My evaporator fan started making noise several days ago, and parts in the freezer were icing up. I had replaced the defrost timer about three months ago, but figured it must have been a bad part. So I thawed out the freezer, replaced the defrost timer, and everything worked okay....for awhile.

Someone suggested that the evaporator fan motor was bad, which I doubted, but I replaced it anyway. That didn't fix the problem either. The defrost thermostat was replaced three months ago also, and doesn't have a bulge, and though my knowledge is limited, I don't think that is the problem either.

Throughout this ordeal, my freezer would run for 3 to 8 hours. Aside from a little excess build up on the coils, there would be a lot of ice on the defrost timer and the wire harnesses. When this happens, it reaches a point where the evaporator fan stops running, the defrost timer won't work (even manually) and the compressor won't come on. When I melt all the ice and turn the power back on, everything runs fine, and will continue to do so, as long as I manually turn the defrost timer. Sometimes the defrost timer would work on it's own, but everything is so unpredictable, I preferred to do it manually every few hours to make sure the refrigerator would continue to run. While this worked well during the day, I'd run into trouble over night, when the unit would run for several hours without frequent defrosting, then everything would freeze up again (in the freezer).

A few days ago, I turned the freezer temperature control knob down to see if the same pattern continued, and the problem escalated. Freezing would occur very fast...less than an hour, seemingly almost immediately. When this happened (and I even left the refrigerator unplugged for about 36 hours) the compressor didn't seem to want to kick off.

The refrigerator was nice an cold while the unit was working, so I'm thinking it's not the Control Damper. I suspect the Freezer Temperature Control Thermostat assembly, but I don't understand things enough to be certain. Thanks for the input.

The water line does not leak, and I changed the cold control. But I am still having the initial problem, which is the refrigerator stops running. The freezer and refrigerator are both cold, and the ice maker works fine, but after running for a few/several hours, the evaporator fan stops. At this time, I can advance the defrost timer and it will kick in. As of now, that (or manually thawing the coils) will get the system working again.

As I did before, I plan to automatically trigger the defrost cycle so the refrigerator will keep running. As long as I'm able to do this, the refrigerator will run. The problem is over night, when I'm not doing this every two hours, the system stops.

Before I changed out the cold control, and turned off my refrigerator (until I received the replacement part), turning down the cold control caused the coils to stop cooling and the evaporator fan stopped. This was after a prior adjustment to the control (also lower) caused the freezer to get colder faster. So it seemed like the cold control was the obvious problem.

After I changed out the cold control and turned on the refrigerator, it ran and cooled normally, and after about 8 hours, the defrost timer clicked on, went through the initial cycle and everything functioned as it should. But, after having run for some time, the original problem has returned.

So far, I have replaced the defrost timer, the evaporator fan motor and the cold control. Is there something in the circuit that could be closing that stops the process? Can the defrost thermostat be causing this even though it fairly new and doesn't look bad? Or is there another component that hasn't been considered yet?

Each time I have replaced the defrost timer, it was part number R0131577. I checked the continuity on both timers and got the same results, but not sure if that is good or bad. I found instructions on the internet for testing this part, but they did not make sense with the readings I got.

The readings I got for each timer (applying one probe to terminal #3, then the other probe to each of the other terminals) were continuity for each connection. When I tested terminals 1 & 4 and 2 & 1, they showed no continuity, when one pair was in cooling mode, and the other was in defrost mode. This was not consistent with the instructions I read, so I don’t know what it means.
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Since I changed out the cold control, the frost build up seems normal. I tested the continuity on cold control I removed and it did appear to be bad.

Both the refrigerator and the freezer are nice and cold, and the ice maker is functioning just fine. But I still have the problem with the fan going off. It will run and hour or two or maybe three and shut off. A few times, it has come back on pretty much by itself, other times I either have had to turn off the power for awhile or manually advance the defrost timer to get the unit running again.


Hard to believe that both defrost timers could be bad.

Thanks