GFMS5HFFASS General Electric Refrigerator - Instructions

Unscrew old filter and remove(counterclockwise). Line up arrow on new filter with arrow on connection housing. Turn clockwise till resistance met. Do not overtighten. Follow directions. Simple.

I applied some tips learned by reading other reviews. So before I started I grabbed my trusty vise grip pliers and a small screw driver. I locked onto the switch actuator, the part that the refrigerator door pushes in, with the vise grips and pulled on it just hard enough to get the screw driver inserted in the right side to push in the catch clip so the switch could be pulled out further each time the catch clip was depressed to the next detent. Then I used the screw driver on the left site to encourage the switch past the detents on the left and very quickly the switch was out of the mount. The wires from the refrigerator pulled out with the old switch. I unplugged the old switch from the wires and plugged in the new switch and shoved the new switch back into the mount, wiggled it a couple of times to make sure it was secure and the job was done. Once I applied the vise gripes at first, the whole job took less than a minute.

This story starts with a GE side-by-side refrigerator that has always had wide temperature swings and a temperamental water dispenser. The ice maker was not making ice, and the built in digital thermometer showed it was running warm. I suspected that the heat exchanger was full of dust and so looked there. What I found was that the condenser tank was hot to the touch and the fan wasn’t running. As an experiment, I aimed a fan at the it for a while I saw that the freezer temperature dropped back to normal.
.The fan is marked as 11.2 DC so I checked for voltage at the fan and found some. With three wires and no wiring diagram I wasn’t sure this answered all the questions, but hooking the fan to a 12 volt power supply didn’t get it to spin.
I priced parts at a couple websites before using partselect.com . They also have a good diagram to look at (Sears diagrams are really poor). I ordered the part with 2-day shipping; it arrived on time, was correct and fixed the problem.

Removed rear and front grills,brushed and vacuumed area- probably caused the fan motor to fail- unplugged fan, removed fan,motor,and shroud in 1 piece, carefully slipped fan off motor shaft, unscrewed shroud and motor. assembled in reverse order. Frige is in tight area, .I'll now roll it out and clean often

unplugged refrigerator. removed light bulb from old socket. unsnapped old light socket and pulled it out just enough to diconnect the electrical plug that plugs into the socket . discarded the old socket and plugged in new socket. snapped in new socket into refrigerator. i watched how to do this simple procedure on you tube and decided to do it myself. easy easy easy

First turned off power and removed top shelf.
Then I used a flathead to slowly pry the switch out by the two sides. You just anlge ita bit and it slideds out easily. Then I disconnected the wires from the old switch, connected the new one and installed the new switch by snapping it back into the cutout.

unscrewed old filter by hand, installed new filter.

Using nutdriver removed access panel on back. Unscrewed water supply line. Using nutdriver removed water inlet valve. The feed line to the icemaker is a pushlock connection so removed feed line. Then reverse process.

Poped out with screwdriver the old swithch and unplugged the two wires. Plugged in the wires to the new swithch and pushed it back in the hole where the old switch was before.

Looked up possible causes on the internet, did the trouble shooting: off wait 15 seconds, then on, hit the ice level switch 3 times. No cycling - order a new ice maker. Had already checked water supply line and water filter. Screws in difficult positions to use standard screwdrivers or if you have medium size hands to remove plastic guards. After that was easy to replace whole unit. Cut plastic guards to be able to get at mounting screws for next time. Designers definitely need to think about consumer repairing of items rather than disposable major items not built to last 10+ years.

While the switch did last for 9 years, the design is poor due to the failure mode. The failure should be to fail off or not able to turn on the lights which would be inconvenient but would not warm the refrigerator contents. Arcing at the contacts eventually caused the switch to "weld" closed. It is not obvious that this is occurring so it took some time to recognize why the temp inside the ref was high while the freezer was OK. Replacing the switch was easy once it was recognized as the problem. All that was required to replace the switch was to remove the screws holding a fiber cover and then pulling off the aluminum cap which covered the switches. Unplug the switch an squeeze the keeper on the switch to release it and pull down. Pop the replacement switch in place and plug the wires harness back in. All in all it took much less time to replace than it has to write this up. T Pope

The existing light switch was very hard to remove. I ended up having to grab it with a pair of pliers and pull it out. Once it was out, it was very easy to put in the replacement and it seems to be working fine.

Take the cardboard grill off the bottom of the back it is held on with 5-6 hex head screws. Located the voltage inverter on the tank. It's on the bottom left of the refrigerator. Removed the screw that holds it in place.Remove the jumper wires at the quick connect. Rotate the voltage inverter and removed it. Check the voltage at the plug in going to the voltage Inverter. It should be 115-125 volts. Plug in the voltage inverter to the Quick connect away from the tank check the voltage on the side that would be connected to the tank. If both sides don't read at least 115 volts the inverter is bad. Order a new on and reinstall in the reverse order.

After I bought what I thought I needed for the repair. I asked a friend to come over and look at it. He changed the
the light socket and put the same light bulb in and it works great. I am returning the light switch but decided to keep the light bulb.

Getting on the internet was so easy. This was really very simple. Thank you for making what I thought would be a big ordeal into something very simple.

Paulette Johnson

opened refrigerator door located water filter location in right back corner unscrewd 1/2 turn and out it comes without shutting off water it is a snap to do by anyone and shipment was really quick thanks. People do not call a service tech for something this simple even a child tall enough can do it.