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21st Century Pony

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I was thinking more long term.

Pull the frunk out, coat the outside with insulation and reinstall. There really isn’t much holding it in place. Should be a quick job and not much $$. Plus you’ll never see the insulation.
That's one way... I was (am) thinking using cyanoacrylate thin panels on the inside because they can be collapsed for normal frunk cargo use, just lying "folded" on the bottom. Just spitballin' here.
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Besides, when (not "if"... when) the 14-year old gets uppity in the six weeks on the road, I want to have the option of locking him in the frunk jail 🤣 Insulation is an important safety factor to keep the prisoner healthy or the parents will have an issue.

Oh that's right I forgot about the escape button...
As the owner of a sulky almost 14 yo, with a MME on the way to me, I'm following this convo.

When I first found the MME and wanted one, I excitedly told my husband about the frunk/ice chest. He said I don't camp (he does, I don't). Joke's on him - 2 years later, we've acquired a lake house and a boat, and an ice machine for the cooler on the boat. My ice chest frunk dreams weren't so far-fetched, I guess!
 
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Personaly, I probably wouldn't be trying to trap heat in the under frunk area.
Coolers are cheap.
Coolers are indeed cheap yet they take up a lot of relative space in a small SUV with people and their travel stuff already competing for space.

Besides, why not test and try? I bought the car... might as well test its SUV capabilities, right? Ford didn't put that drain in there or that well-designed frunk lid seal in the hood for no reason.
 
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I don't think there's enough clearance on the outside. The walls are within about a cm or less of some components. Insulation would have to go on the inside of the tub. Even 1/2" rigid foam would be a huge improvement.
Yeah I had the frunk out last Fall and am looking at the pictures now. As tempting as adding permanently attached stuff on the outside is, I also don't want to block any radiator air flow around the frunk, maybe not immediately but if / when the insulation's glue starts to let go and I can't see it. Agree that inside insulation seems less disruptive to the whole system.

I do like and am leaning toward rigid panels becuase they are easily removable / foldable on the bottom.
 


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Personaly, I probably wouldn't be trying to trap heat in the under frunk area.
Coolers are cheap.
Insulating the funk area only insulates the inside of the frunk area. The entire "engine bay" is open to the wheel wells and vents just in front of the windshield. The Motor even is wrapped in insulation, the radiator clearly is not.


Sounds like a market for @AOSK
MEH. They'd have to insulate the inside of the frunk. That'll drop the capasity down by probably 1/3rd. It's really not that big that it can afford to lose more. It's got the height, but not the widths. Plus it'll end up being a nightmare to drain as no one wants to lift a soft sided cooler full of water out of a trunk.
 

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I don't think there's enough clearance on the outside. The walls are within about a cm or less of some components. Insulation would have to go on the inside of the tub. Even 1/2" rigid foam would be a huge improvement.
There isn’t. I had my frunk tub out a lot when the car was new. The insulation wraps I could find wouldn’t fit properly around some of those components/subassemblies (insulation got compressed to the point of uselessness) so I gave up. Something that lines the frunk tub would work better but it will reduce the capacity and not look nearly as clean. 🤷‍♂️🐩

EDIT: Oh, and the under side of the frunk tub will be difficult to insulate since it sits in places on the car’s chassis and it has some metal reinforcements welded onto it. Not much clearance there for insulation either. 🤔🐩
 

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MEH. They'd have to insulate the inside of the frunk. That'll drop the capasity down by probably 1/3rd. It's really not that big that it can afford to lose more. It's got the height, but not the widths. Plus it'll end up being a nightmare to drain as no one wants to lift a soft sided cooler full of water out of a trunk.
They could make it a soft-sided cooler with a one-way drain on the bottom that aligns with the Frunk drain.
 
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So I felt the inside walls of the frunk yesterday after a longish drive. Hand as a temperature sensor...

The back wall felt warm, mostly in its recessed center. The entire driver's side wall felt really warm. The front wall felt warm although less than the driver's side, making me wonder whether its upper slope had some effect here. Notably, the passenger wall felt uniformly cool.

I did not lift the AOSK liner to feel the bottom.

This certainly reinforces the "airflow from radiator" observations above... and I am now a bit curious about the perceived temperature differences between the driver's wall and the passenger's wall, albeit not enough to rip the frunk out and examine airflow shrouds.
 
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I was at the local REI shop for another reason this Sunday, and I noticed these folding insulated cooler bags. Specifically, their width is 9.5 inches when unfolded, exactly the width (depth?) of the frunk, and their height is about 14 inches.

So I got one (there are two sizes - I got the larger one) and after fitting it in the frunk, went back and got another one.

At 5 p.m. I filled them both with ice. The outdoor temp was 82 F. Each bag took 28 pounds of ice (four 7-pound bags each), plus I filled the remaining space with three more 7-pound bags, or a total of 77 pounds of ice to keep consistency with last week's test. See pic #1.

