Back at my folk's house in the US. At least physically. Mentally somewhere still over Canada.
My mom asked me to look at their refrigerator.
The fan in the freezer compartment has been getting louder and louder over the last two years. About six months ago, quite a bit of water started appearing at the bottom of the refrigerator and running out the door. This happended every morning.
The local repair shop said to replace the entire thing - not worth the repair (bought in 1999). Since the interior was still perfect, the door seals tight and the unit obviously cooling I decided to figure out what was wrong and if it might not just be repairable after all.
Started with the obvious: Pulled the unit out from its niche, everything was clean. No build up, nothing had fallen between the back of the cabinet and the wall causing the heat to build up.
Next pulled the plastic liner in the freezer compartment (well, actually, next was to put everything from the freezer compartment in the oven. Don't laugh - what else in your house is better insulated than a self-cleaning oven?).
Aha - either the front journal bearing was out of its holder or it had worn out.
Did an Internet search and found the motor is the same as used for a continuous action low-velocity air exhaust fan, sold around the corner for 12.99$. Bought it, installed it, problem solved.)
I don't know, but I rather doubt that that fan could be had for the same price from customer service. Could be wrong about that...
Now the water problem. While the power was off the coils had thawed and dripped quite a bit of water. It was flowing right through the air duct into the refrigerator compartment. Ok, I thought - that is the problem. Something in the auto-defrost circuit has failed.
Nope.
Everything was ok, heating element hotted, clock logiked.
But the "plastic" surface of the freezer below the liner was starting to melt!
So, there we had it. At some point in time there had been such a build up of condensed water that it had not all passed down the drain pipe. Instead, it had refrozen, blocking the pipe and raising the surface of the collecting basin to the height of the air ducts.
Once the ice was melted there only remained the problem of the drain pipe.
Using a turkey baster filled with hot water, I squirted and sucked at the several inch (!) thick plug of ice until it suddenly melted and with a whoosh! the water flowed down the pipe.
Put everything back together, turned the power back on and that was that.
I wonder how many people throw perfectly good refrigerators away because of such things...
I also wonder if this wasn't a case of intelligent design on the part of Whirlpool (my parents obviously bought the thing without consulting me first
))
Since there is no way to build a "cheap" compressor and the rest of the cooling system is equally impervious to failure, they have to find something to break down.
Nah, that is just me being my usual nasty old Whirlpool and UK bashing self...
Seriously interesting to work with US sizes again, by the way - found myself thinking in metric and the refrigerator in English common. Have to admit, though - the build quality was not that bad.
My mom asked me to look at their refrigerator.
The fan in the freezer compartment has been getting louder and louder over the last two years. About six months ago, quite a bit of water started appearing at the bottom of the refrigerator and running out the door. This happended every morning.
The local repair shop said to replace the entire thing - not worth the repair (bought in 1999). Since the interior was still perfect, the door seals tight and the unit obviously cooling I decided to figure out what was wrong and if it might not just be repairable after all.
Started with the obvious: Pulled the unit out from its niche, everything was clean. No build up, nothing had fallen between the back of the cabinet and the wall causing the heat to build up.
Next pulled the plastic liner in the freezer compartment (well, actually, next was to put everything from the freezer compartment in the oven. Don't laugh - what else in your house is better insulated than a self-cleaning oven?).
Aha - either the front journal bearing was out of its holder or it had worn out.
Did an Internet search and found the motor is the same as used for a continuous action low-velocity air exhaust fan, sold around the corner for 12.99$. Bought it, installed it, problem solved.)
I don't know, but I rather doubt that that fan could be had for the same price from customer service. Could be wrong about that...
Now the water problem. While the power was off the coils had thawed and dripped quite a bit of water. It was flowing right through the air duct into the refrigerator compartment. Ok, I thought - that is the problem. Something in the auto-defrost circuit has failed.
Nope.
Everything was ok, heating element hotted, clock logiked.
But the "plastic" surface of the freezer below the liner was starting to melt!
So, there we had it. At some point in time there had been such a build up of condensed water that it had not all passed down the drain pipe. Instead, it had refrozen, blocking the pipe and raising the surface of the collecting basin to the height of the air ducts.
Once the ice was melted there only remained the problem of the drain pipe.
Using a turkey baster filled with hot water, I squirted and sucked at the several inch (!) thick plug of ice until it suddenly melted and with a whoosh! the water flowed down the pipe.
Put everything back together, turned the power back on and that was that.
I wonder how many people throw perfectly good refrigerators away because of such things...
I also wonder if this wasn't a case of intelligent design on the part of Whirlpool (my parents obviously bought the thing without consulting me first
))Since there is no way to build a "cheap" compressor and the rest of the cooling system is equally impervious to failure, they have to find something to break down.
Nah, that is just me being my usual nasty old Whirlpool and UK bashing self...
Seriously interesting to work with US sizes again, by the way - found myself thinking in metric and the refrigerator in English common. Have to admit, though - the build quality was not that bad.
