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jay1028  
#1 Posted : Thursday, May 7, 2009 9:03:59 AM(UTC)
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jay1028

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I have one of the famous Samsung side by side friges that is a piece of junk. It is now 2 years old and after it was one year old, the evap coil in the frige side began to freeze up with ice and the frige got to 59deg. After months of service companies attempting to fix it, the main PCB was replaced and all was fine until a few days ago. The same situation is happening again. Now no one here will service the Samsung because they complain they get no support from the factory for advice or parts. In the mean time, I have become very familiar with how to take it apart and hair dryer melt the ice and put it all back togther again. Not wanting to do this anymore, I need some suggestions to help me solve this problem for good. I have the service manual for the machine and the schematic. It is the adaptive defrost and is controlled by the main control board,for the entire unit, no auxilliary deforst board. I want to bypass the digital ckts that are always going bad and wire in the old mechanical type defrost timer but I don't know how to get one to do what needs to be done.

When the coil was iced, I applied 110vac to the defrost heater,which is a metal tube interlaced with the evap coil, and it took 11 minutes for the ice to melt away. Any timers that I have been looking for on the net are 25mins. Is that going to be too long? I need to do something because I am not going to put it out on the street like so many others that have given up on Samsung. This piece of junk cost too much.
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denman  
#2 Posted : Thursday, May 7, 2009 12:58:19 PM(UTC)
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denman

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I would think it should be OK.
The defrost thermostat will turn the defrost heater off once the ice is gone.

Since you know how long it takes the unit to ice up this should help you decide in a timer. They can differ some as to how often they run a defrost cycle.
THIS FORUM IS DEAD!!!!!!!
richappy  
#3 Posted : Thursday, May 7, 2009 2:22:49 PM(UTC)
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richappy

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Your main pc board controls the compressor also. It would not be a good idea to run it with a defective board, you run the risk of other failures. Also, your condensing and evaporator fans are probably dc, not ac controlled.
I would just replace the main pc board and add a 1000 joule surge protector to the outlet, should prevent pc board burnouts.
denman  
#4 Posted : Thursday, May 7, 2009 2:38:16 PM(UTC)
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denman

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I agree with richappy.

Wiring this in could be a pain.
THIS FORUM IS DEAD!!!!!!!
jay1028  
#5 Posted : Thursday, May 7, 2009 2:58:37 PM(UTC)
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jay1028

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I have a surge protector on it already and the main board has them at the AC input connector. I don't believe that surges are the culprit. It is another poorly designed piece of imported junk that looks good on paper but doesn't perform and we consumers are stuck with the bill. If the other forum was still active, you would see how many people could not get their unit repaired and just got another brand. That is intolerable to flush $1600 down the drain because people can't get a service company to fix it. I have two main boards that have gone bad so far and there is no guarantee that Samsung has addressed the problem with any fixes.

So I should just feed the repair people money until I get fed up with how much more I have spent and have gotten no positive results? There is no one in a 70 mile radius that will touch Samsung. Two companies laughed when I mentioned Samsung.
richappy  
#6 Posted : Friday, May 8, 2009 12:24:04 AM(UTC)
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richappy

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I would suggest you search Google for a repair co. that fixes pc boards, worth a try, don't know which co's are the best but you can re-post your problem asking for co's that are good.
denman  
#7 Posted : Friday, May 8, 2009 3:36:19 AM(UTC)
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denman

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You are absolutely correct.
When you buy a fridge and then have to put a surge protector on the line as a precaution against voltage spikes it tells me that the unit itself has design problems.
I am not an engineer but would like to get my hands around the throats of a couple of them because it is obvious that they do not have a clue how to isolate electronic components from motor and heater spikes when they are turned on and off.

Today it is rare indeed to find a recall or a no charge fix for anything unless a couple houses burn down. Companies just do not seem to care if their products have longevity. The mind set seems to be sell it, forget it and move on to the next customer. Also many service departments now make a higher profit margin than the manufacturing side of the business so a few service calls is not a bad thing for the bottom line.

