Hello,

I am hoping that you can provide some guidance in understanding this problem: When dispensing crushed ice from a GE TFS28PPBABS the auger will periodically reverse as if it is attempting to clear a jam. When the auger reverses a full (aka not crushed) cube or two will usually be dispensed. After a few moments it will reverse direction again and return to producing crushed ice. This process may repeat immediately or at any time.

There is no problem dispensing cubed ice.

So far, I have replaced the ice bucket assembly (as a single unit including the auger, blades, etc.) and repaired the ice door assembly. The problem still occurs.

Sometimes, there is a very small drip – not more than two to three drops per fill – evident on the lower right-front of the icemaker. This has led me to suspect that large chunks of ice may be causing the issue. However I may have eliminated this drip as the cause by:

1. Manually emptying the ice bin into a cooler
2. Rinse the ice bin, auger and cutter blades in warm water
3. Manually returned the ice to the bin after inspecting each cube and discarding any clumps or malformed pieces of ice

Immediately after re-inserting the bin into the freezer I selected crushed ice. The failure (as described above) occurred three times in less than 60 seconds.

I have run the auger motor independently with the ice bucket removed and the motor performed as expected with no reversals.

I am at a loss of what to try next. Any suggestions?

ThatGuy;

I thought it was kind of odd also. While trying to understand what is happening I clipped a web cam to the side of the ice bucket so that I could actually see what was going on when the problem occurs. Using this I was able to record a video of the auger running correctly – then reversing for a few seconds – then reversing again.

In the instance that I recorded on the video, the ice dispenser ran correctly for about 18 seconds, then reversed for about 4 seconds, ran correctly for about 7-8 seconds, then reversed again for another 4 seconds. The 4-second duration of the reversal appears to be constant while the length of time between reversals is variable.

I tried to upload the video here, but according to the information regarding attachments, a 9MB video is too large. If there is some other was to upload the video, I’d be happy to try again so that you can see the video for yourself.

As far as the solenoid, I believe that it is working correctly. At least when dispensing cubed ice, I can verify that the solenoid is engaged and the Ice Dispenser Deflector is moved out of the way so that whole cubes can be dispensed.

However, when the auger reverses I do not hear the solenoid being engaged nor hear it being disengaged when the auger returns to the normal direction.

To me it seems as if the problem is being caused by the crusher binding. This is what led me to replace the ice bucket assembly in the first place. But since the problem continues to occur I’m stumped.

The video won't win any awards for cinematography, but you should be able to get it from here: www.nasrp.com/icemaker.mp4.

interesting thread, I too was having the same problem