Light in a singled door NDR 1062 Dometic Fridge

I had a similar problem, and just fixed my broken switch (at least temporarily). My switch could be disassembled by prying apart the case of it once it was removed; there are a couple of melted plastic rivet pieces that hold the case together. Once that's done, it's pretty straightforward to disassemble and clean the contact pieces.

The two external contacts form hooks internally, and the rotating plunger piece has a short round bar/wire through it that swings up into the hooks to complete the circuit. In my switch, at least, the problem was crud and corrosion on these contacting parts. Scrubbing them in soap and water and then burnishing them with baking soda cleaned them up nicely. The switch unit seemed to hold together even with the rivet bits not properly upset, though if it starts coming apart, I think I can secure it with superglue or plastic-friendly epoxy or something similar.

Time will tell how permanent a fix this is. Given the cost and aggravation of looking up and ordering a replacement switch, I'm willing to give it a try. If it doesn't last well, I think I'll swap my light over to an LED and rig up a magnet and a reed switch to turn it on and off.. They'll have to be a transistor or something to do the actual switching, both because reed switches have low current ratings and because they are usually normally open, and close when the magnet is nearby—so a magnet on the door would cause the light to turn on when the door is closed without a transistor or something to invert the logic.

A LED would be a good idea as I am sure the switch burned up due to the amount of current being switched on and off frequently. However the light bulb is also used as the heat source when you turn on the low ambient switch so a LED would eliminate that feature.

The fridge light is a good candidate for LED replacement since the heat released must be pumped away by the cooling system at considerable energy cost. I have two of the 40 watt equivalent LED bulbs in our home fridge but haven't noticed any appropriate for the RV fridge.

It is a small piece of plastic, about 1/8 inch by 1 inch. I don't remember what I had to do to get them back. You might be able to get the correct diameter replacements from your local auto parts store but they probably won't be white.

Thanks Roger for your information. Is it easy to retrieve the rivets to reuse? I just don't want to take it apart and find I can't put it back together again. Then the whole mechanism will be hanging from the light wires?

Toban

Mine did the same thing. I took it apart to find that the switch itself was the problem. Easy fix, just replace the switch (part # 3850456017). The only problem was the switch costs over $25. You can remove the light by pushing the center of the rivets up thru them then pull the whole light down. Then you can retrieve the center of the rivet to reuse or replace the rivet (#0165521030).

We learned to get along without the light. You can also use the low ambient switch to turn on the light.