Thank you so much for actually showing what tools you used to clean and how the brush got the stuff in the back! I was racking my brain trying to figure out how to get those back coils.
What is wrong with refrigerator engineers? They place the condenser coils in the most inaccessible place, making them impossible to clean. Condenser coils get hot and they place them on the bottom of your frige or freezer. Don't they know heat rises? Put them on the top, make them easy to clean. Hey refrigerator designers here's a tip put an easy to replace air filter on your units.
They put them on the bottom becuase the heat from the refrigeration cycle and fan unit evaporate the water from the defrost drain pan that results from melting the ice buidup during the defrost cycle which occurs every accumulated 12hrs (or so) of compressor runtime...
It's not impossible to clean. I clean mine 2x/year and it takes about ten minutes to do. > The air flow through the condenser coil is at a very low pressure differential. Put a filter in the air stream and it would markedly reduce air flow, and a filter would plug up faster than the coils. This is a minor issue of maintenance, which as I say takes me about ten minutes twice/year. You just need to develop the minor skill needed to do the job. There are refrigerators and freezers which don't have exterior coils subject to accumulating dust. On those, the coils are entirely behind the sheet metal of the refrigerator and not in any air flow. Instead, the sheet metal of the refrigerator conducts heat from the coils to the refrigerator sheet metal, and that metal heats up and transmits the heat through the sheet metal where room air absorbs that heat. I have a freezer like that with no exterior coils on the condenser. But you still have to defrost the evaporator coils inside the freezer.
All of your comments are in compliance with minimum industry standards. The vast majority of frigs have forced air across the condenser coils with the coils and air intake at the bottom of the unit. Making them magnets for dust. And nearly impossible to get to for cleaning. Like you I have an old sears refrigerator and a freezer both with passive condenser cooling, almost zero maintenance. My kitchen fridge/freezer, the condenser coils (forced air) are on the top behind an easy to move louvers. Very little dust up there. What I am saying is make a superior unit not one that breaks down or has to be replaced every few years.@@SeattlePioneer
Thank you. I have the same fridge and those coils behind the front are SO DIFFICULT to get at. I’ve tried multiple brushes. Even attached a straw to my vacuum trying to reach. I guess the engineers didn’t plan on ever cleaning the coils. 😖
Thanks for showing about the rear cleaning. Unfortunately, I'd been away for a long time and my fridge got sparse use. It looked every bit as bad as mine. I only wish the warning about unplugging was at the start - but of course, most everyone forgets that. I may have missed it; if it was there! Thanks so much for the video, it helped me a lot. I'm hoping the compressor hasn't been too over worked. Ice cream has been being soft in the door.
Nice job! Last time I made a bundle of straws with a rubber band and then shoved it inside the vac attachment and taped it on the end. The straws give another 10” or so in length & they get in between all the grid lines & sucks out the dust bunnies. Thanks for showing how to get the backside off. My freezer is struggling with the summer heat & I’m sure this is the issue. Thanks for sharing!!
> So what happened after you cleaned the coils? And do you plan to clean them on a regular basis now? It only takes me ten minutes to clean the bottom coils 2X/year. I just did that today, and found a moderate amount of dust to clean away. I'll do that again just before the summer season places major demands on refrigerator cleaning efficiency.
(Sigh . . . . ) I just love watching a man do maintenance around the house. Not sure if this one is married, but if he is, I bet his wife didn't even have to beg him for 6 months to do this. Why oh why do manufacturers make coils on the bottom. So much harder to clean.
Well, you'd have to get it off its rear rollers first, and if you go to that kind trouble you might as well empty the whole thing and just lay it on its back. I wasn't willing to go that far.
It takes me ten minutes to clean the bottom coils on my refrigerator using a refrigerator coil cleaning brush you can buy at a hardware stor for $6-8, and using a vacuum cleaner to suck up the dust. It's really not a difficult job with a little practice. Jacking up the refrigerator as you describe sounds like a LOT more work to me!
Caveat, for those with wood floors, consider getting some Ramboard to roll the fridge on, they are heavy and the injection mold wheel seem will leave a nice groove in the wood.
I guess God knew what He was doing when we got a mucus system. Built in cleaner. I'm not super churchy but my mind wonders and connects things! Love to all!
