TFT22JWBGAA General Electric Refrigerator - Instructions

I had made a dry run at the repair after watching the instructional film provided by part select and it seemed easy enough.
The only problem was that i needed to use the electrical cord extender (provided) to adapt to my plug type. That presented a problm because it needed to be tucked up out of the way to allow the ice bin to clear. Just needed to be creative in how you wrapped the cord behind the ice maker unit before snugging the attachment screws.
Cranking out ice like crazy.

By the time this failure (failed defroster heating element) is evident (top of freezer starts thawing), the entire freezer coil is encased in a block of ice & frost is visble on the back freezer panel.
Empty the freezer & unplug (or turn circuit breaker off) then remove all racks and the light bulb then remove the two lower drawer guides using a phillips srewdriver (2 scrwes each). Use a 1/4" nutdriver to remove the two panel screws on either side of the light bulb socket and pull the panel out, unclip the green grounging wire and set panel aside. this exposes the freezer evaporator coil which is probably encased in ice. If so, use a heat gun or hair dryer to melt the ice away. This takes a half hour of heat application and a bowl or other catchpan should be placed under the coil to remove some of the resulting melting runoff so the evap. pan under the fridg/freezer unit won't be overwhelmed with the excess water.
Replacing the defrost heater & bracket assembly itself is just a matter of removing two phillips screws on either side of the bracket assembly, pulling the bracket free and then uncliping the two electrical terminals. Clip in the new unit to the eletrical terminals & replace the screws, reinstall the rear panel (don't forget to reconnect the ground wire), install the drawer backets, light bulb, shelves and drawer & reapply power. Replacing the bracket itself w/o the defrost proceedure takes about 15 minutes.

Note: If this symptom occurs and is diagnosed (the heater tube will be black and electrically read as "open" using an ohmmeter) and you cannot get the heater assembly & bracket assembly immediately, you can use the heat gun (hairdryer) manual defrost proceedure noted above to get the the unit running while you await the parts arrival. I used the manual defrost procedure and there was just some moderate frost on the coils after five days when I was able to install the replacement part.

Removed cover in freezer over evaporator,unbolted element ,plugged ,and replaced, very simple. Should be first thing checked when theres a problem.

i unplugged the fridge, first i removed the racks, then unhooked the grounding clip. the i tool off two 1/4 nut screws holding the backplate. then i used my wifes hair dryer to thaw out the ice. after it thawed out i unscrewed the element bracket which is secured by two philips screw. after taking the screws off, its just unplug one end at a time and plug it to the new one to avoid confusion. then reverse install to put back together.

Unplugged refrigerator and turned off water valve at wall. Removed the entire back, lower cardboard panel (turns out I didn't have to do this...could have just removed the screws from the right side and folded the cardboard along a perforated line designed for that purpose). Removed screw holding water control valve to back of refrigerator. Took new control valve, and slipped on adaptors for electrical connectors (in bag) to the two smaller of the four electrical prongs). Removed electrical sockets from old connector and placed them over appropriate prongs on new connector. Unscrewed the two old water out lines, cut the old fittings off and slipped the lines snugly into the new outlet valve (new valve had slip on connectors not requiring lines to be screwed in). Keep straight which line goes to which outlet port! Then removed water line going into old fitting and screwed it on to new valve inlet fitting (after removing black plastic protective cap). Turned wall water valve on, checked for leaks (none), and plugged refrigerator back in. Water restored to both icemaker and water dispenser!

By the way, the first valve came damaged, but one phone call and the people at Part Select promptly sent out a replacement which I had the very next day (and this was two days before Christmas!). Great job!

Received the first water valve with very poor included instructions. Watched the suggested instructional YouTube for my part installation which was very well done except my new part was not identical to my old part or the one in the YouTube. A translucent plastic housing on the part obstructed the installation so I needed to trim part of it away with a tin shear before attaching the part to the refrig. The waterline attachments were slip fit rather than what my old part had with compression nuts. I replaced all the plastic water lines using the slip fittings, turned the water back on and- all fittings leaked. Undid the fittings, trimmed the water lines and reattached- still leaked. So I contacted customer service who sent out a new part and followed the above procedure and everything went quickly with no leaks. I suggest you replace the two plastic water lines ( you will need to buy two slip fittings and two diameter lines) these are available at Home Depot. There is also a YouTube for this and it is a must see. My main supply line to the refrigerator is copper tubing. I trimmed the end of the tubing, filed it smoot, steelwooled the surface and installed a new brass compression ring befor reactching to the valve. Note, because of the first leaks, I found it easier to make all my connections including the electrical, plug the refrigerator back in and active the ice maker and water dispenser before reaching the valve the the frig back. Good luck.

