Lec TF3604W firdge freezer

Hi all

We have a Lec TF3604W fridge freezer (upright 6′ tall fridge freezer, fridge on top, freezer on the bottom, separate target temperatures for both on the front panel) which started playing up a few days ago.

Both sections are having trouble holding their temp down, and so yesterday I defrosted it and left it off all day as it was a bit bunged up with ice in the freezer compartment (it’s been bad for this ever since the hinges were swapped to the other side, it doesn’t seal along the bottom of the door properly).

Before I shut it off it was at +7 / -16 with the target temps at +4 / -24 – normally it does not move off the target temps at all. After it was defrosted, and had been on for 3-4 hours, the freezer section got down to -16 with a struggle and then went back up to -9, and the fridge stayed at +20 ambient room temp. This morning, after a night in a cold pantry (it’s winter here – living in the Falklands!) the freezer is at -20 and the fridge is at +10, but still not at target temps and I expect it will warm up again as the house temperature increases.

You can hear the usual muted hum somewhere in the depths of the machine, something sounded a little noisy when I turned it off but I had it on superfreeze for 24hrs before that, now it sounds normal again. The compressor or whatever it is, is on all the time, it doesn’t seem to cycle off and on like it used to. No funny smells, no unusual noises, and the outside of the cabinet gets slightly warm like it normally does.

If you take all the drawers out of the freezer section there is a “cold draft” coming out the vents at the back but it still doesn’t get down to the right temp. Top fridge section is doing nothing at all.

What might the problem be? It seems to be freezing but just not distributing the cold air properly, is there a fan or distribution flaps or something similar buried in the guts of it that might have packed up? How does the temperature distribution work between the two sections?

We live right out in the sticks and getting somebody to look at it will be a pain, I was really wondering if it might be something simple or whether it is a throwaway job – if it is cheap to fix then we will, but if it was going to be a few hundred pounds it wouldn’t be worth it. I don’t mind tackling it myself as I have reasonable technical ability on other things but I’ve never done much to white goods. I have a decent selection of tools, multimeter etc.

It’s only three years old so very annoying that it has packed up already as every other fridge and freezer I have ever owned is still going strong – I have a fridge/freezer and a freezer that are both about 15 years old and an ancient fridge that is well on the wrong side of 20 and never had to touch any of them…

Any suggestions would be much appreciated…!

Many thanks