Frigidaire Freezer repair?

Connect a shorting wire from one terminal to the other (cautiously). Capacitors operating in AC environments don't build up nasty charges like DC units, but testing must nonetheless be done with zero voltage differential. Do some research on capacitor testing before proceeding. It's actually pretty straightforward common sense stuff. HTH

joe

Joe wrote in news:1193008647.006978.228670 @t8g2000prg.googlegroups.com:

Put a hot dog across the terminals. Heck, you can cook a hot dog by putting test leads in each end of it then plug into AC. Should handle a cap huh?!

To discharge the capacitor you can just put a metal screwdriver across the terminals holding onto the handle of the screwdriver. As pointed out usually the AC capacitors don't hold a charge, or much of one.

A quick check of them is to take them out of the circuit and connect one of the older analog multimeters to it. Set the ohm meter to a high range. The meter should go toward the zero ohm mark and drift back to a very high value showing an almost open circuit. If the meter stays at or near the zero ohms the capacitor is shorted and bad. If the meter does not move toward the zero ohms, it may be open and bad.

Sounds like a stinger!

"STINGER: A> (An emersion heater); A device consisting of an electrical cord and a coil of metal that when plugged into a wall socket, and emerged in water, will bring the water to a boil."

-- Oren

"Painting is the art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critics."

A screwdriver would short the capacitor, but will this damage it (cap), because of the arc? I'm not worried so much about the screwdriver :)

I already have the parts off and ready to replace. I may not need a cap, I just don't know if the burnt controller/starter may have damaged the capacitor....

-- Oren

"Painting is the art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critics."

Put on a three in one start kit, and be done with it.