refrigerator freezer troubles

[Todd]

It is electronic

[Stormin Mormon]

Sounds like your man knows some about these new electronic fridge. I'd keep working with him.

[Todd]

Oh Poop. There are some coils I missed. I will vac out the front coils. Then report back.

[David L. Martel]

Todd,

Ok, Let's call a few friends and get the food from your freezer to theirs. Do you have a cooler? Borrow one if not. Get some ice. and move the fridge contents to the cooler. Great, it's no longer an emergency. Lets turn off the fridge. Open the doors. We're going to thaw it out. Should take 3 hrs. Your beer will go bad if you don't drink it. Have one now. All right. Let's turn the fridge on. Set the various controls to mid-scale or whatever the manual advises. Close the doors. It can take about 8 hrs for the fridge to cool down. Got a fridge thermometer I hope. Put it in the freezer. Those beers are going bad. Drink another one. It's been 8 hrs so what's the freezer temp? Less then 5 deg F? Move the thermometer to the fridge section. How's the temp there? Around 40? Move the food from the cooler back into the fridge. Let it run for a few days. If the temps stay cool then get your freezer contents back. At a guess, your fan died. Without the fan the cooling coils in the floor of your freezer iced up. Why the defrost cycle didn't clear this, I don't know but it happens. You've replaced the bad fan and thawed the cooling coils. I hope that fixes it. If not fixed post back with freezer and fridge temps.

Dave M.

[Pico Rico]

Scratch all that. Gather all the neighborhood grills in a circle . . .

[Stormin Mormon]

I've found on some fridge, it's necessary to open the door, and snap off decorative plastic plate. About four inches tall, and runs the width of the fridge. You'll need a vacuum cleaner with a hose in one hand, a flashlight in your other hand, and a long brush in your other hand. Close one eye, look in with the eye closest the floor. Operate the vac cleaner, flash light and brush with your hands.

Look into the back and make sure the fan still runs, not blocked with some fiberglass, DAMHIKT.

[Stormin Mormon]

He did say it was about 50F in fridge and freezer both. And good air flow. This isn't consistent with your diagnosis.

[Todd]

The front was a mess.

After, I did the old toilet paper hanging down three feet over the grill test. The exhaust pushes it about 5 times as far

I have ice in the fridg, so it is down to 50F. The Freezer is a 60F. Now we wait.

I am go to go fishing! Free fishing day ins th PRC.

Thank you for helping me with this

-T

[J Burns]

If his frozen food hasn't thawed, I suppose the food is holding the freezer at about 32 F. I'd take an indoor/outdoor digital thermometer and put the probe in the evaporator air in the freezer. I don't know what the temperature drop should be, but if it read 12 F, for example, I'd think the problem was that the thermostat wasn't keeping the compressor on long enough.

If it looked like thermostat trouble (as the repairman guessed), I'd look for the possibility that some obstruction was subjecting it to too much freezer air. If that didn't pan out, and it were possible to lean a water bag against the thermostat area, a bag of lukewarm water might be used to trick the thermostat and save the food until it could be fixed.

[Stormin Mormon]

Dusty condenser will do this kind of symptoms. Hope that's going to solve things for now. Long time till Monday when you can "get the man".

[J Burns]

I take it back...

[Stormin Mormon]

The situation is rapidly emerging. I suspect Todd will be back in a few minutes. He'll tell us that he prayed over his refrigerator, and sprinkled with holy water and salad oil. He knocked the refrigerator back into the stadium seat, and declared it healed.

Praise be to Whirlpool!

. Christopher A. Young Learn about Jesus

.

[trader_4]

When it's running for that half hour, is cold air blowing into the freezer or is it never really cold?

Also, related to the tech thinking it's a thermostat problem, does this have a temp display? If it's displaying 50F, hard to figure how it can be a thermostat issue on an electronic unit.

[nestork]

The frost all over the freezer items is a clear indication that there's no defrost cycle. Normally, the evaporator coil is the coldest thing in the fridge, and so frost forms on IT rather than anywhere else. That frost is melted off with each defrost cycle, so moisture is eliminated from everywhere in the fridge. Technically speaking, the frost should "sublimate" or go directly from a solid to a vapour without first melting. As that happens the humidity of the air in the fridge goes up, but that humidity would then normally form frost on the evaporator coil. If there is no defrost cycle, and the evaporator coil gets covered over and insulated with frost, the humidity in the air in the fridge will keep rising and end up forming frost on the heaviest objects in the freezer (things with a lot of thermal momentum) which will still be very cold. I expect that's why the OP noticed frost on the stuff in the freezer.

