Article by Jerry Culik
When I need to keep my food cool, I load up my little Igloo cooler with frozen water bottles and an ice pack. That’s good enough for a sunny day and overnight. To make the ice last longer I could buy one of those super-insulated coolers. But with high performance comes premium price (...and bulk). For example, a 24-qt Yeti Tundra 35 that will hold 39 cans of beer (one generally accepted measure of cooler volume)—or 18 16-oz bottles of water—lists for $295 and takes up 3 cu-ft of space. Recently I started thinking about ditching the ice and buying an electrified cooler. A lithium-battery power station runs the GPS and lights and recharges my cellphone, and I’ve got enough power for a small electric cooler. Eliminating a leaky bag of ice means I can also keep things drier; I could use the space that the ice took up for more food—or buy a smaller cooler to save some boat bucks. So, let’s take a look at what’s available...
