Ecozy 2″ Clear Ice Ball Maker with CrystalFlux Technology review

REVIEW – I have been a bourbon drinker for years, and I do prefer to have a large rock of ice in my glass, as opposed to a bunch of smaller ice cubes or crushed ice.  The ice rocks just last longer and they don’t melt as quickly as other small forms of ice, so the drink isn’t watered down as fast.  Plus, it just looks better in the presentation of the drink, which we all know helps.  Am I right?  So for years I have used those ruberized ice ball/rock forms that you fill with water and put in the freezer.  The downside to those is that you really can’t make many at a time, and it takes hours to get a bunch of them made, perhaps even days.  So leading up to a party with a bunch of drinkers who will need ice rocks, you have to start days in advance.  It sure would be nice to have a gadget that within a few hours would give you a bunch of ice rocks for your party, and keep making them so you never run out.  Enter, the $330 Ecozy 2″ Clear Ice Ball Maker with CrystalFlux Technology.  What once seemed like an expensive luxury that didn’t make sense to me now seems reasonable enough with the Ecovy.  Let’s check it out.

⬇︎ Jump to summary (pros/cons)
Price: $330
Where to buy: Amazon or Ecozy

What is it?

A ice ball maker that is a little smaller than a college dorm fridge.  It can be used stand-alone if you manually fill it with water.  It can also be used by connecting a continuous water supply using the included materials.

What’s included?

• Ecozy ice ball maker
• Hoses and connections for a continuous water supply and drain
• A pair of tongs
• user manual
• Two 6-ball plastic ice ball holders to store ice balls in the freezer (can also be used to make ice balls in your freezer)
• plastic drip tray
• water tester

Tech specs

• Size:  17.9″D x 12.6″W x 17.9″H
• Weight:  22 lbs
• Wattage:  233 watts
• Materials:  stainless steel and plastic
• Water capacity:  .45 gallons (approx 58 oz)
• Ice ball tray capacity:  56 balls
• Ice ball production:  4 balls per 40 min, 144 balls per day

Assembly, Installation, Setup

The Ecozy comes fully assembled, so it can be used right out of the box.  There is a connection on the back of the unit for hooking a water line to the Ecozy so you don’t have to manually fill it every time.  It also comes with a drain hole on the back that can be used to drain any water in the tank that goes over the max fill line.  And it comes with all the plastic piping and connections that you need to for both of those connections.  If you are gonna use the water supply/drain hoses, know that the water supply hose is approximately 6 1/2 feet long, and the drain hose is 5 ft. long.  Ecozy recommends the first time you turn it on that you use the self-cleaning cycle a few times with just regular water.  Finally, Ecozy says that you need at least 6 inches on all sides of the unit to work properly.  This is so that there is proper air flow around it to allow the unit to dissipate heat and give the insulation inside the walls the cushion it needs to keep the ice balls cool.  You also need to avoid letting direct sunlight hitting the unit. Again, this helps with the cooling process.  The Ecozy also comes with some plastic ice ball forms, which you can see in the picture below, that can be used to store the ice balls in your freezer that you created in the Ecozy.

Design and features

The Ecozy looks a bit like a dorm fridge, although a little smaller.  The height is gonna probably rule out putting it in your kitchen under the cabinets though.  It is right at 18 inches tall, and like most folks my cabinets are 16 inches from the counter.  So I have used the Ecozy by bringing it out during parties and putting it on the kitchen counter next to the sink. Then I take it back to the garage when not in use.  On the front of the unit, at the top, you’ll see the touch screen where the controls are located.  There you can turn it on and off, start the cleaning process, see when ice is being made or cooled, see when the water runs out, etc.

Below the touch panel is the door that folds down to get access to the inside.  Inside the door you’ll see the removable plastic tray that catches and stores the ice balls.  Inside the tray you’ll see a dimpled soft plastic liner that can be removed and cleaned when necessary.  When you pull the tray out you’ll see the water reservoir under it in the bottom where you fill the water.  The specs state that you can fill it with .45 gallons of water, which is about 58 oz., which should get you 24 ice balls  I typically fill the reservoir with 48 oz of water, which gets me 20 ice balls before I have to fill it again.  At the back of the reservoir in the right corner you will see the MAX fill line next to the drain hole.  So if you put too much water in it, the excess will drain out the back, so be careful.

