Hello all - new the group, but I do have a family member who is a
retired technician from a major appliance retailer and repairer... and
even he's stumped on this one.

I have a 1997 upright freezer and a 2002 top-bottom
freezer/refrigerator with the same problem: Both have worked fine for
several years, until earlier this summer. Both are now Not cooling AT
ALL.

Compressors come on, run fine, get very hot, not noisy. Lo side refrig
lines and evap coil inside are same as ambient temp. Compressor, hi
side refrig lines, and condensor coils (in side wall) are very hot.
Checked freon with charging cylinder and guages. Vaccum pumped out all
the freon and recharged with amount listed on service tag.

No change.

Replaced drier. Recharged with proper amount of freon. No change.
Replaced compressor. Recharged with proper amount of freon. No
change.
Added additional freon. No change, maybe even got worse.

When both lo and hi sides are equalized, the compressor wil pump up the
high side to about 150 psi and pull down the lo to about -30 psi.
After running like this for about 15 minutes it has produced nothing
but a very minor amount (about 2 inches) of frost on only the cap tube
inside the evap. coils. When unplugged from this state, the pressure
takes about 4-5 hours to equalize on its own. We were manually
bypassing the compressor through the gauges to get it to equalize
faster.

Since this was happening with both the old and new drier and old and
new compressor, do I have a restriction somewhere in the coils? Has
there ever been any urban legends about people having any success
removing restrictions? Any secret techniques?

Thanks!
Samster2.0

The clue is that the low side pumps down to -30. That's a good sign of
a restriction in the line, some where. Most likely the capillary tube,
which is the smallest diameter part of the system. For the ammount of
work you have into the system at this point, you could have bought a
used refrigerator which is known to run. I know of no unclogging
secrets.

--

Christopher A. Young
You can't shout down a troll.
You have to starve them.
..

"samster2.0" wrote in message
ups.com...
Hello all - new the group, but I do have a family member who is a
retired technician from a major appliance retailer and repairer...
and
even he's stumped on this one.

I have a 1997 upright freezer and a 2002 top-bottom
freezer/refrigerator with the same problem: Both have worked fine for
several years, until earlier this summer. Both are now Not cooling AT
ALL.

Compressors come on, run fine, get very hot, not noisy. Lo side
refrig
lines and evap coil inside are same as ambient temp. Compressor, hi
side refrig lines, and condensor coils (in side wall) are very hot.
Checked freon with charging cylinder and guages. Vaccum pumped out
all
the freon and recharged with amount listed on service tag.

No change.

Replaced drier. Recharged with proper amount of freon. No change.
Replaced compressor. Recharged with proper amount of freon. No
change.
Added additional freon. No change, maybe even got worse.

When both lo and hi sides are equalized, the compressor wil pump up
the
high side to about 150 psi and pull down the lo to about -30 psi.
After running like this for about 15 minutes it has produced nothing
but a very minor amount (about 2 inches) of frost on only the cap tube
inside the evap. coils. When unplugged from this state, the pressure
takes about 4-5 hours to equalize on its own. We were manually
bypassing the compressor through the gauges to get it to equalize
faster.

Since this was happening with both the old and new drier and old and
new compressor, do I have a restriction somewhere in the coils? Has
there ever been any urban legends about people having any success
removing restrictions? Any secret techniques?

Thanks!
Samster2.0