Had A Scare Yesterday, And Thought My Fridge Was Dying

[pauldun170]

I don't even know what brand my fridge is. I don't see any logos with a quick look, but it's probably a kenmore. I think it's from some time in the 80s. The only "feature" it has is an ice maker, and that was disconnected decades ago. It's exactly what I want in a fridge. Cold on the bottom, colder up top, and no pcboards.

So you are looking for something without an electronic control board?
How much would you like your electric bill to go up with that steampunk fridge you're chasing?

Refrigerator shopping sucks. We went through that crap not too long ago.
No matter how great it is at first, at some point it will disappoint you.

 

[lxskllr]

So you are looking for something without an electronic control board?
How much would you like your electric bill to go up with that steampunk fridge you're chasing?

Refrigerator shopping sucks. We went through that crap not too long ago.
No matter how great it is at first, at some point it will disappoint you.

My electric bill is lower than most. This is my last report...

When it's cooler out, I'm usually 50%-75% better than my "efficient" neighbors. I don't really care about a couple extra dollars of energy a year. Bulletproof reliability is more important. Aside from that, a lot of "efficient" crap is just deferring, and deflecting energy use. I guess it doesn't count if someone else is polluting *their* air and water. How much energy does it take to make a new fridge? How much does it cost to ship parts from China? Whoops! No parts. How much energy is it to make a fridge again?

 

[Red Squirrel]

I don't see how PCBs would make a different with hydro bill. A very basic fridge just needs a thermostat and a relay or two. MAYBE a PCB to act as a power supply or motor controller, at most but lot of compressors just run on straight 120v so don't really need anything too fancy. In a perfect world smart appliances would just use off the shelf PLC and DIN components in a little cabinet on the back and be fully serviceable and also have a standard interface like ethernet and do SNMP or have a telnet console. To me, if I'm paying over a grand for something, this is the kind of quality I would expect and I would expect to be able to keep it for a good chunk of my life time which means 20 years down the line I should still be able to get parts for it and the smart features should be usable because they use something standard. Unfortunately that's not what they give us though.

The idea behind smart appliances is ok, it's the implementation that sucks.

 

[Torn Mind]

Energy efficient just means it'll get tossed after 15 years or sooner and maybe someone or the government trash pickup recycles the compressor and piping for a a buck per pound.....

There's go sexy green. Then there's going scavenger green. The bourgeois educated folks reel their big income and focus only on sexy green. Scavenging is no bueno.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I hate that recycling/repairing is even discouraged these days. With no right to repair etc a lot of stuff is built on purpose so you can't fix it, or it's even illegal to fix. Ex: John Deer and Apple stuff, and I'm sure lot of other companies do the same.

 

[Kaido]

I've had 2 situations in recent memory:

1. Door left open on accident
2. Fridge died

I added 3 things to help:

1. A small battery backup, so at least I have something to help, as my rental doesn't have a generator with an ATS switch or anything
2. A temperature monitor with wireless alert
3. A door-handle-left-open alert

The temperature monitor has 2 sensors, one for the freezer & one for the fridge: ($35)

Amazon.com

The door-left-open alarm is $22:

Amazon.com

I lost hundreds of dollars worth of groceries in both instances, it was terrible. Ponied up a bit to help the issue, so at least I have a heads-up! (UPS beeps upon power loss, temperature monitor has thresholds & beeps when crossed, door sensor beeps when it's left open too long).

 

[Muse]

OP, here. So far so good on my repair around 9 months ago of my big 22 YO Amana bottom freezer fridge. My guess that it was a bad thermostat (I bought and personally installed a new one) proved correct. While working through the problem in a semi-crisis mode I bought a few items: One, Yolink sensors, one for the freezer, another for the refrigerator section, and I can monitor the temperature of either very accurately using their Android app, no need for the primitive devices I used to have to look at by opening the doors. I also use Kasa energy monitoring plugs which tell me how much energy anything is drawing. I have several of those plugs and leave the refrigerator plugged into one. Again, an Android app at a glance tells me if the fridge compressor is on or off.

I used to have issues with the freezer door or refrigerator door being unsealed, but have almost no such problems now. One thing that helps, oddly enough, is that my kitchen floor tilts, which causes the doors to want to shut themselves... unless something is preventing that. I keep an eye on that.

I have no ice maker, it seems like an unnecessary complication of an already pretty complicated device-system. We do have hot spells here, but most of the time it's not hot, and that's year round, so my need of ice is sporadic.

Fingers crossed on not losing food from loss of refrigeration. So far so good for me. My worry on that is pretty much an extended loss of power. To that end I have a generator on my shopping list. What to get and how to use it, install it, maintain it is a research project that I've given some thought and energy but haven't made decisions yet. I figure a consequential earthquake would be the event I am preparing for.

 

[Muse]

Quoted spam post deleted.


My fridge does make weird noises sometimes but they always are temporary, maybe lasting a minute or two. I don't keep track.

My repaired fridge continues to work (I'm the OP).

The repair I did in November 2021 I documented in here - bought new thermostat and installed in my 2000 bought Amana bottom freezer fridge.

I have a Yolink system, Wifi central unit wire-connected to my router, 2 temp sensors, one in fridge, one in freezer. I can be miles away (e.g. at the gym, or, I figure on the other side of the planet) and see on my cell phone what the temperatures are in my fridge. I did this last week from my gym, 5 miles away.
I can also see graphs of the temperature for the last 24 hours. I have been looking at that recently because the temperatures have gone up some. I tweaked my freezer temperature dial a bit this morning to bring it down some. It used to hover between 0 and -10F but lately it's been more like 2 and -2F. I just took a peak and whoa! Since my tiny tweak it's been between 0 and -12F! Well, not so bad. Fridge has been similar. Will now peak to see the 24 hour range:

Was between 38-39ish, now dropped to low for the last 24h of 35.4F. Well, I kind of like my temps on the low side, so will leave things as they are for the next day or so. The instructions say to make your tweaks and not come to conclusions for a 24 hour period.

 

[IBMJunkman]

My grandparents had a fridge that ran on natural gas. No idea how it worked.

How about an ammonia based unit?

Can you still get ice blocks delivered?

 

[sdifox]

My grandparents had a fridge that ran on natural gas. No idea how it worked.

How about an ammonia based unit?

Can you still get ice blocks delivered?

How Refrigerators Work

Gas and propane refrigerators are used in RVs and areas where electricity isn't available. Learn about gas and propane refrigerators and how they work.

home.howstuffworks.com

 

[IronWing]

Is your refrigerator running?









Well, you better go catch it!

^That was peak art in the era of crank calls.

 

[IBMJunkman]

How Refrigerators Work

Gas and propane refrigerators are used in RVs and areas where electricity isn't available. Learn about gas and propane refrigerators and how they work.

home.howstuffworks.com

70 years later I find out. Thanks.