Planned to relax and read for a while - but saw this video first and instead spent the time cleaning dust, dirt and cat toys from under my refrigerator. It's a good thing too, as it was pretty bad. Did not clean behind it yet. Did not see any coils. Do not all fridges have them? Glad you cautioned to unplug before cleaning or I may not be writing this comment. :)
I cannot get a brush into the coils as my Amana has a cage around them. Mine is a top freezer model. I brushed the end of the coils and vacuumed--that got much of the dust, but much still remained. The cage prevent the vacuum nozzle from getting in deep enough...What to do? I used an electric Leaf blower on the lowest setting---all the dust was blown off. This is a messy operation as the dust blows into much of the kitchen. I cleaned it with the vacuum and a dust wand. One could tarp counters, sink, & ones table. It was messy but effective. If one does this every 3 months there is much less dust. Good idea to do it and then clean your kitchen afterwards.
I did this and it worked perfectly. Put fridge by back door of house and used my big shop vacuum in reverse (as a blower). All debris went on back porch. 👍
if you have an air compressor, it's great for blowing out the bottom--if you don't have an air compressor, get one, you will use it a lot--car tires, air nailers, cleaning...
@SeattlePioneer - indeed but unfortunately due to the terrible accordion style design on these vs. the typical parallel aligned style coils, these are not a 10 minute job as only the first wall of the "W" shaped accordion style are easily accessible. To access all the remaining one's behind that first coarse is where it becomes challenging with the usual $6 standard brush.
@SeattlePioneer Looks like those could be similar type. Ours is a Kenmore Coldspot circa 2017 model. If you look up part # W10904626, you might find images or a diagram for a better idea. Or check out the video by mars1952 "tool tip #33" which shows them more clearly. As for cleaning it, I do vacuum what I can from the front first. There's very few wide enough spots where I am able to remove some of the dust with a brush. Then I pull it away from the wall, remove the back cover, return to front, and make a "controlled mess" with short bursts of air from front to back with a small compressor, then vacuum that mess, then do the same from the rear and vacuum that mess, repeat until satisfactorily clean. It's a pain but gets the job done. Hope that helps. Better yet, hopefully you remain lucky enough not to come across the design.
One method that works very well but is quite messy is a leaf blower. Just remove the front grill and lower rear cover then vacuum as much out as you can with a shopvac. Then blast it out with leaf blower from front and back. Compressed air and a shopvac with blow option also works well...
Danni...to be fair, all leaf blowers & compressed air are doing is redistributing the dust. Eventually said dust is going to settle back on the coils AND the compressor - not to mention the mess created in the kitchen from the velocity of the blower. The whole idea of cleaning is to remove the dust not to redistribute, right? 🤔🤔🤔
Yes you can, BUT (and this is a BIG but) after uprighting it you MUST let it stand for at least an hour (longer would be safer) before plugging it back in. Failure to do so can destroy the compressor. The reason for this is that the compressor oil and refrigerant need to drain back down to the reservoir in and around the compressor and all the air bubbles need to rise out of the fluids. Otherwise the compressor will overheat and burn out. Now-a-day most units have an overheat cut-off that'll shut it down, but that might happen to late to prevent compressor damage. This is why you always see refrigerators transported and stored uupright.
As I'm mentioned toward the end of the video, I unplugged the unit before I reached in the backside to clean from there. From the front there is no danger of electrical shock.
The model number is listed in the video description. I have a stack of brushes in the shop and don't remember where each was purchased. Just Google "bottle brush" and I bet you'll get hundreds of suggestions.
So having a vertical wall of coils on the backside like they were a half centruy ago wasn't such a bad idea afterall.
You can almost hear the refrigerator say Ahhhhhhhhhh
:-)
Thank you so much for actually showing what tools you used to clean and how the brush got the stuff in the back! I was racking my brain trying to figure out how to get those back coils.
What is wrong with refrigerator engineers? They place the condenser coils in the most inaccessible place, making them impossible to clean. Condenser coils get hot and they place them on the bottom of your frige or freezer. Don't they know heat rises? Put them on the top, make them easy to clean.
Hey refrigerator designers here's a tip put an easy to replace air filter on your units.
I have worked on commercial refrigerators that have the compressor and coils on the top. I know not why this isn't done on residential appliances.
They put them on the bottom becuase the heat from the refrigeration cycle and fan unit evaporate the water from the defrost drain pan that results from melting the ice buidup during the defrost cycle which occurs every accumulated 12hrs (or so) of compressor runtime...
It's not impossible to clean. I clean mine 2x/year and it takes about ten minutes to do.
>
The air flow through the condenser coil is at a very low pressure differential. Put a filter in the air stream and it would markedly reduce air flow, and a filter would plug up faster than the coils.
