1) Defrost Timer is working fine, no sizzling after 15-30min.
Not sure what this means could you please explain it a little better

2) Removed Defrost Heater wire and tested for continuity; had resistance about 045- 065.. not open.
This looks OK to me. I am assuming that you disconnected one side of it. This prevents reading an alternate/parallel circuit path which can be very confusing when troubleshooting.

SO does that mean I should be looking at replacing the defrost thermostat then??
Best to check it with a meter. It should be 0 ohms when it is frozen. Should open just above freezing.

Denman do you still think it might be freon?
Could be but if the freezer is getting down to a low enough temperature the unit should cool the fresh food section OK. May run OK for a long time even if the freon is a little low.

Another question: About the condenser compressor should it be HOT to the touch? (Keep in mind this thing is running quite a bit)
Yes I would say this is normal. One thing to check is that the condenser fan is running properly and the condenser coils are clean.

Also I read that you should be able to touch the High pressure side lines and they should feel cold? Is that correct???
That varies from unit to unit so I would not use that as a indication of a problem. Cooling is achieved by the freon liquid changing to a gas so if the none of this occurs till the liquid gets to the evaporator coils you will not have cold lines.

I think I would replace the fan. You know that it has problem and it is not too expensive.

Hello Denman.

Did you see the other response's I had in purple in my last post? Just wanted to get you input on those as well.

1) Defrost Timer is working fine, no sizzling after 15-30min.
Not sure what this means could you please explain it a little better

According to the walkthrough that was created by Gene that if after 15-30 of manually triggering the defrost if you hear a sizzling noise then the defrost timer needs to be replaced.

Not quite sure what Gene was referring to. The sizzling you hear is usually just water hitting the hot heater element.

2) Removed Defrost Heater wire and tested for continuity; had resistance about 045- 065.. not open.
This looks OK to me. I am assuming that you disconnected one side of it. This prevents reading an alternate/parallel circuit path which can be very confusing when troubleshooting.

I removed both wires and put on lead on the positive and the negative in the other end of the defrost wire. Did I perform this incorrectly?
Yes

SO does that mean I should be looking at replacing the defrost thermostat then??
Best to check it with a meter. It should be 0 ohms when it is frozen. Should open just above freezing.

Alright, I will remove the defrost thermostat tonight and test ASAP to confrim if it reads 0 ohms and report back findings. I assumed that it was the defrost thermo because of the walkthrough provided by Gene.


Denman do you still think it might be freon?
Could be but if the freezer is getting down to a low enough temperature the unit should cool the fresh food section OK. May run OK for a long time even if the freon is a little low.

Right now, with both the fresh food section & freezer set to the middle (recommended) settings the fresh food section is cold. But now the freezer portion does not freeze anything...example Freezies I have in there now do not freeze solid. Does that help or confuse things further?

It take quite awhile for a unit to get the freezer down to a low temperature from room temperature.
OK sounds like everything is almost running as it should right now re: you are getting some cooling and the coils are ice free because you have manually defrosted them and evaporator fan is running. Put the evaporator coil cover back on. Let it run for a couple hours, then open it up again and check the evaporator coils. If you only have frost on one area of the coils it is a symptom of low freon.
See the below link. Check out the example pictures at the bottom of the page. Note that the first one does not seem to work anymore.
http://www.applianceaid.com/frig_notcold.html

You are welcome

Glad you figured it out.

drl213
I would like to suggest that you start your own thread with the Model Number.
It gets too confusing when added to another persons thread with a different model/brand.

Note, that GE's are a pain as they like to keep their info a national secret.

If the fan is running it is OK, in any case a blown fan will cause poor cooling but will not cause the coils to heavily ice/frost up
But I would start with the defrost.
Check the defrost thermostat and defrost heater with a meter.