Norcold 1210 not cooling Power or Gas

[Tghoover]

Hi all, my favorite topic!

Back to full timing as we are selling our house. I had my 2014 3875FB plugged into my house for about a month. Fridge worked great down to 26F on gas and electric. Now in the RV fulltime, fridge only cooling down to 55F and freezer is at about 38F on either propane or electric.

1. Replaced thermostat already
2. Replaced circuit board
3. I have the fridged plugged into a dedicated 30amp switch directly and voltage is at 120.6.

We are in Galveston area and its pretty hot 109 heat index. When we had it plugged into our house it was at least 95 degrees so still pretty hot. I am planning on trading in this RV for a newer one in about 3-4 months, so putting a residential fridge at this point would be a waste of money. Any thoughts???

 

[wdk450]

Re: Dometic 1210 not cooling Power or Gas

Put extra fans in the external refrigerator vents openings blowing from bottom to top.

Buy block ice to put in the box until you trade it in.

Buy a small apartment size refig/freezer to tide you over.

Ultimate test for ammonia rv refrig is to run it on AC power, unplug the thermistor (this makes it think it is maximum hot inside), see if proper heater current is being drawn from the 120 vac supply (3 amps for my Dometic NDR 1282 - I can see that happen on my Progressive power monitor when I run the refrig on AC power). Refrig/freezer should be down to max cooling (near freezing in the refrig, about 5 degrees in the freezer) in 24 hours.

On edit: In really HOT areas I have heard of people standing small window air conditioners outside the lower refrigerator vent grill so that they blow their refrigerated air into the refrigerator external coils system.

 

[danemayer]

Re: Dometic 1210 not cooling Power or Gas

Did you mean Norcold 1210?

 

[Tghoover]

Re: Dometic 1210 not cooling Power or Gas

Yes Norcold 1210...

 

[mlpeloquin]

Fans at the bottom help, but only cured mine by adding fans at the top vent. Get a pair of them. When I installed my vent fans, I could keep my fridge at 32 degrees in 100 plus temps. We do have dry air here in California. They draw the air from the bottom over the coils and out the top. The hot air gets trapped at the top and has to push against itself to go back down to get out of the vent. The top cooling fins never cool well the way it is designed. The fans work well.

TITAN 12V DC Double Rack Mount Ventilation Cooling fan for Fridge Vent and Ventilation Grille with Speed Controller 120mm

 

[danemayer]

fridge only cooling down to 55F and freezer is at about 38F on either propane or electric.

At the temps you're reporting, I don't think fans at top/bottom/inside alone will fix the problem.

You might check DC voltage at the circuit board to make sure it's getting minimum of 12V DC.

You should check airflow on the back of the fridge to ensure nothing is out of place, blocking airflow.

If 12V DC supply is good and airflow is clear, it sounds like you have a cooling unit problem. There fix is usually a new cooling unit.

 

[wdk450]

I websearched some more on RV ammonia refrigerator cooling unit testing and found a page from Norcold that said to 1)simply test the heater elements for ohms, 2)disconnect the AC heaters from the circuit board, 3)wire the heaters DIRECTLY to a 120 volt ac cord, and 4) plug it in. The refrigerator section should be below freezing in 24 hours. This eliminates the thermistor, the circuit board, the flame, and just tests the cooling unit. Now if the cooling unit is not getting enough external heat transfer through the outside venting system, the results can be skewed. Supposedly if you do the test with the refrigerator removed from the RV, and no cooling channels, just ambient air, it will give a valid test.

I was having problems with my unit getting cold enough last week, and finally unplugged the thermistor for a couple of days. It came back down to normal internal temps. The outside ambient had been around 100 degrees at the time. I have high capacity fans on both the bottom and top vent covers along with a top baffle. https://rvcoolingunit.com/-Condenser-Fan-flush-mounted-wmounting-hardware-P5652854.aspx