As I mentioned, on the back of the unit you will see the water inlet port and the water drain port.  The Ecozy comes with the hoses to connect the unit permanently to a water supply and drain, but I did not do that.  I don’t have a bar in my house, or space in my kitchen, so I don’t really have any choice but filling the unit manually. I haul it out into the kitchen a few hours before a party and just fill it when I want to make ice balls.   On the very bottom of the unit you will find a drain plug that you can open up to drain any remaining water in the reservoir when you are done using it.  You’ll have to slide the unit out from the surface it is on to get access to this drain, and the unit weights 22 lbs.  If you didn’t want to do that, then you could simply soak up the remaining water inside with a towel or something.  The unit also comes with a plastic drip tray that you can lay just under the door seal in front.  That way, when the door is being constantly opened and closed by people getting an ice ball out, drips from the melting water that will naturally happen are caught under the door seal.

Performance

The performance of the Ecozy is fantastic.  It only takes 35-40 min for a full cycle to make 4 ice balls, which is amazing.  It is so fast that I can make 20 ice balls in around 3 hours!  It would take me over a day to make that many in my freezer with the current ice ball silicone forms that I have, so the Ecozy is a must have for my parties. Ecozy says that the daily capacity is around 144 balls a day, which is alot. I used the Ecozy the first time by leaving it on overnight and letting it fill the tray full with ice balls.  After it fills the tray it automatically stops and then keeps the balls cool.  I found that long-term storage of the ice balls isn’t really practical like it would be with your refrigerator in the kitchen.  There was a little melt over a long term, and the balls started melting into each other and became a little difficult to get apart. So for a party at the house the Ecozy works wonderful.  And you won’t have to constantly worry with those silicone ice ball forms in your freezer.

Let’s talk about the quality of the ice balls for a minutes. The Ecozy produces ice balls 2 inches in diameter.  Now, that is slightly smaller than the ice balls I have made with my silicone ice ball forms up till now.  It was weird at first, looking at the smaller size of it, but I have come to like it better.  I like it better because it fits better into a rocks glass and your glass can hold more liquor!  I know it’s a little thing, but hey, there you go.  You will also see that every ball has a little indentation in it, which is formed because of how the balls are made with the CrystalFlux Technology in the Ecozy. This isn’t a big deal to me, but you should know that those little indentations never go away.  They are in every ball.

The dimpled liner in the removable ice ball tray is soft plastic and it is supposed to provide a little cushion when the ice balls fall, but I have experienced that the first couple of rounds of ice balls that fall get cracked inside just a little when they hit the tray and each other.  So even if you use distilled water with no particles in the water, you’ll see some cracks and lines inside the balls.  That doesn’t bother me, but I mention it because some folks might be purists and want that perfectly clear ice ball! Honestly, I like to have a little ‘character’ to the ice ball so that I can see it better when it is inside the glass.  But having said that, I don’t like at all when the ice ball is really cloudy.  So I only use 100% distilled water with the Ecozy.  I tried using tap water and my tap water obviously isn’t that great because every ball that came out looked like a cloud.  Here is a picture of the dimpled liner, and pictures of the ball made with tap water, and then one made with distilled water.  Another reason to not use the continuous water connection is that you will probably be pulling water from your house, which is tap water.  So the ice balls and gonna be a little cloudy.  There is a plus for the convenience, for sure. But the trade off is using water that isn’t that clear.

Finally, the Ecozy comes with a water tester so you can see the total dissolved solids (TDS) that are actually inside your water.  Distilled water typically has near zero TDS, and my tap water has around 180 TDS.  I highly recommend using distilled water.  The ice balls look much better.  Ecozy recommends distilled water if you can get it, or at least use water that has less than 200 TDS.

Final thoughts

If you have a permanent bar in your house, and the counter space, then this Ecozy is an easy choice.  And if you have regular parties it makes even more sense because it kicks out balls pretty darn fast. Just considering that, the price of $330 is fantastic when you look at competing products.  And with the option of having a continuous water supply it can be super easy to use by simply turning it on.  Keep in mind I don’t believe that you can keep the Ecozy turned on long term to store the ice balls like you would a refrigerator.  You will experience some melt, and they will eventually become misshapen and stick together.  But for a party where you will blow through a bunch of ice balls pretty quickly, the Ecozy is a fantastic choice for you.  I can also see this being very useful for a restaurant bar that needs a continuous supply of ice balls.  I highly recommend this product!

What I like about X

• Amazingly fast
• Clear ice balls (with distilled water)
• Attractive design and very easy to use
• Option for continuous water feed

What needs to be improved?

• Each ball has a large dimple that never quite goes away
• The ice balls melt somewhat over a long time period, so this is not for long term storage of the ice balls

Price: $330
Where to buy: Amazon or Ecozy
Source: The sample of this product was provided for free by Ecozy. Ecozy did not have a final say on the review and did not preview the review before it was published.