Norcold 2118SS -- water/ice on bottom of freezer compartment

[TxCowboy]

Have a friend that has a new Big Country with the Norcold 2118SS fridge. The freezer isn't behaving. We're working through troubleshooting this fridge with the great info found on this forum but have one question that is rather perplexing.

There is water/ice on the bottom (floor) of the freezer section. They don't have an icemaker and there is no evidence of condensation or frost anywhere else in the freezer.

Any idea what might be causing this water/ice to form on the bottom of their freezer?

 

[danemayer]

First thing I'd do is use a thermometer to check the temperature in the freezer. If the 2118 is a 4 door, and the doors aren't sealing correctly, it would allow warm, moist air to enter the cabinet. The thermometer would show the temp as too high.

Absent a thermometer, a package of ice cream is a good indicator. Rock hard ice cream indicates good freezer operation. Mushy ice cream says it's too warm.

 

[TxCowboy]

Hi, Dan. Yeah, we've been monitoring the freezer temps with a thermometer over the past couple of days. You have to set it to max (9) to get it below 32 degrees. Checked the seals using the dollar test and just putting our hands around the freezer door edges and it seems to be sealing OK. Oh, and the freezer fan is working.

Any idea about the presence of water?

 

[danemayer]

Jeff,

Freezers normally get down to around 0 (F). So if "below 32" means 30 or 31, your freezer is not getting cold enough. Add a periodic defrost cycle and I'd expect any frost/ice buildup would quickly melt resulting in water at the bottom of the freezer that would turn into ice when cooling resumes.

When the freezer compartment isn't getting cold enough, since it's first in line in the cooling unit, that usually indicates a problem with the cooling unit, or with the thermistor that turns on the cooling unit, or with the heat source.

If the problem is the same on both propane and 120V AC, it's probably not the heat source.

I don't know the details, but I think there's a specific test for thermistors where you put them into ice water and read the resistance in ohms to see if it's working correctly.

A cooling unit problem would include problems with ventilation on the backside of the unit. The heat transferred from inside the box to the outside has to be able to escape, or the cooling unit won't be effective. That's why there are fans on the backside. If you're having trouble cooling, those fans should be running full time. If not, you need to investigate. They're on a thermostat and if they don't come on, you can bypass the thermostat to run them until the thermostat can be replaced.

 

[TxCowboy]

Thanks for the info, Dan. It's our friend's BC so he'll be calling a mobile tech to service this under warranty. Just wanted to be sure we weren't missing something simple.

 

[Toy1Ton]

Please let us know what they fine

 

[Hogladyrider]

We have a 2118x Norcold ss refrig in our 2017 Cyclone that we have owned since April of this year and we have had two issues.

The doors were not level and hence the door flap seal was not closing 100%. Gary was able to fix himself thanks to this forum by taking the low side doors off and inserting a ss washer to make the doors level and viola, no more condensation building up in refrigerator.

The 2nd issue was a oP L1 which means "call a service tech" according to the Owners Manual.

We had ZERO luck calling Norcold, typical. When I called a local authorized dealer that was an RV service center he was a great help and we called the mobile tech he recommended that we had also used in the past and the mobile tech walked Gary thru resetting the module and the refrigerator is operating again.

Owning an RV is just like a house, it's always something.

Of course why does the always something seem to happen when you are packing up the RV to relocate after being stationary for 5 months!

Susan