BC20KW (P7812502W) Amana Refrigerator - Instructions

The refrig seemed warm so I checked the temp of some liquid with a thermometer. Readings were above 60 degrees and I knew food would spoil soon. I vacuumed the dog fur off the cooling coils underneath the machine to see if that would help. Nope. I realized cold air from the freezer was not reaching the refrig. The fan was working but no cold air was coming out. I figured a blockage either in the air duct from the refrig or in the return duct to the freezer. I didn’t see any blockage in the refrig section. I took everything out of the freezer and removed the back wall. The cooling coils were completely frozen solid with frost. Being a frost free machine, I knew there were heaters that were controlled by a timer that melted this frost away periodically and that this cycle was no longer working. I found a schematic on the web, maybe your site, and educated myself on the heater circuit. The circuit consisted of a timer, thermostat near the coils, and a cal rod heater all wired in series. The timer was easy to get to and being a mechanical device I figured it must be the culprit. I ordered one online. I checked its operation and it worked fine. Realizing time was short, I hot wired the cal rod around the thermostat and rotated the timer to its heat position. The frost melted quickly and I put the freezer back together and ordered a thermostat. I canceled the timer order. When it arrived, I installed the new thermostat and it has worked fine for the past month. A little colder than usual as I don’t yet have the settings back to where they were. I have checked the operation of the old thermostat. It’s supposed to close at 30 degrees and open at 45. I have done a continuity check on it by putting it in the freezer, letting it cool down, take it out, let it warm up and it seems to work fine. So I have doubts if I really solved the problem. Wire connections were tight and not corroded. Maybe the timer was hung up on debris that I freed by cycling it. I don’t think this is the end of the story.

1- Remove food from freezer and store in ice chest
2- Turn off refrigerator
3- Remove freezer drawers, 2 drawers, no fastener
4- Remove freezer slide out drawer front , 2 screws
5- Remove ice cube tray holder, 2 screws
6- De-ice back panel with hair dryer / blower
7- Remove back panel in freezer, 8 screws
8- Defrost refrig coil with hair dryer / blower
9- Unplug Bimetal Thermostat, 2 wires, orang / brn
10- Remove Bimetal Thermostat from coil, 1 clip
11- Install new Bimetal Thermostat
12- Re-assemble, reverse order

Once I removed the contents of the freezer I found ice on the inside back panel Removing the panel I found ice on the cooling coils and the defrost thermostat was bulged out where the wires were attached.I removed the panel with the nutdriver as shown in the video. I removed the ice maker connection and removed the panel from the freezer section. I then had to manually defrost the area with a heat gun. The ice had actually covered the Defrost Thermostat - which was bulging where the wires were attached.. The defrosting took the majority of the repair time - the actual Defrost Thermostat replacement only took about 20 minutes once I could get to it. I spliced the wire with a crimping tool as discussed in the video. Once all was defrosted I reversed the operation.Overall, a very simple part change out. The video was extremely helpful - if nothing else to mentally prepare me for the task.

First of all let me say I can't believe I fixed it! And I can thank this website for it, they also had my part at my front door in less than 24 hours. I am so amazed! I am a stay at home Mom, and because my husband is always off with the military I knew the job was up to me to fix. And because times are tough we certainly couldn't afford a repairman. After reading many stories here about the same problem I had, I diagnosed what was wrong with my refrigerator. The defrost thermostat was faulty. First thing to do was turn off the refrig and then unplug it. I then emptied the bottom freezer, used a screwdriver to remove back panel wall. Lo and behold the coils were covered with ice. I defrosted the freezer using a blow dryer, also had to empty the drip pan in the back. when it got full of water. ANd because there is no way to remove the drip pan, I actually got a small air hose from my son's old fish tank(clean one) and then siphoned the water into a pot, took all of 10 minutes! I then used needle nose pliers to remove the bad defrost thermostat from the refrig's wiring.The defrost thermostat which had a bulge in it so knew I was on the right path. I looked at the new defrost thermostat and they had different ends on it then the one I just removed, and I remember reading what another member did, and that was to cut off the connecting caps, strip the wires , use electrical tape to join them and use a crimping tool to place the old caps on to the new defrost thermostat .I then inserted the thermostat to the freezer's wiring. Hope that makes sense to everyone. WEll, everything is running great! Thank-You Part Select, you saved me lots of money!

remove ice maker vent and back piece. Unclip defrost thermostat and unplug. Plug new thermostat in and clip to element, reattach back piece, vent and ice maker. Is a tight fit getting icemaker out, there are 3 screws 2 on top and one on bottom.

