Warm refrigerator

[Perry J]

My new to me Lil Bigfoots refrigerators freezer could make ice cubes but the main porrtion never went below 40 degrees.
I had removed it cleaned the burner and chimney and even let it set upside down for several days.
It dawned on me the trailer was not designed for the refer to work efficiently.
There was no way for the air flow to be directed over the cooling coils.
I built a ledge from the bottom of the upper vent opening to the upper coil and sealed every air inlet other than the bottom vent with insulation.
The air now moves by convection directly over the coils and out the upper vent.
I turned to gas on and turned the thermostat to max about 6 PM yesterday and about 11 AM it was down to 20 degrees in my refer.
Hope this helps others with a warm refer.
John

[Tim Wood]

Good tip and glad it worked for you.

[bicklebok]

Awesome!

[Raz]

Removing heat from that coil really makes a big difference. For some reason manufacturers don't put in the recommended baffles. For really hot days a muffin fan is the next step. I hang one on the vent with paper clips and with gator clips to the battery.

[Jon Vermilye]

A useful document made available by Bryant RV on refrigerator ventilation is Dometic's Vent Installation Instructions (a PDF).

[Matt in SV]

Originally Posted by Perry J

My new to me Lil Bigfoots refrigerators freezer could make ice cubes but the main porrtion never went below 40 degrees.
I had removed it cleaned the burner and chimney and even let it set ...
I turned to gas on and turned the thermostat to max about 6 PM yesterday and about 11 AM it was down to 20 degrees in my refer.
Hope this helps others with a warm refer.
John

Ducting can really improve the efficiency, but why would you want 20F in the refrigerator compartment? 37-39 is pretty ideal. You can get a battery operated fan for the interior if there are cold spots. They run about a month on a couple of D cells.

Regards,

Matt

[Perry J]

Originally Posted by Matt in SV

Ducting can really improve the efficiency, but why would you want 20F in the refrigerator compartment? 37-39 is pretty ideal. You can get a battery operated fan for the interior if there are cold spots. They run about a month on a couple of D cells.

Regards,

Matt

I didn't know what was going to happen after I completed the baffle so I turned the thermostat to the coldest setting.
It's about 38 now.
Before the baffle 45 degrees was the coldest it would get.
John

[BCDave]

Warm refrigerator? Is it Lucas Brand? (Those who have owned English cars will get this)

[Bill and Jacquie G.]

Originally Posted by BCDave

Warm refrigerator? Is it Lucas Brand? (Those who have owned English cars will get this)

The Brits drink warm beer because they DO have Lucas refrigerators!!!

" Lucas - The Prince of Darkness "

BULLY!!!!!!

[Carol H]

LOL I recall on one of my old cars the Lucas wiring harness had 20 wires on it just to make the seat belt buzzer work! The horn would honk if I made a sharp right turn and smoke would come out of the turn single when turning left. It was a new car! The car did get a recall a couple of years after I sold it as it was apparently a ticking time bomb in so far as it might burst into flames due to wiring issues. LOL

A not so funny memory of that car is that the only local person who could keep the car running for me and who was able to figure out its various electrical issues went on to build the bomb that took down the Air India flight 182

[Scott S.]

more pics would be great. not sure I'm grasping this

[Perry J]

No more pics. It's all put back together.
The pic is the bottom of the upper vent opening.
You can see the cover screw holes and 2 screw heads.
I attached a peice of 1x2 as a ledge just inside the opening with the screws you see in the pic.
I cut a peice of old 1/4 " paneling the width of the cabinet and deep enough to almost touch the upper coil on the back of the refer and glued and stapled it to the 1x2 on the inside of the vent opening.
Air flow is now directed ONLY over the coils.
John

[rabbit]