This is a minor issue of maintenance, which as I say takes me about ten minutes twice/year. You just need to develop the minor skill needed to do the job.
There are refrigerators and freezers which don't have exterior coils subject to accumulating dust. On those, the coils are entirely behind the sheet metal of the refrigerator and not in any air flow. Instead, the sheet metal of the refrigerator conducts heat from the coils to the refrigerator sheet metal, and that metal heats up and transmits the heat through the sheet metal where room air absorbs that heat.
I have a freezer like that with no exterior coils on the condenser. But you still have to defrost the evaporator coils inside the freezer.
All of your comments are in compliance with minimum industry standards.
The vast majority of frigs have forced air across the condenser coils with the coils and air intake at the bottom of the unit. Making them magnets for dust. And nearly impossible to get to for cleaning.
Like you I have an old sears refrigerator and a freezer both with passive condenser cooling, almost zero maintenance. My kitchen fridge/freezer, the condenser coils (forced air) are on the top behind an easy to move louvers. Very little dust up there.
What I am saying is make a superior unit not one that breaks down or has to be replaced every few years.@@SeattlePioneer
Thank you. I have the same fridge and those coils behind the front are SO DIFFICULT to get at. I’ve tried multiple brushes. Even attached a straw to my vacuum trying to reach. I guess the engineers didn’t plan on ever cleaning the coils. 😖
Thanks for showing about the rear cleaning. Unfortunately, I'd been away for a long time and my fridge got sparse use. It looked every bit as bad as mine.
I only wish the warning about unplugging was at the start - but of course, most everyone forgets that. I may have missed it; if it was there! Thanks so much for the video, it helped me a lot. I'm hoping the compressor hasn't been too over worked. Ice cream has been being soft in the door.
Glad I could help
Nice job! Last time I made a bundle of straws with a rubber band and then shoved it inside the vac attachment and taped it on the end. The straws give another 10” or so in length & they get in between all the grid lines & sucks out the dust bunnies. Thanks for showing how to get the backside off. My freezer is struggling with the summer heat & I’m sure this is the issue. Thanks for sharing!!
Sounds like a good idea. I'll try it next time.
>
So what happened after you cleaned the coils?
And do you plan to clean them on a regular basis now?
It only takes me ten minutes to clean the bottom coils 2X/year. I just did that today, and found a moderate amount of dust to clean away. I'll do that again just before the summer season places major demands on refrigerator cleaning efficiency.
(Sigh . . . . ) I just love watching a man do maintenance around the house. Not sure if this one is married, but if he is, I bet his wife didn't even have to beg him for 6 months to do this. Why oh why do manufacturers make coils on the bottom. So much harder to clean.
🛠 Always ready to get it done! 🛠
Because manufacturers don’t want you to clean these condenser coils so the compressors overheat and burn up so you have to buy a new refrigerator
I was thinking use a jack and tilt it up from the front maybe 30 to 40 degrees and u can access everything
Well, you'd have to get it off its rear rollers first, and if you go to that kind trouble you might as well empty the whole thing and just lay it on its back. I wasn't willing to go that far.
It takes me ten minutes to clean the bottom coils on my refrigerator using a refrigerator coil cleaning brush you can buy at a hardware stor for $6-8, and using a vacuum cleaner to suck up the dust.
It's really not a difficult job with a little practice.
Jacking up the refrigerator as you describe sounds like a LOT more work to me!
Nice support tools for a vacuum.
Caveat, for those with wood floors, consider getting some Ramboard to roll the fridge on, they are heavy and the injection mold wheel seem will leave a nice groove in the wood.
Good tip!
I guess God knew what He was doing when we got a mucus system. Built in cleaner. I'm not super churchy but my mind wonders and connects things! Love to all!
Planned to relax and read for a while - but saw this video first and instead spent the time cleaning dust, dirt and cat toys from under my refrigerator. It's a good thing too, as it was pretty bad. Did not clean behind it yet. Did not see any coils. Do not all fridges have them? Glad you cautioned to unplug before cleaning or I may not be writing this comment. :)
I'm happy you were inspired. Yes, all refrigerators have coils somewhere.
You need a portable air compressor to blow all that dust out of them coils from back to front and then from front to back a few times.
That's too messy an aproach for my house, but I'v seen other do that.
