First of all thanks to all who posted their stories, because those stories helped me to narrow down what could have gone wrong with my fridge. I did not know how frost-free refrigerators worked at all, reading your stories and doing some on_line research I understood the theory behind the work. My freezer was working constantly, but fridge was warm, cold air would not reach to fridge because freezer was completely frosted.
I had ordered defrost heater, defrost timer and thermostat. I was sure one of these parts was the problem.
First I used flat screwdriver to turn the timer manually untill frdge stopped running(timer is on the left bottom corner behind the black decoratve plastic under the door) . Waited about 20-30 min, checked ,freezer was still frosted. I disconnected the fridge from the wall socket and took shelves out from freezer compartment. This is where hair-dryer came in handy or you could wait till ice would melt on its own, which could take long time.Then loosend 2 screws on left wall that were holding icemaker unit half-way , unplugged the icemaker and took it out. Then took the light-bulb and cover off. Next I unscrewed and took the posts out that were holding shelves in place. Then I took remaining screws from back wall out and gently pulled back cover up then forward a little until I could see electrical connectors behind the cover and unpluged them. Back wall cover was ready to come out. I discovered thick wall of ice covering entire cooling unit. Used handy hair dryer again. When the ice melted, I saw the thermostat was busted open ( Iguess water or moisture got into the unit, then froze and ice pop-openned the cover damaging one of the connecting wires). I diconnected wires and changed the thermostat , which was very easy, just one clip holding it in place . Then plugged the fridge and checked if heating unit was working by touching it. Negative. Closed the door and let fridge run for 15 min, turn timer with screwdriver until fridge stopped working, cheked heater again- wallah it was warm and then it got really HOT! and melted all of the new frost build-up(a sign that thermostat was working). Closed the door waited another 15-20 min, fridge came-on on its own. Unplugged the fridge, pulled it forward from the wall and used sponge to drain the water from holding tray- about one half gallon of it. This is a good time to use a vacuum clener to undust the back and under the fridge. Then put everything back, in reverse order, ofcourse. Cleaned fridge and freezer compartments with warm soap and winneger solution (really good- this was a present to my wife who took our two little daughters to grandmmas and out of my way), put everything back and turned the fridge on recommended settings. Its been 5 days allready and it works great ( I used thermometr to check temperature inside the fridge and freezer). I'm thinking of returning defrost heater and timer back.Thanks PartSelect.Com, I saved lots of money. Hope this story will be helpfull to someone.Thanks for your time!
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