36348257897 Kenmore Refrigerator - Instructions

Disclaimer - if you aren't confident about doing this repair, call a repair specialist in. Also, take care not to damage the freezer coils as they have refrigerant in them that I'm told is harmful if it leaks. It may also be under pressure. The instructions that follow won't require you to touch the coils. There is no need to unplug the refrigerator or disconnect the water supply to do this repair. The screw driver you will need is a phillips (the one withe the + head).

1st, take out your frozen food (which, if you need to do this repair may not be frozen) and put it in a cooler or the refrigerator.
2nd, remove the ice cube bucket and dump the ice cubes in the cooler to help keep the frozen food cool. Turn the ice cube maker off.
3rd, remove the freezer shelves.
4th, locate the panel covering the freezer coils. It's a panel at the back of the freezer. It hides the freezer coils and protects them from damage. It's held in place by two screws located at the top left and right corners of the panel.
5th, unscrew the screws holding the panel to the refrigerator.
6th, detach the clip at the top of the panel.
7th, remove the panel. You should see the coils now. The coils will be covered in frost if the defroster heater has failed. If the coils are not covered in frost, there may be another reason for the refrigerator failing to cool.
8th, even if the coils are covered in frost, you should also inspect the defroster heater at the bottom, underneath the coils. The business end of it is a long tube running horizontally between two wires. If it's black like a badly burned out light bulb, then it's failed. If the bulb appears fine, you may have a different reason for your refrigerator and freezer frosting up. We'll assume that the defroster heater has blown out, and proceed.
9th, place a towel at the bottom of the panel space, to soak up any water that melts and runs down. There is a drain under the coils. It collects water that melts during the defrost cycle, but I'd rather mop up the water instead of relying on the drain.
10th, use hot air blowing from the hair dryer to defrost the coils. Just play the air from the hair dryer over the coils, starting at the top, and working down. The frost will quickly melt and the water will be soaked up by the towels. If you want things to go faster, you can throw hot water on the coils to melt them faster, but that produces more water to mop up, and makes a big mess. It's also dangerous to have water lying around if you then decide to use the hair dryer to continue defrosting the coils.
11th. MOST IMPORTANT. Don't use your screwdriver or any other sharp object to pick away at the frost on the coils. If you damage the coils the refrigerant could leak out. I'm told that it's dangerous stuff. Furthermore, I expect that you'd have to buy a new refrigerator if you damaged the coils.
12th, once you've defrosted the coils, locate the defroster heater and bracket assembly again. It's held in place by two screws, and has two insulated wires running into it on either side. Unscrew the screws, disconnect the wires and remove the assembly. Throw it away - there are no useful parts in it.
13th, install the new defroster heater and bracket assembly by connecting the wires to it, mounting it back into its place, and rescrewing the screws.
14th, put the panel back in place, replace the clip, and screw the panel back in place.
15th, turn the ice cube maker back on and replace the ice cube bucket and shelves. Put your food back into the freezer.
16th, use the freezer and refrigerator as normal. If the defroster heater fails again (I'm on my third one in less than six years), you'll notice frost building up on the panel at the back of the freezer before your freezer and refrigerator stops cooling. The frost build up is your signal to defrost the freezer and buy another defroster heater and bracket assembly. I don't know why this part is so weak, and don't know any fix except to keep replacing it.

I have a fridge in my garage. I have found that a glass of ice water or a cold drink outside is very important to me. When I discovered melting ice dripping onto the garage floor I was very upset. I spun the fridge and found that the compressor and fan weren't starting. I got out my multi-meter and discovered that power was not making it to these components. I did some research and found the wiring diagram online. There really isn't too much going on with a fridge and the most likely candidate seemed to be the run capacitor. I ordered the part, replaced it in a few minutes and the fridge began working again.

