[Festivus]

Had this issue 2 or 3 years ago. Repair guy thawed coils and replaced defrost heater. Now we have this issue again. I defrosted the coils with a blow dryer last night and the unit is working fine, for now.

I don't have any electrical testing devices to test this or other parts. So, should I just replace the heater again? Heater and thermostat both? I'm also seeing post about control panel issues. That sounds like a big expense.

This refrigerator has been nothing but trouble for us. The ice dispenser always crushes ice. It leaked out of the water inlet housing/valve and ruined our floors. And the thing freezes up like this. I'll never buy another GE refrigerator.

[richappy]

Go to the back of the fridg., pull off the motherboard cover, unplug fridg, and unplug the 4 pin power connector. Check pc board for pins labled line and defr. Stick a jumper between these two mating pins on the connector. Fridg should now defrost. If so, replace the motherboard and both freezer and evaporator thermisters. If no defrost, you probably have a bad defrost thermostat, or heater, just check.

[Festivus]

Originally Posted by richappy

Go to the back of the fridg., pull off the motherboard cover, unplug fridg, and unplug the 4 pin power connector. Check pc board for pins labled line and defr. Stick a jumper between these two mating pins on the connector. Fridg should now defrost. If so, replace the motherboard and both freezer and evaporator thermisters. If no defrost, you probably have a bad defrost thermostat, or heater, just check.

Thanks for the advice. I ended up calling a local parts place and they said to bring the heater in. I did and it was toasted. Got a new one and put it in. We'll see. The new ones for this model are double burners. Old ones were single. Guy at parts store siad that old ones couldn't handle the load.

[Festivus]

Well, I thought that we had fixed the problem when replacing the bad heater. This morning it wasn't cooling and the coils are all iced over again. Wife is thawing them out now with a blow dryer.

I bought a little electrical tester and I have continuity through the heater. What a pain in the @ss this is turning out to be.

richappy, I read your post. If the fridge is unplugged, won't it defrost anyway?

I tried to follow Gene's sticky post but my thermostat doesn't have an adjustment on it. But it may be screwed up. It's a metal cylinder with a blue plastic piece fitted in it. The blue plastic was in it crooked. When I straightened the plastic piece and pushed it into the metal some water came out. Maybe this was the issue?

[richappy]

You have a bad defrost thermostat, replace it.AP3884317

[Festivus]

Thanks for the quick response. It looks easy to do except for one thing... I can't figure out what I need to remove to get to the connection for it. The thermostat intself simply snaps on to a coil. But the leads go somewhere and I'm not sure where and what I'll need to take off to get to the connections. Any advice on that? Again, thanks a ton for the help.

[richappy]

Just snip the leads off near the base so you can easily strip insulation and attach to the new one.