Can You Speed Up Ice Tray Freezing?

[Pengwuino]

Ya know... I am getting sick of not having a refrigerator with an automatic ice maker. I hate having to wait like half a day because no one bothers to refill the ice trays. This brings me to my question.

Is there a way to make ice much quicker in those trays? I don't know of any way to produce any larger temperature difference then what the freezer creates... adn that seems like the only way i could more quickly create ice! Save me everyone! I'm melting, meeeelting, oh what a world.

 

[rachmaninoff]

LN2? ...

 

[Pengwuino]

Yah, i wish i had liquid nitrogen sitten around my house... id be screwing everything up.

 

[Astronuc]

Just turn the freezer setting to max or min.

Perhaps buy a couple of extra ice trays, and once you remove some ice cubes, refill with water.

Without liquid nitrogen, one simply needs a large metal block (relatively high thermal conductivity) with a large mass which is more or less at equilibrium temperature with the freezer. The idea large cold mass with good thermal conductance will freeze the water quickly.

Now as for the water - put a bottle of water in the refrigerator so as to cool it - get it closer to freezing than room temperature or tap water. Then use that water to refill ice tray.

 

[Moonbear]

Before I had an automatic ice maker, I used to just have about 4 ice cube trays instead of just the one that comes with the freezer. This meant I had enough to quickly make ice for parties, but also if someone left one tray with just one ice cube in it, and another was still in the process of freezing, there were still two more trays with ice cubes to use.

 

[BobG]

Before I had an automatic ice maker, I used to just have about 4 ice cube trays instead of just the one that comes with the freezer. This meant I had enough to quickly make ice for parties, but also if someone left one tray with just one ice cube in it, and another was still in the process of freezing, there were still two more trays with ice cubes to use.

You must live alone. Around our house, it takes about 26 trays. That way, you get 18 ice cubes for six people from each of the trays with one ice cube, have one tray in the process of freezing, two trays with homemade popsicles, three ice trays from the person who was so irate at having been stuck with three single cube trays that they left them sitting empty on the counter, a cat drinking water from the filled tray that was accidently left on the stove, plus one tray filled with dirt and seeds for a school project.

 

[Astronuc]

These days, we can just leave a bottle or tray of water outside the back door.

 

[zoobyshoe]

When I happen to run out of ice, I don't wait half a day for more to freeze. Takes ten minutes tops to run to the store for a bag.

 

[Danger]

Get a tank of CO2 and spray the tray. If the dry ice mixes with the water ice, you can carbonate your own drinks.
I don't use real ice cube trays. Foam plastic egg cartons work a lot better.

 

[Pengwuino]

When I happen to run out of ice, I don't wait half a day for more to freeze. Takes ten minutes tops to run to the store for a bag.

Yah and probablly $10 tops a month to do that :P

We have 4 ice trays and I got to say we're all somewhwat lazy when it comes to refilling the damn trays. I'm the only one who seems to know to put water up until near the brim when refilling it however so whenever someone else makes ice cubes, they are very small compared to the trays i make.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Yah and probablly $10 tops a month to do that :P

No way. I only happen to run out of ice about once a summer.

You ought to buy as many trays as you can possibly stack and make sure they're all filled at least once a day. Those trays hardly cost anything.

 

[Pengwuino]

The problem is that space is at a premium in our refrigerator because my mother seems to think that 5 years later, those frozen pie crusts may still come in handy.

 

[Moonbear]

You must live alone.

You're right. It must be 4 trays per person. I think the way it works in a typical family of 4 is that you have 16 ice cube trays, one has one ice cube left, one is still full, the other 14 are either stuck back in the freezer empty, or left on the counter somewhere near the fridge, and one of the parents comes along and is annoyed enough by the pile of ice cube trays to fill the 14 plus 1 with one cube in it to maintain a steady ice cube supply. For me, well, I've just learned to like my soda warm.

 

[Kazza_765]

We have two freezers between 4 housemates. Unfortunately one is so badly frosted that anything put in there quickly gets consumed by ice and is lost for all time (I'm going to have to hire an arctic excavation team to recover my frozen peas). We lost both our trays to the ice, but on the upside, with a sharp knife and a hammer we have all the ice we need.

 

[Mk]

I didn't realize so many people used ice trays!

Here on Guam we use them, because the water supply is not clean enough to drink, but in the States I always used an automatic ice maker.