Pulled Perry's thread up because I'm starting the same type of project. Photos of the aluminum baffle which I fabricated and the huge, open chamber in which the fridge mechs reside follow. I intend to attach the baffle by replacing sheet metal screws in the upper side of the lower access door and thru bolting. The <1" pinch in the air column will come just below the upper condensation fins. The Bryant RV link mentioned above suggests that the furnace should be level "with the top of lower opening." I assume this means the mechanicals as the fridge body rests on the floor of the trailer. The mechs are roughly on level with the lower access door but no attempt was made to close off the "sump" below the stool upon which the mechs are mounted. Installing a sheet metal plenum to close off some of this space below, beside and above the mechs is not a simple task and requires removing the fridge box and mechanicals. I'm not willing to do that yet so am wondering what "insulation" I should use to both plug air leaks and also reduce the volume of this space. Is aluminum faced glass batt insulation an acceptable material. I assume there is some fire hazard in the area around the percolation coil. I'm going to use a 120vac muffin fan initiallly, perhaps buy a couple 12v if I get better performance than in the past. I realize that I may have a number of problems, dirty flue, badly adjusted flame, no "hot weather" resistor pigtail in the thermostat line, faulty thermostat. This fridge will cool acceptably on 120vac but immediately shuts down and warms up again. The propane maintenance problem is on the back burner UNTIL I get a positive indication that the fridge will function on electricity.

jack

[Lizbeth]

Jack, thanks for chiming in. I really need to do something like this in the Boler to help the fridge run better.

[Rick G]

Originally Posted by rabbit

This fridge will cool acceptably on 120vac but immediately shuts down and warms up again. The propane maintenance problem is on the back burner UNTIL I get a positive indication that the fridge will function on electricity.

jack

Jack, it looks like your electrical system maybe has a problem different than just not getting cold enough. You don’t say what make and model fridge you have, and I can’t read the labelling well enough on your picture, but Dometic often has the gas control on the left and the burner on the right when looked at from the rear, so it could be one of those.

The fridge wiring should be very straightforward. In the two brands of fridge that I have taken apart, including Dometic, the electric heater is a single unit with embedded wiring for both 12V and 120V operation. In other words, the same heater works on both voltages. Yours has separate power switches for the two voltages, and a thermostat below the power switches. Other than that, there is probably nothing else in the electrical circuit except perhaps a fuse. The owner’s manual for the fridge should have a wiring diagram, or else you can likely find a service manual on the internet.

If your fridge is getting cold, then turning off and warming up without ever going on again, there are two places you could start. First, the thermostat. On one of my fridges, the thermostat was burned out from years of use, but seemed to work. It still clicked on and off when the temperature was adjusted, but the terminals to the heater were burned out and would not pass the current. I was able to get a similar sized thermostat from an RV fridge place. Since thermostats are basically on-off, any RV type that will fit into the space will do the job. It is possible that your thermostat has a poor connection that heats up, causing it to expand, then breaks the connection with the expansion until it cools down again. No repairs are generally practical, just replace the thermostat.

The other possibility that I can think of is a similar crack in a wire, connection, switch, fuse or the heater itself. Since the heater works well enough to cool your fridge the first time, it is not likely the heater. You can test this by cooling the fridge down until it shuts itself off, then measuring the resistance across the heater wires once your fridge has shut itself down (disconnect the power before doing this). Again, it is possible that a poor connection will heat up and expand enough to cause a break. In my experience these kinds of cracks usually close up by themselves fairly quickly as they cool, say a minute or two after the power is removed, thereby re-establishing the connection, so if you fridge stays powerless for long periods (like 20 minutes), then it may not be that. Intermittent problems are the hardest to find.

One thing that might help is to use a volt meter to follow the voltage from the wires through the switch, fuse and thermostat, trying to find where the power is cutting out. Another possibility is that the circuit that is supplying the power to your fridge has the fault.

Good luck.
Rick G

[rabbit]

Fridge is a Dometic RM 2202. It's presumably the age of the trailer ('98) and appears to be in good condition (clean, no discoloration on coils). I guess I'll try some of the your troubleshooting tricks to identify the problem on shore power. THEN I'll worry about the propane. Thanks Rick.

jack