The ice maker on this 2016 French Door, Bottom Freezer GE refrigerator is currently called out as P/N WR30X28682 (replacing the originally spec’d P/N WR30X25766). This ice maker has been making cubes that are commonly connected at the top for 2-3 cubes wide, indicating the tray is overfilling with water. Also, the ice bin immediately below where the ice tray empties develops a fist-sized clump cubes, frozen together, that I break up and pull forward every week or two, but the front 2/3rds of the tray does fill with single/double ( and every now and then “triple” cubes) connected across the top.
My past experience with icemakers is with the Frigidaire model that does have adjustment screw on the electro-mechanical ice maker controller where you can decrease/increase the # of seconds the fill cycle runs, filling the tray for cube production, but I’m not able to find any information on whether or not this ice maker has such an adjustment.
My questions:
(1) Is there any mechanical adjustment on the WR30X28682 ice maker itself for the amount of time that water is fed into the ice maker tray?
(2) If the answer to Q1 is no, it seems to me that the problem would be with either with the ice maker itself or with the solenoid water control valve upstream of the ice maker. Could it be both? If so, which do you recommend starting with? Both?
The supply water for this ice maker has come from an RO system supplying water to a filtered water spigot at the sink since it was new.
The development of a clump of ice in the bin immediately below the discharge of ice from the tray has been a long-time situation, though I believe the extra moisture in the freezer compartment may be the source of the moisture condensing on the the evaporator coils and fan in the fridge compartment, and now on the freezer compartment fan (and coils?) as well. I’ve yet to tear into the freezer compartment fan, but base upon the noise it’s beginning to make I will soon.
Thanks in advance for your help!
Q1, There is not a adjustment on the icemaker to adjust water fill. Q2, I would say the inlet solenoid valve is bad and is not closing properly. Part of the problem may be the RO system that feeds the icemaker; it tends to decrease the water pressure going to the icemaker. The valve uses water pressure to help close the plunger in the solenoid. As far as the clumping in the bin, that can be caused by the defrost system, especially if you notice the cubes at times look shiny.
DavidP_APP_Team,
Thank you so much for confirming the icemaker has no adjustment for water fill, plus your input on the inlet solenoid valve and the potential of a decrease in water pressure from the RO system impacting it.
Since I do notice the cubes look shiny at times (plus I have replaced the refrigerator compartment evaporator coil fan twice in a little over 2 years now) would you please elaborate on your statement, “that can be caused by the defrost system”? Also, do you know what the minimum/desired water pressure is for the inlet solenoid valve to close properly? Thank you for your help, David! WDMT
The reasoning behind shiny ice cubes is when the ref. goes into defrost system, the temperature in the freezer rises, it can cause the ice cubes to start thawing out, not a lot, but enough to affect the cubes, when the ref. comes out of defrost, the wet cubes re-freeze and can clump together. This is usually not a problem, being you auger in the bucket will typically break up the clumps. I have seen with my own GE this happen. As far as you water pressure, you need a minimum of 20 psi. I had a customer who had this problem, and the valve would literally open up overnight and run water on the floor through the water dispenser. Good water pressure keeps the valve shut. You typically want about 60 psi going to the refrigerator. Also, GE had problems with the evap fans, and on my ref., I had to replace the fan motor and the control board to fix the problem. The fan speed is controlled by the control board and there was some issues with the board and fan motor.