So, I would look for a wiring diagram for that fridge and see if it's equipped with a test plug which will allow you to check for continuity through the defrost heater. Failing that, look for a removable panel in the freezer compartment. Behind that panel you should find the evaporator coil and the defrost heater. Visual inspection of the defrost heater should tell you if it's still OK or not. It needs to be in one piece.

If there's no continuity through the defrost heater, or if it's obviously broken, then you don't have a defrost cycle, and frost will build up on the evaporator coil and effectively insulate that coil, thereby resulting in your freezer becoming warmer, which is what you're experiencing.

Check with your fridge guru and see if there's a way of testing for continuity through the defrost heater. If not, ask him what panel needs to be removed to access the evaporator coil and defrost heater(s), and visually inspect that defrost heater.

Defrost timers are always suspect, but defrost timers are generally pretty reliable and are seldom the cause of problems.

If the frost that's formed on your evaporator coil is all patchy, with some being hard ice, then it's probably your defrost thermostat. Technically, this thing is called a "Defrost Termination Switch", or "DST", and a new one only costs about $10 to $15.

And, finally, beer won't go bad if you don't keep it cold.

I guess one of the "advantages" of living in Winnipeg is if your fridge ever craps out on you in the winter, you can put all your food in the trunk of your car. The outdoor temperature will be colder than the freezer in your fridge from November to March most years. But, if you live where I live, the idea of keeping food in your car instead of your fridge to reduce global warming isn't one you think about too much. In fact, you think a lot more about buying a car with a big engine that'll produce more CO2 to kinda help this global warming thing along.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Wow, that must save a lot of energy if you get ice at 60 degrees. Mine has to go lower tan that.

[John Doe]

Maybe raise the pressure inside the fridge to 100 kbar?

[J Burns]

In the past, I downloaded the service data sheet for my refrigerator. It includes the approximate wattage at a certain ambient temperature, with the thermostat at midpoint, in the last third of the cycle.

I paid under $20 for a watt meter than plugs into a wall outlet. I've seen what the refrigerator uses, but I'm going to write down wattages at specific room temperatures.

That way, I can plug in the watt meter to see if the high-side lines are dissipating heat normally. If the compressor was cutting off because of dusty lines, I'll bet the wattage would be very high.

[Todd]

Just a little cool

They are store bought thermometers

See my reprise at the end of the thread.

[Todd]

Make and model?

[Todd]

Hi All,

I am back from fishing. Caught three 4" fishletts. The most beautifully adorned rainbows I have seen in years.

To reprise:

Symptom: insufficient or no cooling.

Tests so far:

0) my wife informed me we purchased the unit in late November 2001

1) found the Condense Fan motor leaking oil and replaced it: no symptom change

2) all fans are operating normally

3) cleaned out the dust from the coils under the bottom front left (my left) and any I missed from the back. Went fishing. No symptom change.

4) whipped the back off again:

A) removed the relay from the condenser. Ohm'ed out the three pins: bottom to bottom: ~14 ohms bottom left to upper: ~10 ohms upper to lower right: ~9 ohms

B) measured the voltage on the connector that I removed from the relay: ~115 VAC

5) while fishing, I asked my wife, who has every sound that goes "bump in the night" cataloged, what the compressor sounded like when it fired up: "A snap, followed by a motor whoosh". She also said she hasn't heard it for the last few days.

6) Listened to about two hours of videos on troubleshooting relays and condensers. Got to listen to the sounds that Stormin' asked me about on You Tube.

A) the compressor is hot to the touch. (You can leave your hand on it for a few minutes.)

B) there is no sound coming from it whatsoever. No rattle. No clunk. Absolutely nothing.

7) figured out that the welding, cleaning out of tubes, and recharging are over my head when it comes to changing a compressor.

Game plan submitted for you guys approval.

1) change the relay (get some dry ice on the way back from the parts store).

2) if that does not help, call a repairman.

Just an aside. No one around here carries parts. I have to drive to Reno to their supplier if I want a part. Go figure.

If the repairman I call doesn't have a condenser and/or that weenie tube to the side, I will just have to go get them myself.

Thank you all for the help.

-T