- Oct 3, 2007
- 1,539
We got a free refrigerator from my in-laws who upgraded to a new one. Nothing wrong with the old one, they just wanted stainless steel to match their new kitchen. It sat in their garage for a month unplugged before I finally was able to pick it up, I transported it upright the whole way (I heard you're not supposed to lay them down-not sure if that's an old wive's tale or not) home and it sat in my garage for another month before I found the time to run electric out to it. I branched off an existing 15 amp circuit that feeds our two sump pumps because the receptacle for one of the sumps was conveniently located just behind the wall to the garage, so I took a short length of Romex, and ran it from the receptacle out to a new receptacle in the garage. I plugged the fridge in, set the controls to the recommended settings on the dial for the fridge and freezer and waited 24 hours.
At that point I was getting 48-50 degrees in the fridge and 25-27 degrees in the freezer. The compressor seemed to be running non-stop. I decided to give it another 24 hours and still no dice-same temps. Temperature in the garage at this time varied from low 60s during the day to high 40s/low 50s at night. The most obvious fix in refrigeration that I know of is making sure the coils are clean, but I don't know where they are? The back of the unit is flat, no coils to be found-are they underneath maybe? Still, if it was working fine at my in-laws, I don't see how it could have accumulated so much dust on the coils in two months? I used standard 14 gauge Romex so I don't see how there could be a voltage drop issue (like if you plug a large appliance in with a long extension cord), and my connections in the boxes are all good. I'm stumped...
At that point I was getting 48-50 degrees in the fridge and 25-27 degrees in the freezer. The compressor seemed to be running non-stop. I decided to give it another 24 hours and still no dice-same temps. Temperature in the garage at this time varied from low 60s during the day to high 40s/low 50s at night. The most obvious fix in refrigeration that I know of is making sure the coils are clean, but I don't know where they are? The back of the unit is flat, no coils to be found-are they underneath maybe? Still, if it was working fine at my in-laws, I don't see how it could have accumulated so much dust on the coils in two months? I used standard 14 gauge Romex so I don't see how there could be a voltage drop issue (like if you plug a large appliance in with a long extension cord), and my connections in the boxes are all good. I'm stumped...