Advice/guidance sought - troubleshooting 1956 Canadian Westinghouse refrigerator

[turquoisedude]

My month of March was kind of a disaster all around.  I took off on March 4th for a short vacation break with my Hubby to Mexico.  We needed a Covid test to get back into Canada then and well, guess who failed... I was stranded another 10 days, isolating until I could finally return to Canada.

Naturally, while I was away I got a disturbing email from Hubby - "that old fridge of yours isn't working right".  After a frantic series of messages, I narrowed it down to the 56 Canadian Westinghouse "Frost Free" I use as an overflow fridge in St-Liboire.  The problem turned out to be that it was freezing everything.  I instructed Chris to adjust the temperature to a warmer setting but that made no difference.  I can't confirm if the refrigerator was running continuously but Hubby did manage to get it to shut off.  And subsequently not restart.  I finally took a half-assed look at it today, thinking the cold control was shot.  However, when I extracted the control unit, it looked to be very much more complicated than I am experienced with.  The 4 wires coming out of the control are throwing me.  I suspect there's a relay tucked in there somehow and and I was not sure if there was a way to short the cold control switch to see if the compressor would still start.

It's a long shot but does anyone out there have some service/diagnostic information on one of these 'pushbutton defrost' Westys?  

The Canadian model/style numbers may be very different from similar US models.   Mine is a model PK-125 for whatever that's worth.

 

[turbokinetic]

I'm not sure how the pushbutton defrost mechanism works, however I do have info on the thermostat control. It contains the start-relay and the thermostat in one module. Is the pushbutton defrost part of the same thermostat control? In your picture it looks to be a separate switch.

I will share a generic Westinghouse wiring diagram shortly which shows how the thermostat and start relay interact with the compressor, but it won't have the defrost circuit on it.

 

[turquoisedude]

Thanks for jumping in!

Hi Dave, I was hoping you'd see this post... LOL 

 

The pushbutton defrost is a separate unit - it's in fact a countdown timer that activates a circuit to an electric heating unit in the freezer section (Not sure exactly how that is placed, though). 

 

I was afraid that there was a relay in that control - I had an older Canadian Westy (it was a model LH-8 I think) that had a similar setup and which also died due to a relay failure.  

 

I'm looking forward to seeing the generic wiring diagram - thank you very much!

 

[turbokinetic]

I edited the above post to include the diagram.

If worst comes to worst - you can use an aftermarket thermostat; and also an external aftermarket start relay, such as a Supco RO81. The aftermarket start device, and aftermarket thermostat together will take the place of the Westinghouse control.

 

[114jwh]

Hey Paul - Hope you can get this working!

I'm not sure though that it has a heating element in the freezer - I have an old Westinghouse with the push button defrost that looks similar to yours and mine is a hot gas defrost system. But maybe mine is a bit different.

Anyways - good luck! Your persistence seems to always pay off.