I have a side by side Amana fridge about 12 years old. One day I noticed everything was not cold anymore. I checked the temp with my infrared thermometer and it was about 70 in the top of the fridge, 40-50 in the bottom, and freezer was the same! So after pulling out the two baskets in the bottom of the freezer and the side rails that hold the baskets, I used a 1/4 nut driver to remove the back lower panel. After looking at the electrical schematic on the back of the fridge, I jumpered around the defrost thermostat, a little cylinder with two wires coming out of it. Bingo, the fan turned on. Well after a few days of running fine with it jumpered my new one arrived. I never really tested my old one with a meter so I did that and it tested fine, so I plugged the old one back in and it worked fine for a few days. Then one day I noticed that fan wasn't running again so I just put the new one in. I had to cut one of the connectors off as it was female instead of male and crimp cap it together, but besides that it went fine. So after connecting it I noticed the fan motor was buzzing but not spinning. I wiggled wires around and determined the connector going into the fan motor had to be a certain way to make the connection. I unplugged it, it wasn't corroded or anything but if pulled down on, it would not make connection. So pulling up on the connector proved that it would make good connection, so a ziptie keeping the wires tight in the up direction proved to be the solution. I'm pretty sure my old defrost thermostat was not the problem. So that's my story. Hope it helped.

Opened new kickplate from pkg and snapped it on !! So happy

I removed the back cover in the freezer section by removing six screws. The entire coil, the thermostat and the lines were all iced over. I used a hairdryer to defrost everything. I removed the thermostat by uncoupling the connectors and unclipping it from the coil tubing. I found the thermostat was bulging and deformed. I jumped out the thermostat using an insulated clip lead. I taped it so it would not short to anything. I plugged the unit in, turned the unit to "1" and advanced the defrost timer to defrost. I could hear the water hissing on the coil. I ordered the thermostat. It arrived in 3 days. The new one had a different terminal. I cut off the matching one from the old part and used a scotch-lok to make the connection to the new part. I slapped it in, dressed the wires and replaced the cover. I noticed that when I advanced the timer after replacing the thermostat, it did not immediately come on. The thermostat has an operating temperature window. I checked it several days later and found no frost. Everything works great.

It made so so easy watching the video. Thank you for that. I was ready to but a new one for about $800. but I did the repairs in about 20 minutes for about $23. Thank again

unplug refrigerator,remove content [shelves] then remove panel screws,slide thermostat from tube and unplug both wire ends,match up both thermostat[old unit have male round connector] you'll need round connector.cut old unit wire off,cut new unit wire,strip both ends join with solder and cover with heat-shrink and reinstall,fridge is cooling now.

I checked your web site for similar problems. Most were the bimetal defrost thermostat. Some had defrost timer problems. Althought my bimetal thermostat was deformed by the ice I replaced both parts. The fix was easy after defrosting the evaporator. By using the spec sheets I found the locations and replaced the parts. The refrigerator is now working fine.

Had to defrost the freezer which takes most of the time. Once freezer is defrosted its a simple matter of disassembling and removing the cover which covers the evaporator and disconnecting the defrost thermostat and replacing with the new one then reassembling. The information provided at the Parts Select site was all I needed to get the repair done.

remove frozen food. take back panel off. use hair dryer to dethaw finned part. swapped defrost thermostat.one lead ok, other had to cut ends and wire splice together. replace panel and food. took care of problem, food in fridge stays cold. totally impressed with delivery time. ordered mon here tuesday. awesome..........

Just as others discribed, removing ice maker, defrosting Freezer, removing freezer basket and shelf, removing the back panel, locating the iced over thermostat. One of the connectors wasn't the same, so I cut off the connector and wire from the old thermostat, spliced the wire and connector to the new one. Used heat shrink to cover the splice. Reassembled everything. :-D

I used the original connector from the spent thermostat and waterproofed the connection with a 16g wire nut and electric tape. Works great! In hindsight I would have ordered the part earlier as this is a typical solution to a freezer frosting over. Manual defrost is a pain!