Freezers...

[MinionZombie]

Anyone know why a freezer might stop freezing the food for a few hours and then seemingly go back to normal operation?

There was no power cut last night, the dial setting wasn't changed and the door was closed properly, yet our freezer stopped working sometime last night and we lost a bunch of food. It seems to be working again, but was wondering if anyone had any idea/previous experience of a freezer deciding to stop working for a few hours for seemingly random reasons.

[jscott]

Is it a frost free freezer? If so, sounds like it's getting stuck in defrost mode, which means a bad timer or thermostat (your defrost heaters are staying on too long). If it's not frost free, could be the fan motor, or a sealed system (compressor/freon) problem. How old's the freezer?

[Neil]

After a storm/power cut our freezer stopped working. Basically I was about to buy a new one, but thought bugger this!

I pulled it out, emptied it - everything had to be chucked anyway - and took one or two obviously panels off and gave it a good clean.

I let it thaw and then put it back togethor and viola! Fine!

I recon the power cut cocked up the defrost mode/timer, and me probably unplugging/thawing it sorted it. The good clean could only help!


If this is happening persistantly then probably time to get a new unit (if it's old). To get an engineer in and then change a part will most likely cost 1/3 to 1/2 the cost of a replacement!

[coma]

Sometimes when there is a big powere drain the powere companies cut overall power capacity and things don't work right because of the lower feed.

[MinionZombie]

Would a power drain affect any other electrical goods? We've got a second freezer (also frost free) out in the garage and that's working fine.

It could be like JScott says being a faulty timer thingy, it's only going down to -10c when it should be -18c.

My Dad thought it might be a small leak in the compressor gas unit type thingy ... but my "hmmm" about that is surely if it was a small leak to the compressor gas thingymajig then the temperature would warm up slowly over time rather than all in one night...

Thanks guys for the info, we'll see if it can be fiddled with (getting a man out would cost the same as a new freezer like Neil says), but as we have a second (and bigger) freezer in the garage then we're fine on that front. Won't be getting a new freezer indoors until my Mum's next decoration extravaganza is over (a new bleedin' kitchen, lol).