Hello all, many years since I have been able to post here.
I made a bunch of repairs to my 1964 Frigidaire Imperial 19 last summer in anticipation of using it with my completely new kitchen, featuring my 40" Frigidaire Flair double-oven/range. Repairs like new gaskets, dent removal and a very deep cleaning. Imagine my disappointment when I realized it would only run for a few days before icing over the evaporator
(It had been in storage for about a year while I moved and had never had problems beforehand.)
Diagnostics eventually lead me to the defroster coil. Open circuit. So I carefully removed the coil from the evaporator. The evaporator is different than anything else in the Frigidaire line, so I'm sure the defroster coil is as well.
I took a stab at using Home Depot-sourced gutter defroster tape, which is of similar diameter to the metal defroster coil...I was even able to wrap it in the original pattern. (That is why you see the outlet box... It is powered by the 110v defroster timer circuit an meant I didn't have to cut up the defroster tape for trial runs.) Unfortunately the tape is about 1/3 the wattage (130ish watts) of the OEM coil (400 watts). This meant it would work a few extra days, but ultimately the icing would overcome the evaporator.
The challenge is now "what can I substitute?" There are similar coils (wattage/length) but they would require me to "re-bend" them and I'm not sure that would work. I think I've seen "generic" lengths of coil which are made to be bent, probably for servicing legacy-type built in freezers at restaurants, etc. Problem there is they won't sell to the general public. I can probably get around that eventually, but rather than reinvent the wheel, I figured I'd see if anyone here has solved the same problem?




I made a bunch of repairs to my 1964 Frigidaire Imperial 19 last summer in anticipation of using it with my completely new kitchen, featuring my 40" Frigidaire Flair double-oven/range. Repairs like new gaskets, dent removal and a very deep cleaning. Imagine my disappointment when I realized it would only run for a few days before icing over the evaporator

(It had been in storage for about a year while I moved and had never had problems beforehand.)
Diagnostics eventually lead me to the defroster coil. Open circuit. So I carefully removed the coil from the evaporator. The evaporator is different than anything else in the Frigidaire line, so I'm sure the defroster coil is as well.
I took a stab at using Home Depot-sourced gutter defroster tape, which is of similar diameter to the metal defroster coil...I was even able to wrap it in the original pattern. (That is why you see the outlet box... It is powered by the 110v defroster timer circuit an meant I didn't have to cut up the defroster tape for trial runs.) Unfortunately the tape is about 1/3 the wattage (130ish watts) of the OEM coil (400 watts). This meant it would work a few extra days, but ultimately the icing would overcome the evaporator.
The challenge is now "what can I substitute?" There are similar coils (wattage/length) but they would require me to "re-bend" them and I'm not sure that would work. I think I've seen "generic" lengths of coil which are made to be bent, probably for servicing legacy-type built in freezers at restaurants, etc. Problem there is they won't sell to the general public. I can probably get around that eventually, but rather than reinvent the wheel, I figured I'd see if anyone here has solved the same problem?



