Transplant
06-03-2014, 07:37 AM
Hi, glad to find this forum. Thanks in advance for any advice.
- Unit is about five years old
- Problems started with minor melting and refreezing in the icemaker. Then temps in the freezer became much more variable with freezing in the crisper and meat drawer of the fridge, followed by some freezing along the fridge wall adjacent to the freezer (ie bagged greens touching this wall would freeze and get slushy). This was occasional and not too bad.
- There was ice buildup in the back of the freezer, then some in the fridge behind the crisper drawer. At this point temps became much more variable, more extreme and more frequent. The freezer might be at -6F one day and 4F the next. Anything on the top shelf might freeze hard and soften up.
At this point I emptied, cleaned and completely defrosted the unit manually, opened the back panel and vacuumed. The compressor and condenser fan both seemed to be running normally. This improved things for a day and then the pattern repeated. The evaporator fan inside the freezer may or may not be operating normally.
- The freezer lost cooling power except for the bottom few shelves, and then the fridge started to warm up. At this point, the freezer control says 31 and nothing near the top will freeze. Most things in the lower drawers stay frozen. The fridge is in the 60s on the top shelves and only has cooling in the bottom drawers.
- There is no ice build up in either compartment, but there is a small amount of condensation and what appears to be melt water in the freezer. The upper portion of the coil is wet, not frozen.
I'm attaching photos showing that the evaporator coil is frosted only on the bottom half. There is excessive buildup at the bottom. When we opened the back of the freezer, there was less buildup and it only covered the bottom three coils. The buildup shown developed within a few hours of removing the panel.
Could this be anything other than a coolant leak?
- Unit is about five years old
- Problems started with minor melting and refreezing in the icemaker. Then temps in the freezer became much more variable with freezing in the crisper and meat drawer of the fridge, followed by some freezing along the fridge wall adjacent to the freezer (ie bagged greens touching this wall would freeze and get slushy). This was occasional and not too bad.
- There was ice buildup in the back of the freezer, then some in the fridge behind the crisper drawer. At this point temps became much more variable, more extreme and more frequent. The freezer might be at -6F one day and 4F the next. Anything on the top shelf might freeze hard and soften up.
At this point I emptied, cleaned and completely defrosted the unit manually, opened the back panel and vacuumed. The compressor and condenser fan both seemed to be running normally. This improved things for a day and then the pattern repeated. The evaporator fan inside the freezer may or may not be operating normally.
- The freezer lost cooling power except for the bottom few shelves, and then the fridge started to warm up. At this point, the freezer control says 31 and nothing near the top will freeze. Most things in the lower drawers stay frozen. The fridge is in the 60s on the top shelves and only has cooling in the bottom drawers.
- There is no ice build up in either compartment, but there is a small amount of condensation and what appears to be melt water in the freezer. The upper portion of the coil is wet, not frozen.
I'm attaching photos showing that the evaporator coil is frosted only on the bottom half. There is excessive buildup at the bottom. When we opened the back of the freezer, there was less buildup and it only covered the bottom three coils. The buildup shown developed within a few hours of removing the panel.
Could this be anything other than a coolant leak?