Followed the video describing the repain and the written directions. The Video is excellent and made the job easy to follow

Remove front cover did not remove wires remove ice and water unit took off flapper put new one on 5 minutes back together

Unplugged the refrigerator then used the cordless drill to remove the 6 screws on the access panel on the back of the fridge to be able to get to the fan. Was able to pull the fan off by hand and push the new fan on by hand. Plugged the refrigerator by in and watched the fan run for a few minutes then replaced the access panel. Really quick and easy repair.

Removed icemaker from freezer,
Removed 3 screws from cover plate, and removed screw securing main gear, removed gear.
Pulled back cover plate to expose switches and mechanism.
Removed screw holding switch to remove switch, and installed new switch.
I should have taken a pic of the cover plate, the interior mechanism and the wiring as I went along. It would have saved me 45 minutes in reassembly. Also, as luck would have it, I reversed the wiring on the switch. So off was on, and I had to remove it, switch wires and re-install.
But it works!

the previous left behind a side by side, everything worked however the auger in the ice bucket was a little rusty. I wish that I could say it was all me but the truth of the matter was the videos on file.

They were nicely done and easy to follow as I took the unit apart and replaced the auger in about 30 minutes. Thanks for all your help in part look up.

Part attaches to metal plate near crushing fingers which attaches to ice holding bin. Remove about 6 screws total on each side of plate. You must disassemble the auger & other parts so you can reassemble it in the proper order. Not many parts but i always take pics to cut down on time. New part is at the other end of the auger and acts as the holde of the auger shaft. Picture a crankshaft with a bearing on each end so the auger rotates between new part and the other end of auger shaft. That's it.

It seems my refrigerator was old enough [1987] that the spacing on the holes for the bracket were different than the part that is currently sold. The holes on the new bracket were 30 mm apart on center, but on the old bracket they were 20 mm apart on center.

Clamped the old and new brackets together in a vise to use the old bracket for spacing and drilled a new hole through the 4mm of steel.

After which it was a snap installing the new hinge assembly.

Had some knowledge of freezers and located Parts Select Web Site. Excellent advice and illustrations. Took four days to determine fault, locate part, order, receive and repair. Price was very reasonable and response was more than acceptable.

Good Job Parts Select.

1. Found Compressor and coils obstructed by
heavy dust: Cleaned
Re: No change

2. Check defrost timer for recycle. Good

3. Defrost freezer and initialize
Re:No Change

4. Check heater by setting timer for defrost:
Re: Not heating. Disassembled assembly and
found heater burned with open coil.

Located parts on web site exactly as depicted, Ordered part and Parts select did all the rest very responsively. Recieved the part in just over two business days. Fridge has been operating fine since.

Better than any service man.

This should have been an extremely easy, quick job, but because I'm not that familiar with refrigerator parts, and NO INSTRUCTIONS came with the part, it took quite a while. The fittings for the water lines to icemaker and water outlet were dramatically different from the old part. The old part had screw-on fittings. The new one did not. I went first to Ace hardware-they had never seen fitting like this, and didn't know what to tell me. I drove 20 minutes to Home Depot, and the guy there told me that, rather then screwing on, or needing another part, the fittings were a quick connect, where you just shove the plastic tubing into the fitting. Finally an answer!

I went home, did as he'd said, hooked it up (shoved the tubing in, used the provided electrical adapters for the contacts, and screwed the thing on. It takes a good while for the icemaker to get cold enough to start it's cycle (which I found out from an internet search), and about 6 hours later, I started getting ice. It works fine now, love the in the door water/ice on my "new" 10-12 year old $75 plus $35 for the part-huge 26.6 side by side refrigerator, but the part should have had at least an indication that the water fittings just needed to have the tubing shoved into them.