Bought an Evakool Fridgemate carcass for very cheap as the compressor unit had died. What was left was basically a box with holes as not only compressor removed, the owner removed the housing as well. He left the evaporator coil which is now useless so I removed it. As this was riveted in it left the rivet holes as well as a 25mm hole thru which the pipes from compressor went to evaporator coil. Other issues:

1. Removal of housing meant no handle and part of the body moulding gone as it appears that all that may have been removed to install the compressor unit.

2. one latch missing

3. parts of gasket had holes.

My first task was to patch up all the holes with the worst being the 25mm that the pipes entered the box. The other headache was removal of handle on the other side I think to house the compressor, etc also had part of the body panel removed. Forgot to take photo so cant show you. But can show you result in the pics to follow. While box is plastic there are many types and you need to know which one so that a proper bond takes place. It seems that virtually all these type of coolers are made from polyethelene and specifically lldpe. There's also ldpe, hdpe and a host of others just to confuse the picture. Anyhow, some what made simpler by the fact that both ldpe and lldpe are #4 for recycling and that's the number in the recycle triangle you look for. Ldpe and lldpe are not differentiated so I just had to hope the characteristics are close enough for me for the repair. I had a hell of a time to find ldpe. Milk bottles and most plastic bottles are hdpe and advice is that you can use ldpe to mend hdpe but not vice versa. I think for practical purposes it has to do with melting temp as hdpe is like 10degrees more and if use hdpe to mend ldpe your ldpe will be a mess before the hdpe has even softened. Anyway, it appears that some shopping bags are ldpe and these are the shiny ones not the supermarket ones. I also found some blue lids that were ldpe. So first filled the hole with some insulation. Then, with a heat gun, melted the ldpe to cap the hole. Keeping heat on it smoothed off as best I could. Sanded off remainder. You can also use an iron. Set on dry heat and use baking paper as ldpe will stick. Following pic is result on the inside. Rivet holes similarly repaired.

Next I repaired the external shell similarly to above. then I used pvc pipe to carry a rope handle. Cut the pvc and used heat gun to flatten so that I can rivet to the cooler and result is:

With the missing latch, Evakool sells a pair for $20 plus postage. Can also order from Evakool stockists. Installing a new one entails drilling out old rivets and installing new ones. As I'm missing only the bit that has the elastic, I decided to try and fashion my own using hdpe. So clean one milk carton, cut it up and melt it in my toaster oven on baking paper. I made a mould from some wood lying around. Some 20 odd minutes later the hdpe has melted and working quickly I get this into my mould. The hdpe goes clear when melted but when cooled turns opaque. So when cool, I hacksaw the piece until it's similar to the actual one. Can clean it up but couldn't be bothered. After all it's only for fish. Drilled a couple of holes for the bungy cord. Got a nail that fit into the existing piece that will act as the hinge.

One neat trick was to put a torch on the inside in a dark room. Any gaps will have the light shine thru. Marked the gaps for filling. Had a lot of self stick foam for draught excluder so used that to patch the gasket as Evakool wanted $20 plu $10post for enough metres to redo the lot. Now, I'm doing this on the cheap so I scrounge and use what I already have.

last was the drainer bung. Funny thing was that I had all the bits except the threaded flange. Evakool suggested I buy a complete kit as they couldn't be sure which one will fit the parts I have. While I may do that, in the meantime I used retic poly parts as they fit. A lot of brands are now using the drainage bung and base that are installed in boats and I thought why not. But my drainage hole is less than 22mm and the smallest base cutout is 25mm. So I'm still looking for that.

Sticks out from the body but these parts are cheap and the most likely bit to break will be the riser which costs less than $1

So there you are, one ice cooler refurbished. I'm not finished yet as the corners are a little warped but I've put more self stick foam there.  Three things I'm doing are:

1. make ice packs from 50mm pipe, these line the bottom and can keep your fish or food off any melted water.

2. found that the polystrene boxes which transport tassie salmon are long enough to cut up and fit the inside. They're soft and may not last but I'm using my polycarbonate sheets to reinforce one side. Anyhow, there's plenty free from any of the seafood retailers and you're helping environment by recycling. they wont decompose if thrown in the tip. I cut one up to fit the top of the cooler, reduces total space but need not be used. Another thing is if you have some thin rubber/neoprene you can size a sheet and this will help retain cold.

Oh yeah, in fitting the polystyrene I found that the cooler sides also warped. Not much but it's there so using the polystyrene will help to retain the cold better.

3. When cooler in vehicle in full sunshine it can get a bit hot. So to help insulation and prevent warping, I folded up one of those windscreen reflectors to fit. Just used duct tape to hold the folded corners, easy.

Added fish ruler, source a basket as the holders for the original basket still there but no original basket came with it. Many of the small chest freezers have baskets that fit so just have to scrounge on one verge collection day.

Here's the polystyrene side and how it fits. Hope you like the advert.