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My Hotpoint side by side fridge is not cooling well… The freezer stays cold, all food in freezer is solid as rock and the icemaker is full to the top and works perfectly. I did some reading here and checked a few things. I removed the back panel from the freezer and the coils have very little build-up and the defrost light checks fine. I put everything back together and moved to fridge side. I removed the cover over the damper door and checked and the opening is clear between freezer and fridge, but the door does not seem to stay open very long. When I moved the fridge control from 4 to 5 the door did power open and when I pressed the door switch to simulate the door being closed the fan in the freezer started and I could feel nice cool air being blown in. However, it I close the door and check it an hour or so later, the damper door is closed while the temp is still warm in the fridge… between 45-55. If I leave it several hours (5-6 hours or overnight) the fridge will get down to 40-42 but as soon as you open it a time or two, it will not get down to that temp again during the day. I have tried all the settings from 9 down to 1 (9 being coldest setting) and it does not help. 4 seems to be the best setting for at least a little cooling.
Does the control rotary switch house the temp sensor and control the damper door?
I also cleaned the condenser coil in back of the unit, but it did not seem to help anything.

Hi Gene,

I really appreciate your help on this... unfortunatly the fridge is at my cabin and I will not be going back there till Aug. I was hoping to take the most likely part/s with me to fix while there. However, if we cannot establish that most likely without this info, I will make these checks and post the info here in early Aug. If you have an idea of most likely, I would be interested in taking them if they are not really expensive.

Thanks!

Ken

Hi Gene,

Wanted to say thanks for your help and give you a follow-up on what I found. I did change the Temp Sensor, but it did not help... Got a new main board and changed it and it worked, but the temp still really did not get very cold really barely stayed about 40-42, but would get down to 38 overnight when fridge was not opened. Found on the back of the original main board, there was a poor solder on one pin. I re-soldered that pin and decided to give it a try to see what that did so I reinstalled the original board. Wow, it worked great and the 8 setting for the fridge keeps the fridge at 37-38 all the time and the 9 setting keeps it at 33-34 steady.

I would feel better having the new board installed for reliability, but it really did not control the fridge nearly as well as the repaired original. I hope it lasts.

Again thanks for all your help and advice!

Ken

Hi Gene,

The new main board is a WR55X10942, appliancepartspro number: AP4436216.

I left it sitting in the box on the top of the fridge, forgot to grab it on the way out. Do you think it is bad? wonder if they would exchange it?

Have a great day,

Thanks,

Ken