze dryers there's no other company that's releasing only 120 degrees uh freeze dryers so all the other ones gonna like one 40 145 so kind of um kind of a disappointing problem when it comes to the checklist definitely needs to probably be updated if if they're going to have the higher standards that most people would expect when it comes to the machine now we still have a standard release valve this is how you're going to release all the air into the chamber not a fan of this uh Harvest Right has the same type of thing this one's really really long um but it's kind of may be good because you can go other places you don't have to get right next to the machine however um just not a fan of of air or moisture going in fact foreign yeah so going back into that right in fact looking at this yeah that's the way it is sorry I was look at the vacuum hose as well because their vacuum hose is definitely different on this machine than other machines so uh not a fan of obviously you cannot clean this hose like that is impossible to actual clean and so I'm not a fan obviously they use stainless steel fittings which is good but you can't clean this hose um or anything like that there's no clamp on this hose to actually secure this in so say if it does get loose you're going to have obviously a vacuum leak in this area as well so not a fan of this I'm not a fan of obviously if you want to take sides off you can't do it because of the way it's just set up as you guys can see here uh overall the door is pretty standard you know it moves just like all the other machines do um a standard clamp that is typically seen on the Harvest Right machine I still believe the one that I was on stay fresh looks better and I feel operates a little bit better for me but this is a standard door gasket that we see on all the machines this is where I honestly have my true concerns about the machine so this will plug into your tray system not a big deal the trace system is very small so if you're looking at getting a larger this might be close to a medium but I would still probably uh challenge that maybe so you're going to plug these in typically just like you would and then they plug out right uh the one thing I don't see on these and I well the gaskets inside here so that's that makes sense so but the heating the heating pads I like these better than the typical orange ones I have a bunch of stuff on them however the tray system is super super small and there are just wires I'm not sure these look like they might be like a silicone like putty type stuff that's kind of on there not sure how well you're gonna be able to clean all up in here on any of the trays if you see my hand barely fits in the tray I might be able to reach halfway so if you have big hands uh make sure that you have something else to clean this tray system itself overall it does look quality built um but you know I can't wait for a company to actually release a tray system that just comes apart that can actually be dishwasher safe or anything like that and that can actually be a hundred percent clean but overall the tray system is built very well it seems like the trays these are their trays this is a stay fresh tray um as you see shortness wise there's a big difference um stay fresh only has four trays in their system however you're gonna get more food in the state fresh still um just because of the way everything's built you're gonna obviously you're gaining all that extra room here so you don't get anything more from this system uh I'm not a fan of sorry my dog wants to get part of the video the way this is all built right so you'll see you can get inside here the wires and stuff um there's a hole so which means bacteria can obviously grow in that hole possibly the drain valve is actually like a fitting um in this drain valve so for you to clean clean in here I think is going to be very problematic and then going back into the vacuum I can't even reach my finger all the way back maybe with my pinky with my pinky I can get all the way back in here right so you're once again going to have problems cleaning in there making sure that there's no form of bacteria in there or anything like that um they did put a filter on here which is cool uh but once again it's with all the food it's what it's gonna get probably moisture on it it could probably have a high chance of stuff just getting on there once again you're gonna have a hard time cleaning in there my thing my pinky doesn't get all the way back to the back of that um so while they put a filter I'm not sure if that filter is actually beneficial due to it's only filtering air from the vacuum uh when you release all the air to the drain maybe I misunderstand this machine but um either way you're going to release Air from there or you're going to be releasing air from your vacuum pump which okay I didn't see any valve on doing that either way this could be a hard spot to clean this is gonna be super hard because it's actually and it has fittings it has the the stuff for a fitting in there as well so you're not going to be a little clean back in there definitely worried about sanitary on this machine getting into the other parts of the machine I've actually adjusted some of this stuff already because of um these wires were all actually laying next to your condenser area in here right so this gets pretty hot these wires were laying right next to it in fact they were actually zip tied here so obviously wasn't a fan of that if you can see back in here here's your screen display area they put some some anti-static um plastic I believe this is what this is actually called when you take it back pretty standard screen all that type of stuff uh however there's some wires that are not properly um outfitted on here uh it looks like they use some sticky stuff that already came up uh the wire is already coming off the the plastic so you already see like exposed wire on the machine so not a big fan of that obviously not as high quality um in my opinion this condenser uses its um not typical Freon that we're all used to so if you look on the back of if you actually look on the back of the the blue Alpine label it actually has a danger warning for like fire and all that type of stuff because this is actual flammable uh refrigerant uh that being said I've done a lot of research about this and that's kind of what took this video so long to make is this is going to be more standard in homes in the future because the United States government and everything like that is going away from the old style of our refrigerant however it made me very worried and what does that mean if whose responsibility is this if this leaks all sudden it does burst and the flame my house catches on fire is at Blue Alpine or is it my homeowner's insurance or who actually is um responsible when that happens so from the research that I've done it looks like it would be my fault which means my homeowner's insurance would do it even