I cannot get a brush into the coils as my Amana has a cage around them. Mine is a top freezer model. I brushed the end of the coils and vacuumed--that got much of the dust, but much still remained. The cage prevent the vacuum nozzle from getting in deep enough...What to do? I used an electric Leaf blower on the lowest setting---all the dust was blown off. This is a messy operation as the dust blows into much of the kitchen. I cleaned it with the vacuum and a dust wand. One could tarp counters, sink, & ones table. It was messy but effective. If one does this every 3 months there is much less dust. Good idea to do it and then clean your kitchen afterwards.
Thanks for the leaf blower suggestion!
...people don't clean their dyer vents either!
Undo all grill covers back and front ,pull fridge out and get your leaf blower out .Blow baby Blow 😅😅😅
Easy peezie
VACUM
Yeah, but that will send dust all through your house!
I did this and it worked perfectly. Put fridge by back door of house and used my big shop vacuum in reverse (as a blower). All debris went on back porch. 👍
i recomend to disconnect power before cleaning!!
Most definitely; as I mentioned @ 8:21
Wow that was pretty nasty!
Yep!
if you have an air compressor, it's great for blowing out the bottom--if you don't have an air compressor, get one, you will use it a lot--car tires, air nailers, cleaning...
I was unwilling to use it in the house and blast dust into the air.
@SeattlePioneer - indeed but unfortunately due to the terrible accordion style design on these vs. the typical parallel aligned style coils, these are not a 10 minute job as only the first wall of the "W" shaped accordion style are easily accessible. To access all the remaining one's behind that first coarse is where it becomes challenging with the usual $6 standard brush.
@SeattlePioneer Looks like those could be similar type. Ours is a Kenmore Coldspot circa 2017 model. If you look up part # W10904626, you might find images or a diagram for a better idea. Or check out the video by mars1952 "tool tip #33" which shows them more clearly.
As for cleaning it, I do vacuum what I can from the front first. There's very few wide enough spots where I am able to remove some of the dust with a brush. Then I pull it away from the wall, remove the back cover, return to front, and make a "controlled mess" with short bursts of air from front to back with a small compressor, then vacuum that mess, then do the same from the rear and vacuum that mess, repeat until satisfactorily clean. It's a pain but gets the job done. Hope that helps. Better yet, hopefully you remain lucky enough not to come across the design.
One method that works very well but is quite messy is a leaf blower. Just remove the front grill and lower rear cover then vacuum as much out as you can with a shopvac. Then blast it out with leaf blower from front and back. Compressed air and a shopvac with blow option also works well...
I think the blower ideas would produce a mess in my house I'd be cleaning up for weeks!
Danni...to be fair, all leaf blowers & compressed air are doing is redistributing the dust. Eventually said dust is going to settle back on the coils AND the compressor - not to mention the mess created in the kitchen from the velocity of the blower. The whole idea of cleaning is to remove the dust not to redistribute, right? 🤔🤔🤔
Thanks for all your help with this DIY appliance care! I noticed my fridge still had some bubble wrap/foam on the bottom of the coils is that normal?
Bubble wrap?! No, that shouldn't be left. Some units have styrofoam spacer blocks though, and those remain.
Cab a fridge be unplugged, turned on it's side to clean the coils?
Yes you can, BUT (and this is a BIG but) after uprighting it you MUST let it stand for at least an hour (longer would be safer) before plugging it back in. Failure to do so can destroy the compressor. The reason for this is that the compressor oil and refrigerant need to drain back down to the reservoir in and around the compressor and all the air bubbles need to rise out of the fluids. Otherwise the compressor will overheat and burn out. Now-a-day most units have an overheat cut-off that'll shut it down, but that might happen to late to prevent compressor damage.
This is why you always see refrigerators transported and stored uupright.
Do you need to take everything out of the fridge to move it?
I didn't need to in order to roll it forward a few feet. But I probably would have had too if it needed to be moved farther or turned.
Well did u turn of the refrigerator
As I'm mentioned toward the end of the video, I unplugged the unit before I reached in the backside to clean from there. From the front there is no danger of electrical shock.
I do it and not at all bad use slow speeds
What is your model number? Where did you get that small brush?
The model number is listed in the video description. I have a stack of brushes in the shop and don't remember where each was purchased. Just Google "bottle brush" and I bet you'll get hundreds of suggestions.
i used an air compresser on my coils alot easier mine looked like that it hasnt been done for yrs now it looks great under there....
That method usually leaves the kitchen saturated with all that dust! What happened when you did that?
If you wore a ballcap it would cover up your bald spot.
It's a must when outdoors!