By 11 a.m. today (Monday) most of the outer ice was melted. The ice inside the bags was doing great. See pic #3.

I like this idea after playing with choices of frunk-focused insulation at Lowe's because:
- these well-fitting cooler bags have nice arm straps to carry from / to the car, whether camping or at the house or store.
- we now have a choice of using one bag or two (half the frunk or all of the frunk) as a cooler.
- I don't have to mess with adding frunk insulation.

See the REI tag, front and back, for product ID of these cooler bags (pic #2). NOTE: these cooler bags do not have a bottom drain... the water from melted ice will stay in the bag. I might put in brass grommet drains, maybe...

I will post here when all ice will be gone. Let's see how many days...

Price: about $52 for REO Co-op members, per bag. I think the shelf tag was around $72. BTW, a little birdie tells me they will be on sale this Friday 😛

Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230514_172441


Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230514_202617


Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230515_114233


Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230515_114255
 

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> definitely not for eggs

Side note: unwashed, farm fresh eggs don't need to be refrigerated and will last for several weeks at room temperature. It can save you some important room in the cooler if you have anyone nearby that sells them. (Just make sure they've never been chilled or washed.)
 

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Little late to the party, but to add my two cents - I took a trip from Salt Lake to Las Vegas, and my sandwiches were absolutely cooked by evening. This was even with insulated food bags that were filled with ice. The ice had melted and the water completey evaporated.

I've started using the frunk as a mini-microwave: buy some of those breakfast sausage sandwiches, and by evening, you'll have a hot dinner ready.

I second the use of a refrigerated cooler. There's a 12v outlet in the back to keep one plugged in. This way, you can have hot food in the frunk and cold drinks in the trunk.
 

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My 2¢ is you should probably avoid putting cold things in your frunk while driving due to the blast furnace effect. Get one of those cooler bags with ice or a 12V cooler and put them in the trunk instead.

When you arrive at your destination, then fill the frunk with ice or move the cooler bags to the frunk. Bare ice in the frunk is really more of a tailgate situation (only a few hours duration) where you want to cool down a 24 pack, etc. I think the cooler bags are a smarter choice for camping a few days.

FYI the ice lasts longest if you don’t drain the melted water out of it. So I wouldn’t drill anything. Also filling the entire volume of the cooler with ice is important to prevent convection currents. Zero airspace is best.
 
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My 2¢ is you should probably avoid putting cold things in your frunk while driving due to the blast furnace effect. Get one of those cooler bags with ice or a 12V cooler and put them in the trunk instead.

When you arrive at your destination, then fill the frunk with ice or move the cooler bags to the frunk. Bare ice in the frunk is really more of a tailgate situation (only a few hours duration) where you want to cool down a 24 pack, etc. I think the cooler bags are a smarter choice for camping a few days.

FYI the ice lasts longest if you don’t drain the melted water out of it. So I wouldn’t drill anything. Also filling the entire volume of the cooler with ice is important to prevent convection currents. Zero airspace is best.
I'll let everyone know how things work out.

...and it's difficult to drill a foldable bag ;).
 

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I was at the local REI shop for another reason this Sunday, and I noticed these folding insulated cooler bags. Specifically, their width is 9.5 inches when unfolded, exactly the width (depth?) of the frunk, and their height is about 14 inches.

So I got one (there are two sizes - I got the larger one) and after fitting it in the frunk, went back and got another one.

At 5 p.m. I filled them both with ice. The outdoor temp was 82 F. Each bag took 28 pounds of ice (four 7-pound bags each), plus I filled the remaining space with three more 7-pound bags, or a total of 77 pounds of ice to keep consistency with last week's test. See pic #1.

By 11 a.m. today (Monday) most of the outer ice was melted. The ice inside the bags was doing great. See pic #3.

I like this idea after playing with choices of frunk-focused insulation at Lowe's because:
- these well-fitting cooler bags have nice arm straps to carry from / to the car, whether camping or at the house or store.
- we now have a choice of using one bag or two (half the frunk or all of the frunk) as a cooler.
- I don't have to mess with adding frunk insulation.

See the REI tag, front and back, for product ID of these cooler bags (pic #2). NOTE: these cooler bags do not have a bottom drain... the water from melted ice will stay in the bag. I might put in brass grommet drains, maybe...

I will post here when all ice will be gone. Let's see how many days...

Price: about $52 for REO Co-op members, per bag. I think the shelf tag was around $72. BTW, a little birdie tells me they will be on sale this Friday 😛

Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230515_114255


Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230515_114255


Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230515_114255


Ford Mustang Mach-E Frunk as a camping ice cooler - test prior to a family Summer road trip. 20230515_114255
Lifting those out of the frunk could get a bit heavy for some folks depending on just how many bags of ice each holds.
 
 




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