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Our 3 year old Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Fridge Freezer seems to have the common problem of the freezer working but no cold air getting to the fridge.
This happened before and it was the defrost timer.
That time it iced up really badly, but there was no ice at all behind the freezer backpanel this time.The next thing to try is a manual defrost.
Why can’t I use a hairdryer, set on cold/warm and not hot?
This seems to be frowned upon.I was thinking of having the hoover at the bottom end and blow the hairdryer through the top.
Do people think this is the likely cause, because personally I wouldn’t have imagined the air channel from the top of the freezer section behind the fridge would get blocked with ice.
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
Hair dryer is fine if it’s not held close to the plastic,a lower powered one is better r set it on lower heat.
No sharp objects and switch off first.
BGRe: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
High dryer has multiple heat and speed settings, that’s the beauty of having a high maintenance wife 🙂
Air flow was OK through the channel above the fan in the freezer to the top of the fridge.
However the hair dryer air wasn’t flowing through the one behind the salad drawers that I take it goes behind the workings behind the freezer panel.After a little while of blowing warm air, you could start to feel the air coming out at the bottom of the freezer.
External grill at the back of the fridge wasn’t very hot either.
(I’ve ordered another defrost timer anyway).
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
One thing you could have tried was to wind the timer around to where you hear a distinct click where the defrost starts & you could have seen if the heater started to heat up.
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
I’ve replaced the timer.
It looks like I’d have needed a special tool to wind it on.Opening up the old timer, it did seem like there was a bit of brown as if maybe it had burnt out?
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
Doing a full manual defrost seems to have got things working again.
Maybe there needs to be a Sticky for when the fridge part of an auto defrost fridge freezer goes hot as it’s frightening the number of fridges that could be being thrown away when a simple defrost would cure it.When I took the freezer backpanel off, the polystyrene was sticking to the ice rather than coming off with the panel.
I couldn’t remember if it was supposed to come off so I left it.
Therefore I think I wasn’t doing a proper defrost with the hair dryer 😳I take it when it’s got badly iced up (possibly due to a faulty defrost timer), the 20 minute defrost every 8 hours simply can’t keep up?
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
Almost 2 weeks later and it’s at it again 😡
Removing the panel showed it’s iced up.The freezer has basically been mostly empty since last time as we didn’t want to throw away food if it wasn’t working.
It was on the normal 3/4 setting. Is this too cold a setting when there’s nothing in the freezer?Is it worth changing the thermostat, or does this problem always point at the defrost timer?
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
If you have just changed it, the defrost timer is not likely. Have you checked the defrost heater for continuity & insulation using an appropriate test meter?
Please isolate product from mains electric supply before use.
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
TheSpinDoctor wrote:Have you checked the defrost heater for continuity & insulation using an appropriate test meter?
No, I haven’t got one. I suppose I’d have to work out if it was worth the money to try and replace the heater vs buying a new fridge freezer…
If left to it’s own devices it freezes into a solid block with the wiring for the heater at the top right also frozen in ice:
If the timer failed and this allowed the wiring to be frozen solid would this break the defrost heater?
Another view:
This is how frozen up it was today before I gave it a quick blast with the hairdryer. How frozen up should it get? It gets worse than this:
When its fully frozen up, sometimes ice appears around the insulation where the stuff enters the fridge freezer (not frozen in this pic):
There also is some ice at the other end of the insulation at the bottom. It also drips from here when I manually defrost it:
Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
Silly question, but the defrost heater is the metal loop on the bottom isn’t it with it’s wires going up the right?
Which bit is the defrost thermostat?
This would be more reasonable to replace cost wise if I could identify it as the problem.Would a cheap meter from Screwfix/Toolstation do for testing the heater:
http://www.toolstation.com/shop/Hand+To … 170/p11867Re: Zanussi ZEBF 249 W Hot Fridge, needs defrost?
These timers are rubbish!
It turned out the one I had was faulty.
I got sent a replacement but that one doesn’t seem to be switching to defrost for long enough.The original one I bought was 25 minutes each 8 hours.
The replacement was rated 20 minutes.
However it is totally variable. It took as little as 10 minutes one defrost and usually goes for 15 minutes.
I believe this is the reason for the fridge not getting as cold as I want.With a manual defrost, it’ll happily get close to zero.
Left to it’s own devices it runs about 7.
With some extra wind-on defrosts it runs about 5-6 degrees.Are these timers supposed to be that variable, or should I return it for yet another replacement?
Are there better branded or even digital timers available?Personally I think it’s a bit of a design flaw having the heating element at the bottom. Checking after one defrost I was left with a beautifully defrosted bottom third and the top 2 thirds being a solid block of ice still.
I think the ones where there’s coils all the way behind make more sense.i think its time you looked at whats really wrong with it
look at the top of the evaporator, theres 2 little white boxes… you know,,,the thermal cutouts which dictate if the evaporators defrosted enough for the timer to advance?
it isnt all about time ya know .. yes, it might freeze for say 12 hours.. but to hope that 10-15 minutes of defrosting is enough would be silly, wouldnt it
the cut outs are faulty
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