though the leak would come from this machine because I didn't identify the leak and all that type of stuff so that being said our refrigerators and stuff are eventually moving over to this from all the research I've done but definitely probably some concerns that I do have and that's why this machine actually hasn't even been started is I'm trying to figure out with the amount of grams of refrigerant in the machine how big that fire could be or how long that refrigerant is going to be in the air because here in Alaska we have heaters in our garages while this machine comes with the no spark vacuum pump my heater in my garage doesn't care about that um so in turn I have to worry about what that's going to do I'm sure places in Lake Michigan obviously Alaska some of those colder places have heaters in their garage so that creates some form of a spark in turn like it could combust if it's leaking so obviously a big concern when it comes to that when you go to the back side here um as I said you can't take that that panel off this is a typical foam that was used in the Harvest Right machines and once again it's being used to get in these machines not a fan of it um because stay fresh went to like a actual foam that could be peeled off and you could replace it at the end of the day this is probably not replaceable I don't I've never I I'm not a big I just haven't used it the hose for the vacuum is a heater hose a silicone heater hose um this is a newly replaced item so they used to have one and when I've talked to customers who have used the machine and I've also talked to the company they had some complaints that during vacuum this hose would just suck down in turn that can definitely cause some issues the company claims that wouldn't cause any issues with vacuum however when you're restricting the amount of air flow that can come through the hose it can cause issues in my opinion um not it's just it's just a flimsy hose at the end of the day it like is real flimsy not a big fan of it I explained that I will be looking at hey what do we do to maybe have parts to fix this in the future however when you take this off this is a ball valve and it's just screwed in there so I mean there could be some stuff there you don't see any Teflon tape on any of the connections is it needed is it not needed could it be a leak point a hundred percent it could be a link point is it not needed I don't know um I'm I'm hoping a lot of testing was obviously done before they didn't put any type of Teflon or anything because Teflon the the tape is very standard with fittings as a as a whole you'll see they used um stretch tape or the this uh this heat tape uh that once you heat it it kind of goes on the wires that being said there's like exposed wires all in here it's not like I think I could probably easily break some wires just messing with this thing um not a big fan of how all these wires are put together this is where your heater and stuff is because there's just exposed wires I can already see and it's not it's not just what I would expect from a company um these obviously wires are all these go to the back door um and it's actually what powers machine so that's why you see these ones loose so you have to actually unplug the whole thing in order to get that back panel off and everything like that a little more work than the other machines for sure um this is your vacuum sensor right um once again it does it it's very flimsy um not a big fan of it as a whole um yeah so that's also this refrigerant takes a really long time to cool everything down so that's the low down kind of on this machine without starting the machine just looking at what they give all that type of stuff that being said everyone's always asking well where are where do you put this with other machines being that I haven't started this machine still after having it for weeks now uh should obviously hopefully probably explain my caution about this machine stay fresh in my opinion is still probably the number one machine for sure uh it's very comparable and priced to the blue Alpine very still comparable to the price of the Harvest Right machines and when you look at my video of going over like Quality Parts in the machine and everything that I've done before on that video I think you just see a lot more quality Parts on the stay fresh machine that being said I haven't always been a fan of the Harvest Right machine however Harvest right in my opinion after seeing this machine and working on Harvest Right and everything this is going to be a very hard machine for the average person to probably replace parts and everything else like that so Harvest Right is in number two in my opinion and with this machine unfortunately right now I just say really stay away from those Sheen there's a lot of stuff that needs to be looked at on cleaning the machine um just the way all these parts are really put together if there's repairs that need to be done anything like that there's not a lot of support still from the company when it comes to repairs they're not going to have a lot of people that for one understand the machine such as like this channel here where we can kind of walk you through fixing a Harvest Right machine and all that type of stuff I feel very confident if there was issues with stay fresh machines I could walk through that but Tim at stay fresh has been very good about people and health and stuff I haven't asked these guys for help don't get me wrong because there's nothing wrong with machine per se I'm just not a fan of the design how it's put together and all that type of stuff hey if you want to get ready to turn this off for me um it's pretty standard and then it doesn't lip in and then it's it's like that that's what I'm talking about like it's just there's like a spot here um so stayfresh.com if you want to stay fresh machine that's my number one machine that I would honestly suggest and recommend um Harvest Right sorry my dog loves to just be seen um Harvest Right number two I would personally stay away from the extra large machines right now just because there are quite a few issues with those machines that we've seen um and they're a little bit more difficult to probably do some work on and blue Alpine unfortunately is at the bottom of the list of machines currently and as you see I told you guys my dog wanted to see you well so I hope this helps I'm sure there's going to be a lot of hate on some company or something like that but understand I can only go off of what is in front of me I've used some other machines all that type of stuff but overall stay Fresh Harvest Right blue Alpine if you guys have any questions leave a comment anything like that let me know I hope you guys all have a great day

Channel: Donald’s Freeze Dryer Support and Reviews

Views: 7,703

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Id: nxypfwIWaCk

Length: 20min 28sec (1228 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 11 2023