Per the trouble shooting guide on the home page of the website. I suspected the defrost timer was bad because ice had heavily accumulated on the back wall of the freezer compartment and the temperature inside the refrigerator was warm. First, I removed all the freezer racks. Then removed the (4) screws on the back wall in the freezer compartment. I then removed the ben from the ice maker to allow more room. Once I saw all the ice, I unplugged the refrigerator, and used a hair dryer to defrost ( it took about an hour to get it all). Once the ice was all gone, I then moved into the refrigerator compartment and removed the top shelve. This allowed me more room and access to the defrost timer which was behind the back panel. I used the trouble shooting guide to test the old timer prior to removing the new one from the package, (just in case I needed to send it back). Through this test I determined that the timer was bad, it wasn't the heating element or the t-stat. It was very easy to access, I removed the two knobs and lifted up the panel. I located the defrost timer and removed the screws as directed. I replaced the timer just as I had removed it, plugging in the electrical terminals per the removal process. I then reversed the order and put the panel and top shelve back on. Once all complete, I then moved back into the freezer compartment and replace the back panel and then the ice ben. I plugged it in and haven't had a problem since. This site has saved me a tremendous amount of money, a service contractor quoted us $300, to determine the problem. I ordered the part and it was sitting on our door stoop the next morning.

I applied some tips learned by reading other reviews. So before I started I grabbed my trusty vise grip pliers and a small screw driver. I locked onto the switch actuator, the part that the refrigerator door pushes in, with the vise grips and pulled on it just hard enough to get the screw driver inserted in the right side to push in the catch clip so the switch could be pulled out further each time the catch clip was depressed to the next detent. Then I used the screw driver on the left site to encourage the switch past the detents on the left and very quickly the switch was out of the mount. The wires from the refrigerator pulled out with the old switch. I unplugged the old switch from the wires and plugged in the new switch and shoved the new switch back into the mount, wiggled it a couple of times to make sure it was secure and the job was done. Once I applied the vise gripes at first, the whole job took less than a minute.

First I took a beer out and opened it then took a sip. Then I went into my garage and searched for my Black and Decker power drill with a phililps head on it. Failure to locate a phillips head bit i took another sip of beer and took out one of those old fashion screw drivers. I went back into the kitchen and much to my dismay the fridge didnt fix itself. After another sip of beer I took the old slide out and took it to the outside garbage. On my way around the house my neighbor started to mock my home fix-it skills and his back yard became the new home for the broken slide. I put the new slide in, reinstalled the drawer, and filled it with beer.

1. Important: First you will need to prepare for water from melted ice. Plug the drain hole in the bottom rear of the freezer. Have plenty of rags near by. A pan or small bucket is helpful.

2. Unplug refrigerator

3. Remove (4) screws (2) w/screwdriver and (2) w/nut driver. You can remove the light cover to get it out of the way but you don't have to.

4. Remove the evaporator cover (The rear wall)

5. Melt and remove any ice build up. Remember those rags?

6. Remove (2) screws from the heater bracket

7. Remove the failed heater. My old heater was a single element. The new heater was a dual element. This made no difference.

8. Disconnect (2) wires.

9. Re-route and reconnect (2) wires. The wires were re-routed because the new heater has both wires on the same side. Not a problem.

10. Install new heater on the bracket (2) screws

11. Replace cover (4) screws

12. Power up the refrigerator

Our refrigerator is a double door unit with ice and water in the left door. The right door was the one with the problem. It was 5:15 AM when the problem occured. I could see that the door was out of alighnment and had dropped down - preventing it from closing. I lifted the door and closed it. I wrote down the model number and found a detailed drawing of the appliance on the web site "partselect.com". When the hing earrived I compared it to the broken one. I removed all the food stored on the door, put several pieces of wood under the door to shim it to the same height as the adjacent door. I then removed two bolts from the refrigerator with a 1/4" socket set. I put the shim from the old hing aside for later. I removed two bolts from the door with the same socket -Note a metal tab had to be bent silghtly so the wrench could go on the head of the bolt- I removed the plastic cam and made note of its orientation and that of the shim above it on the door. I put the shim and new cam in place on the door and installed the 2 bolts. I inserted the pin of the new hing into the hole in the cam (I had just mounted) on the door. I put the shim (the one put aside earlyer) behind the hing and replaced the two bolts. I held the shim and hing up against the door as I tightened the two bolts. When I was satisfied that the bolts were tight I removed the wooden blocks that were holding the door up so the door was supported by the new bottom hing assembly. The door now opperates perfectly and the refrigerator was not taken out of service for the repair. Total time including cleanup was a little over 15 minutes.

unplugged refrigerator. removed light bulb from old socket. unsnapped old light socket and pulled it out just enough to diconnect the electrical plug that plugs into the socket . discarded the old socket and plugged in new socket. snapped in new socket into refrigerator. i watched how to do this simple procedure on you tube and decided to do it myself. easy easy easy

Removed back panel. Opened cover to relay attached to the compressor and pulled off replacing with new relay. No problem.

