Hope someone can help. I have an 8 year old Kenmore SxS refrigerator
that would only start after tapping on the control panel. When I
removed the thermostat the contact points looked burned and if I moved
the terminals it would start the frig. I figure I found the problem,
but the replacement part might have caused another problem. (?)

I replaced the THERMOSTAT with a brand sold by MARCONE, not the Sears
EXACT replacement. The difference was the thickness in the long wire
that detects the temperature. The new one was considerable thinner!

Now the frig stops, again, and everything in the frig compartment
sweats and defrosts.

After reading some of these posts I figure that because of the
difference in thickness of the wire detector it has altered the
balance or adjustment to the DEFROST TIMER. Is that the cause of my
NEW problem? I saw the defrost timer detector right next to the
thermostat but it did not look that it had any adjustments on it.

Thanks in advance for any help with this. - Oscar