We have an intermittent cooling problem with our Maytag MSD2732GRS
refrigerator. It cools fine when it runs, but sometimes shuts down and
doesn't restart.

I diagnosed this as a defrost timer problem by manually advancing the
Invensys S-68233-2 8 hour timer with a screwdriver, although I had to tap
on it after I heard the "snap" before the refrigerator would start.

The problem persisted after I replaced the timer. Also, the old one seems
to work fine in a bench test. The gears spin, and the state does change
from run to defrost and back. I advanced it manually to a few minutes
before the run-to-defrost transition, then let it make both transitions on
its own. I stopped the test after that one iteration.

With the new timer installed, the refrigerator makes the transition from
run to defrost, but more often than not hangs up just a couple of clicks
short of the transition back to run. If I advance the timer manually,
sometimes the refrigerator comes back on, and sometimes it does not.
In the latter case, I can get it to run by tapping next to the timer.

A few times, I have heard the fans falter and surge repeatedly after I
restart the refrigerator by tapping near the timer. With a few more taps,
it will run smoothly, so far.

This sounds like a loose connection, but I would appreciate any hints on
where to look or how to diagnose. The schematic folded up inside the
control section is for a model with adaptive defrost, so it is not that
useful for troubleshooting.