Freezer died - any recommendations (other than just putting stuff outside)?
 

I have no luck with appliances....deep freezer (a 16.7 cu ft upright) died after about 5 years, a Frigidaire. This is the 4th cooling appliance that I will have replaced in the past 7 years.

Is there a deep freezer that I can buy that will actually last 15 or 20 years? I am willing to pay for quality....but rumour has it that all the compressors are actually built by two companies and all that is different is the fancy box and controls.

Anyone have any insight as to what to buy? I had to chuck out a bunch of frozen food including some good steaks, some fine homemade pies and other nice stuff.

Anyone?

Dennis

PS - I wondered if it was the electrical system in my house, had the panel replaced, had the city check for noise or problems on the line feed into the house, had a monitor on the system for a while....nothing found, nothing changed.

Because you knew someone was going to post it...

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1389066844.jpg

I suggest you add another few inches of snow. That should solve the problem.

Do you keep your freezer outside or in a garage? If so..... get it into the basement. Anymore if you keep an outside fridge you'll void the warranty

Was just going to ask the same thing.

They are designed to operate in an indoor environment so excessive heat / cold will shorten lifespan.

And a garage is not indoors.

I went through two in three years, both I believe were GE and both in my basement. I said eff it and bought a cheapie fridge/freezer for the garage and a nicer and bigger kitchen fridge. Now I have a beer fridge and the wife is happy. I researched the hell out of them before our purchase and came to one conclusion - they all suck. I couldn't find one brand that had consistently good reviews regardless of price point.

there are many compressor manufactures

When mine dies, I'm going to do my usual and see if Costco has one. The one I have was foisted off on me by my neighbor when he had his yard sale. It was old then and for $20 I figured I'd just use it until it died. That was 5 years ago.

Upright freezers have longer cycle times, bigger compressors and draw more energy.
Why? When you open the door all the cold air falls out.
Some of the better uprights have drawers inside so that doesn't happen.

Get a decent chest freezer and be done with it. You could most likely run two small chest freezers on the same amount of energy as an upright.

My parents bought a Sears freezer in 1961 when we lived in Hawaii. It was moved over 11 times. In 1979 when my dad retired they moved to Oklahoma. That same freezer was moved to the garage that was kept just above freezing in the winter but was often 100+ degrees in the summer. In the mid 1990s they had an ice storm that caused one large limb to fall onto the power line. That shorted the lines and every appliance, the TV the electric blanket, the coffee pot and the main refrigerator were fried. Anything that was plugged in was ruined, EXCEPT that freezer. It finally died just 3 years ago. That freezer lasted 49 years of hard conditions.

They don't make stuff like that anymore.

It's so cold here that we're putting stuff in the freezer and refrigerator to warm it up!

My dearly departed freezer was inside, plenty of access and air flow....and I guess what I really want to do is to buy a freezer just like the one your parents had. Are freezers (or anything for that matter) available at ANY price? Could I make a FrankenFreezer by buying a very high quality compressor unit (if they are even made) and replacing the compressor that has likely failed.

Is there any quality in the world available from any vendor at any price?

...well, other than Pelican of course, but neither Wayne nor Porsche sells refrigerators...

...and thanks to all for their help and suggestions so far!

Dennis

I think the short answer is no, nobody makes them like they used to. When I was researching for a new side by side refrigerator, I even found issues with the high dollar ones like Viking and SubZero. I would have spent more for true quality, but ended up only spending around $1800 on a higher quality Kenmore (I think). If it's going to live a short life, why spend a bunch of money? In our modern society, sadly everything is disposable.

if it's a compressor that's gone bad, it's probably toast.
But if it's just a compressor relay (more common) it's a $15 part and a 10 minute fix.

Has it been properly diagnosed?

No, probably not. Service is a scam as they want $90 to come and diagnose, then if they need parts (no way they can take things like a relay apparently) they have to book another appointment...another $90 and then the parts cost. If it is a relay the cost for service would come to around $250......for a freezer with a new cost of $650. If it is something more severe, then of course the parts/labour go up and the economics go all to heck.

I am pretty handy, does it make sense to just buy the $15 relay on spec and swap it out myself?

Dennis

For 15 bucks throwing a start up relay at it is not a bad gamble. That is likely the first thing a service man would check.

When we had a microwave oven quit they wanted the same BS 90 bucks to show up and then more to come back and fix it. I asked them where their shop was and hauled it to them. It was a warranty fix!

As I am sitting in bed typing this our deep freeze in the basement quietly runs and does its business. We inherited it from my wife's mother ten years ago. I think that you are having a run of bad luck with cooling mechanisms. Yes as the above says replacing the relay is minimal outlay as a chance fix. Check Consumer Reports, Epinions.com for how good each freezer is. When I think about it I have spent more on my Boxster in 2.5 years than I have on appliances in 10 years.

Each year we defrost our freezer(I think it is supposed to be frost free) and give the internals a good vacuum....

Not sure how to answer that one.
You know your experience and capabilities better than I do.
To diagnose a relay you'd need a multi-tester and household current is involved. You would have to simulate a live curcuit to measure if the relay is opening or not.
If you are really good with sparktricity, go for it.
If you are unfamiliar or uncomfortable messing around with stuff that may shock you, then by all means don't mess with it at all. Stay away.
We all have things we are good with, but unless we're really good with electricity we have no business being around it.

You're right though, a service call to replace a relay could cost $250 for a 10 minutes worth of work. Nice racket.
Maybe you know someone who is good with electricity and can measure if a relay is getting a signal to close and is in fact closing?

Out of curiosity, I wonder if there are such things as instructional videos to diagnose freezers on you-tube?

I remember about a year back my washing machine agitator died.
I was about to pull the plug and replace it, but I found an instructional video on you-tube for that particular model that described how to replace the ratchet pawls. Took 10 minutes to do and the pawls were $7 on e-bay.
That washing machine is still running fine and saved me 'bout $400.

But that did not involve working with electricity.

YouTube has videos about almst everything. It is sure worth a shot to search for it.

+1 on YouTube. I fixed our 5 year old washing machine that wouldn't drain by removing the bottom front panel and cleaning out the drain filter. Found all kinds of stuff in there.

I had a Kitchenaid wine cooler (spendy $1200 version) that stopped running at ~ 5 years. Google and YouTube came to the rescue with info on how to test for a faulty thermostat with a simple ohm meter and test bypass wire. Got a new thermostat for $30 and the cooler was still running 5 years later when we sold our house.