Indesit C1300 dead in the water

[murphaph]

Hi all (thanks for sorting that dave),
I am the not so proud owner of an Indesit FF (model C1300). The thing has been icing up in the fridge section for ages and I did nothing about it 😳 and now it’s dead. There is no refrigeration at all in either fridge or freezer section but it’s not a fuse etc. as the light still works. Before the unit died the compressor motor sounded like it was really struggling to turn over. It would often stop and then might come on if the temp switch was turned off and back on. Anyway, I’m an electronic engineer so tested the temp switch and it doesn’t feel right to me….it reads open when set to OFF (seems reasonable) but it reads almost dead short (just 0.3 ohms) at ANY temp seting which seems wrong, surely it should decrease as the temp is set colder and colder. Anyway, I was surmising that the defective switch may have caused the compressor to run almost continuosly since the unit was installed 3 years ago. Is this a reasonable assumption? I can smell a faint burning odour from the compressor area leading me to think the motor is burned out. You can’t even see a motor-the compressor all seems like a built in unit that is not serviceable (at least by me!) as it plumbs directly to the gas containing pipes. I believe this type of fault is uneconomicla to repair and am thinking about a new one. Any thoughts? Are indesits crap? Thanks everybody.

[Optimist?]

Re: Indesit C1300 dead in the water

Hello Sir,

If the temperature switch was a bimetallic strip type it would exhibit the behaviour you measure, wouldn’t it?

As for the compressor, I’ve been looking at this side of things (a lot) myself lately, and there’s a (local) relay, on many models I believe, that is used to start/run the comressor. As you’ll know, relays are susceptible to contact degradation, especially in a high temperature/big current surge environment. Cheap to replace if it’s that. Lots of other possibilities though as I’m sure others will be kind enough to suggest.

I’m very ‘optimistic’ that this is what’s wrong with my (newer) old FF. £24 for a new relay from Bosch….

Best of luck,

Pete

[murphaph]

Re: Indesit C1300 dead in the water

Thanks for the upbeat reply optimist! I didn’t think of bimetal strips but I didn’t think they’d use them in a system like a refrigerator. How would it work? Would the temp knob just mechanically push the contact closer/farther from the strip to determine the ‘kick in’ point? I suppose I just haven’t seen bimetal strips since physics classes at secondary school!

Anyway, as for the relay…..I looked for one yesterday but couldn’t find one. The compressor (tecumseh) all seems self contained with no external components apart from a wiring junction box from which the wires disappear inside the compressor unit.

This machine really did not sound too healthy in its last days. It was sort of ‘gasping’ to compress.

[hotpnt]

Re: Indesit C1300 dead in the water

Hi thermostats work by the gas contained in the phial changing pressure under varying temperatures, this then operates the stat at the correct running, the icing in the fridge would depend on wether it was all over icing (possible stat jammed on) or if it was more of an ice lump then may have been a blockage in the gas system pipework, either could have caused a compressor failure eventually, relay failures are rare but the contacts to the compressor may have burnt out, if the compressor itself had failed/jammed you would normally still hear a slight ‘click’ when the unit was swithced on

[murphaph]

Re: Indesit C1300 dead in the water

Thanks hotpoint, how does the rotary temp switch work? Is it just a varistor?

[Optimist?]

Re: Indesit C1300 dead in the water

murphaph wrote:Thanks for the upbeat reply optimist! …

You are very welcome.

I got very lucky yesterday, finding an American site which made reference to the compressor relay, which I hadn’t found/suspected up ’til then. My luck increased when, to my slight astonishment, Bosch’s website had a 3-page exploded diagram of my very FF, including part numbers and an English-language listing of part-numbers/names/prices.
I’m used to electronics websites where if the thing went out of production more than 5 minutes ago, the site denies all knowledge of it’s existence, v. frustrating. :tup: to Bosch.

It got even better when I e-mailed the US ( or Canadian?) site asking if they knew of anywhere that I could look at the internals of a FF compressor. Fella came straight back with a link which led to a super picture-dominated ‘I took it apart, here’s how it all works’ thing someone had done. Links via PM, if you want. Unless I can put them up on here?

Pete

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