Better than paying $250 for someone else to do it.

I removed the back panel held in place by 5 screws. I located the thermostat and disconnected it from the wire connection to another part. Due to the connection requirement, I had to cut the wires from the original part and splice the connector with wires to the new part. After securing the spliced wires and covering in electrical tape, I replaced the panel and all screws.

As advised by the forum just replaced the defrost heater assembly now the refrigerator works perfect. did not have to replace the thermostat.
My nephew had exactly same problem on ge refrigerator - replaced the defrost heater assembly and the problem is solved. Just remove the back panel in the freezer compartment, disconnect the cable, remove the nuts and replace the assemble. It is very simple. Bought both assembly from parts select.com - got next day delivery. they are great. would do business in future.

Remove freezer contents, shelves, and interior back-panel. Melt all ice on freezer coolang coil with hair dryer. Be careful not to touch to coling fins on the coils with the hair dryeer since they damage easily. Unplug the old heater coil wire harness at the top of the coils. Gently remove the thermocouple clipped to the top coil. Gently remove the wires leading down to the heater coil at the bottom-back of the freezer. Remove the old heater by removing the two mounting screws. Install new heater by reversing the steps above.
Good luck.
Ps. When the heater coil fails the result is, both the freezer and refridgerator sides get warm and food spoils. A good indicator to watch for is frost building up in the freezer on the interior back-panel. I taped cheap thermometers in both side to help mointor the temperature in case it happens again.

First turned off power and removed top shelf.
Then I used a flathead to slowly pry the switch out by the two sides. You just anlge ita bit and it slideds out easily. Then I disconnected the wires from the old switch, connected the new one and installed the new switch by snapping it back into the cutout.

The problem with this model is usually a burned out heater assembly, when the freezer is still freezing, but the fresh food section is warm. To check, first disconnect power from refrigerator. Remove food and then shelves from freezer section. Remove the screws that hold the back freezer panel in place. Remove back panel and the coils will be exposed. If they are covered in ice the heater is most likely the problem. At the bottom of the coils below the heater assembly is a drain hole plug this hole with a rag. Place a large towel in bottom of freezer pan beneath the coils to catch the water. I do not recommend any method to melt the ice from the coils but a hair dryer, do not chip at the ice or you will most likely damage the coils. After you have defrosted the coils and removed all water from the unit, remove the two screws that hold the heater element in place, this element is directly below the coils. Look at the element, if it is burnt black, this is a tell tale sign it is bad. If that is the case it will need to be replaced. Remove the electrical wires located on te end of unit, the new unit will have instructions with it, reconnect the electrical wires per instructions, remount heater with the same mounting screws that held it in place. Be sure to remove rag from drain hole, replace back freezer panel with screws, replace shelves, and plug refrigerator back in. If your problem was a cold freezer section but a warm fresh food section this should fix your problem. In conclusion, this problem and the fix for it is indicative to these model's ge refrigerator's

This is a sibe-by-side refrigerator/freezer that needed a new lower hinge set for the fridge door.

First I removed everything from inside the fridge door, closed it, then loosened the top hinge bolts with an 8mm socket on a 1/4-inch ratchet. Using an 8mm nutdriver, I removed one bolt and loosed the other just far enough to be able to lift the hinge and swing it out of the way. (These bolts are long. The nutdriver is faster than the ratchet but you need a ratchet or a wrench to first break them loose.) Then I just lifted the door off the bottom hinge and set it aside.

The plastic lower front grill was covering the lower hinge but that grill is just held at the ends by spring clamps -- popped off easily so I could get to the hinge bolts. Again, 8mm bolts, just remove & replace hinge. I also had to replace the upper half of the door closer cam, which is screwed to the bottom of the door, being careful that the holes lined up: cam, shim, door holes.

Now the tricky part was lifitng the door back on the lower hinge. (It helps to have an assistant at the bottom to locate the hole for you.) Once the door was up, I swung the top hinge over, ran the two bolts in finger tight with my nutdriver, checked & adjusted the spacing* of the fridge door and tightened the bolts. This was all very easy! (*^_^*)

*On a side-by-side, you'll want the door to be straight up & down with a consistent gap top to bottom with the freezer door. The hinge has some slack for adjustment by positioning the door, then tightening the bolts. You'll see what I mean.