Mr Draper, your General Electric Frost Guard Refrigerator is here...

[retropia]

Ice Cream

Well, Louie, if this General Electric refrigerator's freezer can hold all of the ice cream that Betty required during her "Big Betty" days, it should be of adequate size for most households.

 

Certainly we know that the refrigerator does a good job of keeping whipped-cream-in-a-can fresh and delicious.

 

 

[hydralique]

Defrost System . . .

Does this unit have the GE reverse cycle defrost system or conventional electric resistance heaters? While the reverse cycle (aka heat pump) design is more complex it sure is clever and eliminates problems with the resistance heaters. I had to deal with the latter on my '66 Frigidaire, not a hard job but a PITA as it took numerous adjustments of the heater position under the freezer floor to make it work consistently and not slowly frost up.

 

[rp2813]

Defrost systems

I think John L. covered the defrost mechanism in the original thread Phil posted about this fridge in Shopper's Square.  Apparently the larger model had the more reliable system in John's opinion.

 

Louie, here's a shot of my fridge toward the end of its initial cleaning prior to moving into the house.  The grille at the bottom wasn't yet installed, but otherwise the exterior was ready to go at this point.

 

It's the 12 cf model so is fairly short as well as being only 30" wide. 

 

 

 

[rp2813]

Happy Easter

The colored eggs are a year-round installation, but this weekend is an ideal time to share . . .

 

 

 

[danemodsandy]

Louie:

Your new fridge - long may it wave - was designed for a world without today's Big Kahuna package sizes. Milk came in quarts, not gallons. Oh, you could buy half-gallons, but that was huge back then.

Pop came in single-serve bottles, not monster two-liters. Juice was little cans of concentrate, not big jugs of Tropicana or Sunny D. Frozen vegetables were little cardboard boxes of same, not ginormous plastic bags. A TV dinner was small, not like today's "Hungry-Man" sizes. A frozen pizza was eight inches across; they didn't try to emulate the dimensions of pizzeria pizzas. Pot pies were little 7-ounce things, not today's one-pounders.

If you'll watch your package sizes, you'll find that fridge more than adequate.

 

[epixstar128]

I have this fridge one year older and its got hot gas defrost. Its not complicated at all comp has a high side and low side. It takes the hot gas from the compressor and just opens a solinoid to direct feed it to the coil.

 

[epixstar128]

Louie open tge back panel up and look for a wiring diagram. One was installed in mine snap a pic and we can see what kind of defrost system it is.

 

[yogitunes]

just beautiful......

remember when fridges came with those built in egg racks......nice touch for adding color Ralph....

this reminds me of the joke, does the little light stay on when the door is closed?.....there was also a cartoon of this little sliding door that allowed you to look inside and see a tiny man running to hit the switch once the door was closed

 

[ptcruiser51]

Frost Guard

According to my GE factory rep when I worked at THD, it works this way. Most GE and Hotpoint models have a timed defrost cycle where the coils will heat up to melt rime buildup. About 10-15 min. before the cycle starts, the fridge will drop the temperature about 5 degrees or so to compensate for the heat generated during the cycle. This is to eliminate things like nasty ice crystals forming on top of ice cream or inside boxed frozen vegetables. I think Maytag used a similar system but the name escapes me.

One thing I noticed on the models in this thread is the new Trimwall design which was introduced around 1964. It used a new type of insulation to keep the walls thin, thus increasing interior capacity.

My mom had a 1966 model GE top-freezer that said "Frost Guard" on the freezer handle. It was the same one as was in the coffee break room at Sterling-Cooper on "Mad Men". They sold it with the house in 1993 - never a repair.

 

[Ultramatic]

 

 

Hey thanks for all the well wishes guys! I fired it up this morning after giving it 8hrs for the oil to settle back into the motor. It's cooling like nobodies business. I placed a bottle of water in the freezer and it was frozen solid in 3 hours. Needless to say, I'm damn impressed with it's performance. And boy is it quiet! I'll be posting more pictures in a bit.

 

[Ultramatic]

 

 

Sandy, I have memberships to Costco, BJ's and Sam's. I think I better keep the chest freezer after all.

 

[Ultramatic]

 

 

The light tower is elegantly simple:

 



 

Everything well fitted, with quality materials. The liner is all one piece, porcelain steel, as are the vegetable/fruit crisper bins.

 



 

And even more lights.

 



 

And design everywhere.

 



 

Oh BEHAVE!

 



 

Yeah baby, YEAH!

 



 



 

While I do like a lot of things hard, butter isn't one of them.

 



 

The worst I've found, where the basket attaches to the freezer door.

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

[a440]

Great pictures Louie!
The shot of the fridge coils reminded me of loving to see the frost on them when I was a kid. Growing up in the heat / humidity of New Orleans, our fridge would frost so much that you could not see the coils any longer. It never had an issue with keeping the correct temp. I am sure my opening the door to stare at them was one of the reasons they would get so frosty! The fun part was watching it cycle the defrost! It would instantly start to melt and the water and frost would slide to the catcher tray in the back. Then I would love how the water would simply flow down the back of the fridge wall and under the crisper and down the hole to the pan beneath the unit. (metal pan at that)
You have given me the itch to start looking for one! I think it would be so much fun!
Brent

 

[Ultramatic]

 

 

Thanks Brent. I used to do the same thing when the coils frosted up! LOL! We had this model when I was 4 or so. Lasted until the the late 80's.

 

 

[a440]

Louie thanks for the picture. That appears to be the GE I grew up with.
Ours had the coils in the Fridge part, and had a small fan on the left hand upper corner of the freezer. Would this be the same model?
It was such a fun Fridge!

 

[Ultramatic]

 

 

Hmm, I don't remember seeing a fan in the freezer section for that particular model.  And Happy Easter Brent!

 

[Ultramatic]

 

 

I gotta' ask, where in the world could I find a replacement for the damaged plastic inner panel for the freezer door? And the missing ice try shelve? It really mars an otherwise a very good condition refrigerator.

 

[epixstar128]

If it helps man i snap a few pics of my two trays

 

[epixstar128]

2

 

[lorainfurniture]

I had a pink bottom mount.

I remember looking at the defrost system which was the "heat pump" design. Sadly it suffered compressor failure..

I still have the matching pink stove.