I have the same problem on a new Whirlpool side by side I purchased in October. The water in the door dispenser is never cold. My 30 year old GE never had a problem like this. I tested the capacity of the tubing in the Whirlpool as suggested above. The firs 8 oz glass came out at 64 F. The second was 61 F. The following three were at 68 F, which is the temperature of the cold tap water.
This design just plain sucks. The other problem I have is that food items at the back of the refrigerated side freeze even though the temperature is set at 37 F. I have a thermometer inside and the control is holding 37 F but the back is much colder than the front.
Normal? Why would you say that? People buy through the door dispenser to obtain a reasonable amount of chilled water. If a refrigerator cannot deliver at least 2 or 3 8 oz glasses of water at about 45 degrees, there is a design issue.
The culprit is that they no longer use good volume holding tanks. They use too short 1/4 inch tubing that yields only a third of the needed volume!
We must require Whirlpool to develop a fix. Either a 30 ounce holding tank or enough tubing length to yield the same volume.
Test as follows: Set fridge temperature to a lower setting, between 30 and 35 degrees. Verify temp with thermometer.
Draw 4 ounces of water. Measure temp and throw out. Keep drawing water 4 oz at a time and measure each draw for temp. One of your four ounces should be around 45 degrees. If still near sixty, there is an issue. Verify the cooling plastic tubes behind the crisper. Insure they are same temp as fridge.
Also, estimate the volume of the coiled tubing which acts like a little tank.
Use this equation:
Volume in ounces = number of coils x 3.14 x diameter of coil bunch x 3.14 x .125 x .125 x .534
The above is for a 1/4 inch plastic line and for the diameter of the coil bunch in inches. Volume is in ounces.
If volume is not around 30 oz, that is not good. I calculated mine and got 9 oz. I can only get 4 oz of chilled water–8 if I am lucky. My old GE calculates at 30 oz with its little holding tank.
We must get with Whirlpool and request a fix or a recall. No matter what size the fridge is, a reasonable amount of chilled water is a must!
Ours also does not dispense cold water. We have checked all possibly incorrect items and everything is correct. Checked water temp and it is about 60 degrees F when dispensed. Pretty much the same as the tap water. If we wanted tap water temperature, we would not have paid extra for the through-the-door water. Have spoken with repair people several times and their response was…just put ice in your water if you want cold water. Feeling disgusted and ripped off at this point. Will not buy another Whirlpool appliance and will tell everyone to steer away from through-the-door water because it is a total waste of money.
Hi. I found no water running into those plastic tubes in the fridge. I have not figured how to get water running into those tubes. It run directly from supply line to dispenser
Hi. I found no water running into those plastic tubes in the fridge. I have not figured how to get water running into those tubes. It run directly from supply line to dispenser
Might as well add my lack of cold water woes. Fridge is new since July, got the professional install. Never has water been colder than room temperature. Ever. Doesn’t matter how much or how little water is used. Always the same temp. Fridge and freezer work great. I think a class action lawsuit is in order.
Same problem here in a rental property I just took over. Everything else works fine, the water filter is new, yet the dispensed water always is close to room temperature.
Our brand new Whirlpool WRS321SDHZ08 (21.4 cu ft side by side) has exactly the same problems. The coil has 12 turns and is 8.5 in diameter. I was told that the 5/16" tubing has 1/4" diameter. With an extra turn for the tubing leads to the coil, I get a capacity of 9.4 oz. The air temp next to the coil is 36°. Service tech and I agreed on water temp, never much below 60° and averaged 65° over several portions in a paper cup (which has little heat capacity). Before tech and I measured it, the water had not been used for 10 hours. Previous Whirlpool top-freezer with internal water dispenser did provide a first glass of really cold water but subsequent glasses were not as cold.
Same issue with a WRS321SDHZ08 Sde-By-Side Refrigerator. And like everyone else on this thread, my previous 30 yr. old Side by Side never had this as an issue. It always dispensed cool clear water. I’m very disappointed with Whirlpool’s lack of ownership of this issue. The fact that I bought this unit less than a year ago and that people have been experiencing this issue for over 10 years speaks volumes to Whirlpool’s lack of caring re: issues brought to their attention by consumers…Shame on you Whirlpool!!!
Since this thread still seems to be getting an annual update, here’s mine:
Brand new WRS321SDHW11, reservoir capacity is 9 oz., tap water temperature 70°F at sink, refrigerator water dispenser tested by drawing 4-oz. samples into a Solo cup six times in succession:
Time since last dispense:
20 min
90 min
200 min
Temperature of 1st draw:
64°F
62°F
59°F
Temperature of 2nd draw:
60°F
51°F
48°F
Temperature of 3rd draw:
64°F
58°F
57°F
Temperature of 4th draw:
66°F
66°F
65°F
Temperature of 5th draw:
67°F
70°F
68°F
Temperature of 6th draw:
67°F
70°F
68°F
So, if it has been an hour or so since the last use of the water dispenser, it may be possible to get a single cup of cool-ish water (mid-50°s) out of the fridge door dispenser, if one discards the first few ounces dispensed and if the cup has low thermal mass (e.g., a paper or plastic cup).
If anybody with subject-matter expertise is still reading this thread, I’m curious what the potential negative repercussions (other than the increased space requirement, and voiding the warranty) would be if one were to replace the reservoir tubing with an increased length of tubing (say 100 ft or longer), to increase the capacity of the chilled water reservoir. Going from the current length (approx. 30 ft) to 100 ft should triple the resistance of the tubing, but the flow rate is already quite fast, and I suspect that the tubing resistance may not even be the most significant flow restriction in the path (thus, I expect that any impact on the water flow rate will be acceptable). Any thoughts?
I’m not quite sure how to answer your question. Adding more tubing would give you more water that has been chilled for a longer period of time, but is it going to be enough to make a real difference? I know what Whirlpool would say: they would tell you to add ice to the water if you wanted it colder. i saw several of the newer Frigidaire models that completely remove the coiled tubing and ran the water straight from the house to the dispenser.
In my use-case, getting even 1–2 cups of properly chilled water would be sufficient. In principle, this can be achieved by tripling (or possibly just doubling) the length of tubing in the “reservoir”. I was posing the question because I wasn’t sure whether this would have unintended consequences, such as stressing the water pump, increasing the probability of leaks, increasing the chances of bacterial growth, or any number of things that could go wrong — whether or not such potential mishaps are foreseeable or imaginable by me.
A related idea I have is to potentially route the reservoir tubing to the back of the top shelf instead of the back of the crisper, as we cannot really use that area of the refrigerator due to items freezing if left there for a few days (even at a relatively warm refrigerator setting). A suitable amount of insulation around the most exposed parts of the tubing should be able to prevent freezing of the water in the reservoir, while cooling it to a lower temperature than can be reached behind the crisper…