Dometic fridge too cold

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EriikK

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Joined
Apr 13, 2014
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Location
Ann Arbor MI
Cold beer is good, but when you pop the top and tip it up... and all you get is a little slush, this is a problem.  :D
And when the veggies in the bottom bin are frozen too, She Who Must Be Obeyed says This Must Be Fixed. :D

This RV is brand new to us, so I read the manual (RTFM!)  The manual makes no mention of any thermostat or adjustment for the fridge, and indeed when I look around I can't see any.  What to do?

This is our first RV, a 2014 Gray Wolf 25RR with a Dometic 6.? fridge.  We ran it on propane while traveling and all was well.  We plugged into shore power on arrival, the fridge switched over, and the next day we had this issue.  It stayed this way the whole time we were plugged in.

Yes it's under warranty, but I suspect that if I get a little education from y'all before I call the dealer, things will go better.  ;) Thanks for your help!





 
 
On the fins in the in the back of the frig you will see a plastic piece attached to one of the fins.  This is your temp control, slide it down the fin a little bit and watch your temp. ( get a frig thermometer)  This should help control your problem.  One way I found to remember this is if you go down as in down south you get warmer,  go up as in up north( Minnesota) you get colder.  Some refrigs have a button on the control panel labeled 1 thru 5,  1 is the warmest setting and 5 the coldest.  My houseboat frig was this way, but I don't think newer frigs have this control.
 
One of the shortcomings of an RV absorption fridge is that it does not cool evenly inside. There is no internal fan to distribute the chilled air inside, so temps can vary widely and the placement of stuff on the shelves can cause one portion of the interior to be very cold while another is relatively warm. Differences of 10 degrees are not unusual. Try moving the contents around.

What specific model is the fridge? The Dometic RM2604 & 2804 have a known failure mode that affects electric cooling only. I think those have separate thermostats for electric and gas.

Moving the thermister (the temp sensor on the fins) affects both gas and LP modes equally, so might not be the answer if yours is good in one mode but freezes in the other.
 
I had that problem,I bought a little battery operated fan from rv dealer. The fan is just right to circulate the air around in ref. The fan is for that purpose.it measures about 3 x 3 inches.also helps cool ref off quicker on start ups.worked well for me.Good luck..
 
Also,on the problem of slush in the beer,I was told one time if you shake it up before opening that will get rid of slush.lol
 
Ron2012 said:
Also,on the problem of slush in the beer,I was told one time if you shake it up before opening that will get rid of slush.lol
Click to expand...
Yes.  Shaking it will get rid of the slush. :) :)
 
"Drinking it will also get rid of the slush."

Yes, but it's too slow.  After a long sweaty day of riding single-track on the motorcycle, I was about ready to chew open the d@mn can when the cold beer wouldn't come out.

Thanks for the advice.  I will find the sensor on the fins, and I will find the exact model number.  It's possible this problem would occur when running on propane too, but we didn't leave it on gas long enough to find out. 

So when it's running on electric, does it have a compressor and run the normal refrigeration thermodynamic cycle?  Or is the electric just supplying heat to the adsorption cycle like the gas does?  Just curious since I'm in the heat pump business.

 
The electric supplies heat instead of propane.  You have a closed system, so applied heat will want to expand the gases.  In a closed system if the gases can't expand they then get compressed.  This produces the same process that a compressor would do in a normal refrig.
 
That's really odd there is no controls on the face of the fridge that control temp.  ??? I would loook over at the manufactures web site for a manual for your fridge there has to be a proper control for temperature. I've got a NorCold fridge and it got a temp select button that goes from one to nine and nine being coldest setting. Even back in my old 1976 Dodge motorhome had a Dometic fridge with a twist knob control inside the fridge. So I would highly suggest looking up your fridge at the manufactures web site.

http://www.dometic.com/enus/Americas/USA/RV-Products/Manuals-and-Instructions2/
 
Have to agree with Mopar Man,there has to be thrmostatic control some where to control temp. After almost 40 years in heat&air business ,you for sure have to control temperture on any refigeration system.
 
Molaker said:
Yes.  Shaking it will get rid of the slush. :) :)
Click to expand...
I can joke with the best of them, but when you're talking about shaking beer you're also talking about wasting it. THAT'S NOT FUNNY!!
 
I see this is an old thread, but the fact is that the new Dometic fridges (like the one in my 2018 Airstream) have no user control for temperature. I find that odd as many others do. I am working with Dometic to get some kind of answer to stuff freezing. I know there is a circuit board in the fridge that does this control. I will post what I find out but it is taking some time to get answers.
 
rjones1138 said:
I see this is an old thread, but the fact is that the new Dometic fridges (like the one in my 2018 Airstream) have no user control for temperature. I find that odd as many others do. I am working with Dometic to get some kind of answer to stuff freezing. I know there is a circuit board in the fridge that does this control. I will post what I find out but it is taking some time to get answers.
Click to expand...

Why don't you start your own thread under Tech Talk.
 
Checking in four years after I started this thread.  I found the sensor on the clip, on the fins at the back of the fridge.  Moved it (down I think) until the temperature was more reasonable.  It took some experimenting.  Also we now pay attention to not overloading the fridge, leave enough room for air to circulate via convection.

The result is that this problem has not come back in four years of camping.  I was afraid I'd have to be adjusting it all the time but that is not the case.  We set it four years ago and forget it.  The freezer will freeze ice consistently, and the fridge keeps things cold but not frozen.  I'll call that success. 

Details:
Yes really, our fridge has no temperature control knob or button, I think that's common nowadays.  And we are not very careful about leveling the unit side to side.  Sometimes we put boards under the wheels but mostly we shrug and say "we're here, it's good."  We're almost always wild camping, running on propane with no electric hookup, so it's possible there is an electric-only problem that we just don't care about anymore.







 

 
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