 

[Pengwuino]

I might have an idea. I have a can of compressed air here...maybe if i just spray it upside down onto the tray portion under an ice cube, it might super accelerate the ice-making-amabob process.

Time to experiment!

haha i remember trying to freeze a fly... didnt work.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Here on Guam we use them, because the water supply is not clean enough to drink, but in the States I always used an automatic ice maker.

What water do you drink, then, and what does anyone use the supplied water for?

 

[Cybersteve]

Here in the Uk as well as having ice trays we also have fillable bags.
These are disposable polythene bags divided into compartments (about 20 or so) that you fill from the top then tie into a knot.

They don't freeze any quicker but they are a lot less messy than trays.
They can also be tucked into any available space.
I usually hide some where the kids won't look, under the sprouts, that way I can normally find some for my Scotch!

 

[zoobyshoe]

They can also be tucked into any available space.

That sounds like the solution Pengwuino needs. I've never noticed these bags for sale here though.

 

[daniel_i_l]

Heat the water up a little (microwave - not too much!) before putting it in the freezer it will freeze faster!

 

[Cybersteve]

I forgot to mention the other advantage of ice cube bags over trays.

When frozen you can just tear out as many ice cubes as you need and pop the rest bag in the freezer - much easier than picking cubes out of a tray.

 

[kleinjahr]

A nice product is Scubes. Simply a plastic bag divided into interconnected cells. Fill at the sink, tie off and stack flat. The "cubes" are a little smaller than standard.

 

[Pengwuino]

Heat the water up a little (microwave - not too much!) before putting it in the freezer it will freeze faster!

Exactly why would that happen...

 

[Chi Meson]

Heat the water up a little (microwave - not too much!) before putting it in the freezer it will freeze faster!

Exactly why would that happen...

It is true that under precise circumstances a certain amount of water that starts at a higher temperature will freeze sooner than the same amount of water at a lower temperature, I am very sceptical that it would work in the situation daniel describes.

The situation in which it would work is as follows: take a buck of water at 80 degrees C and another at 90 degrees (equal volumes of water). Splash both buckets over freezing cold surfaces.

The warmer water will evaporate more in the initial seconds, removing significantly more heat. This will reduce the temperature of the remaining water to a temperature below that of the "cooler" water.

But as far as water in ice trays go, if you take room temperature water (20 degrees c) and warm it up to say, 50 degrees C, it will take longer to freeze because it is warmer water. Warmer water takes longer to freeze. I have personally busted this myth in my General Science class.

 

[zoobyshoe]

A nice product is Scubes. Simply a plastic bag divided into interconnected cells. Fill at the sink, tie off and stack flat. The "cubes" are a little smaller than standard.

Isn't this the same thing Cybersteve described?

 

[zoobyshoe]

I have personally busted this myth in my General Science class.

I've seen this notion of warmer water freezing faster taken apart over and over in threads here. It just won't die: people keep telling each other to put warm water in their ice trays.

 

[Chi Meson]

I've seen this notion of warmer water freezing faster taken apart over and over in threads here. It just won't die: people keep telling each other to put warm water in their ice trays.

Well, as the water gets colder, then it will take longer and longer to freeze, won't it?

 

[Danger]

Yes. It's the Zeno's paradox thing. Every 10 minutes or so it's half as warm as it used to be, so it can never reach the freezing point.

 

[EnumaElish]

Ya know... I am getting sick of not having a refrigerator with an automatic ice maker. I hate having to wait like half a day because no one bothers to refill the ice trays. This brings me to my question.
Is there a way to make ice much quicker in those trays? I don't know of any way to produce any larger temperature difference then what the freezer creates... adn that seems like the only way i could more quickly create ice! Save me everyone! I'm melting, meeeelting, oh what a world.

If you hold the bottle you want to cool under running (tap) water, it will cool in no time. Alternatively, wrap a wet towel around it and leave it alone for a while. There! Who needs ice?

 

[Chi Meson]

If you hold the bottle you want to cool under running (tap) water, it will cool in no time. Alternatively, wrap a wet towel around it and leave it alone for a while. There! Who needs ice?

Oh yeah, the old bike bottle trick. I can't tell you how many times I've explained this to people* during a long bike ride after they ask why my bottle is wrapped in an old, wet, cotton sock.

They don't believe that it works until I squirt them with cold water** after 2 hours in 90 degree weather.

* Turns out some folks really don't want the full explanation; let this be a lesson to all physics geeks: have a 30 second explanation ready for anything.

**a bit smelly though; now I use a new, wet, cotton sock.