They design to get a good Energy Star rating. You buy it with the idea that it will save you a few bucks in energy cost while also helping the environment and then junk it in 5 years because of problems. Would be nice if the Energy Star included the energy that is used to produce the unit and the parts to keep it running rated by lifetime. Then the unit that lasts 15 years but uses more energy per year would get a better rating than the 5 year junker.

The service companies may actually be doing you a favor by not fixing it, they know that they will be back in the not too distant future and they will have to face an irate customer.

This is an over designed poorly thought out piece of you know what.

I know that the above is absolutely useless when it comes to help but wanted to let you know that I also feel your frustration.

All I can recommend is get on the net and yell loud and clear on every site you can find that this is crap. Who knows if enough people yell it may make a difference or at least save others. A good example of this is the Maytag Neptune washer fiasco.

THIS FORUM IS DEAD!!!!!!!
richappy  
#8 Posted : Friday, May 8, 2009 5:10:13 AM(UTC)
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richappy

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I worked as an electronic engineer for over 20 years and most of the companies I worked for had a good failure analysis department and I observed life tests on systems I worked on.
However, there where places I worked at that ignored engineering protests and produced stuff that used cheap parts or systems without rigorous testing before design completion.
I complained to upper management to no avail except to be put on the "problem" employee list. My last job was working at an Air force base where I saw that they did care about "problems".
I can't say who is to blame in this case, but I am sure it is not only engineering who is at failt, but the entire company.
jay1028  
#9 Posted : Friday, May 8, 2009 8:24:16 AM(UTC)
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jay1028

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I have a backround in electronics for over 40 years and I have decided to make an electronic circuit to do what is needed for the defrost operation and bypass the faulty control from the micro processor on the PBA Main board. Looking at http://tinyurl.com/pnaopl is the schematic for the unit. Outlined in a red box is the relay controls for the compressor and defrost heaters. One side of the relay coils are tied to +12vdc. the other side of a coil is connected to an IC (relay driver) that gets it signals from the processor. I plan on opening (cutting) the three IC pins that run to the relays and insert a digital timing circuit that will (energize the original relays) to run the compressor for 12 hours, then run disable the compressor and turn on the defrost heaters in the frige and freezer for a time that I haven't determined yet.. Then repeat the cycle.... just like the old mechanical defrost timers did every 12 hours.

This diagram shows essentially what I want to do. http://tinyurl.com/o4vmfw

Denman, I appreciate your last response. It made me feel better that someone understands. If you remember on the other (closed now) forum, I went through an ordeal on the phone with Samsung and as usual they deny having any issues with anything they make but they did extend my initial one year warranty for three months so that the repairs would be covered. The person I spoke with was sympathetic and I could tell that he had heard this all before.

Richappy, I don't think this Samsung frige ever had a design review or someone would have caught this unstable problem. Fortunately the rest of the frige operations always work fine.

The thing I don't know is how long to energize the defrost heaters. I found that 11 minutes removed the blocks of ice that were on the bottom of the evap. Since there is no bi-metal defrost thermostat in this circuit because a thermistor is used to alert the processor when to terminate the defrost cycle, I need to know what max temperature is acceptable for a defrost heater. I don't want to melt any plastic. The defrost heater is an aluminun tube type that is interleaved in the evaporator coils as one assy. I could add a bi-metal in series but I have found that they all look similar but they range in price from over $8 to over $40. Why is there such a range in price?

I'm open to suggestions. I just can't leave the frige like it is now, not know when it will act up again.
woodchuckie  
#10 Posted : Friday, May 8, 2009 11:50:20 AM(UTC)
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woodchuckie

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It seems common to have a cut out at 55 and cut in at 30. The placement on the evaporator is important to make sure it doesn't cut out too soon or too late. I don't know why one would be so much more expensive unless it's because some have a wiring harness with a plug on the end.
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