NDA1402 error 13

[JimM68]

I'm just gonna hafta kill this thing. Every time I get it behaving, something else... 😞

Error 13 came up today. Open water drain heater in the freezer. Not surprising, as I abuse it pretty bad everytime I have to pull it apart to manually defrost the freezer.

Question is, will it continue to cool normally with this error displayed?

[jerseyjim]

"Everybody knows....." where'd that come from? Maybe "biased" comes from someone else.
AND....BTW....since the 1980s, with TT (2) and a motorhome (1)...ALL came with Dometic fridges....and never had a problem anywhere with any of them. I might think the vast majority of RV owners never had a problem with them. ((Destruction of one fridge by a nearby lightening strike doesn't count.))

[jwmII]

dougrainer wrote:

jwmII wrote:
It's interesting to hear the different problems people have had with their Dometic and Norcold absorption refrigerators over the past 25 years. Both manufacturers continually shoot themselves in the foot with their poor performing, poor quality, high priced, high maintenance equipment, forcing the customer to go to house hold type refrigerators where there is virtually no problem and nearly 100 % satisfaction with performance and dependability. And after all of these years of substandard performance in every way they are still in business and selling their junk to the RV industry who in turn shoves their junk out the door to the consumer. Once again, 25 years at least of this, and still in business. Just AMAZING.

What is amazing is someone like YOU, that has no basis for your post. I have a Basis. We have at least 2 residentials to be repaired under warranty a month and we are a medium size Dealership. READ Consumer Reports and see their ratings for Residential refers. They ALL have problems and failures, just like RV refers. The OP's problem, was, he was trying to do the work with NO knowledge or understanding of the Dometic refer and controls. He was able to muddle thru and finally get his refer repaired. BUT NOT, because there was a BIG problem, just his inexperience and trying to do the work himself. Doug

What is even more amazing is someone like YOU saying I have no basis for my post . I have over thirty years in this business dealing with this junk along with the home based product which certainly does have its problems but no where near the problems posed by the dometic or Norcold product. It doesn't matter whether the person was inexperienced and trying to fix something he did not know about. The fact is that he should not have to be putting up with substandard performance of that product. Guys like you are as much a part of the problem in dealing with this garbage as the people who built it and then get you to do their bidding for them in foisting it off on the public. How many of the vapor absorption product are the cause of fires that caused the total destruction or totaling out of RVs versus house hold units that burned down homes?? Regarding your comments on Consumer Reports. Everybody knows they are biased in their reporting, especially on their household reports. Shame on you!! I quit selling vapor absorption and deal only in the house hold product for RVs. And at this time am moving away from all RV work.

[jwmII]

dougrainer wrote:

jwmII wrote:
It's interesting to hear the different problems people have had with their Dometic and Norcold absorption refrigerators over the past 25 years. Both manufacturers continually shoot themselves in the foot with their poor performing, poor quality, high priced, high maintenance equipment, forcing the customer to go to house hold type refrigerators where there is virtually no problem and nearly 100 % satisfaction with performance and dependability. And after all of these years of substandard performance in every way they are still in business and selling their junk to the RV industry who in turn shoves their junk out the door to the consumer. Once again, 25 years at least of this, and still in business. Just AMAZING.

What is amazing is someone like YOU, that has no basis for your post. I have a Basis. We have at least 2 residentials to be repaired under warranty a month and we are a medium size Dealership. READ Consumer Reports and see their ratings for Residential refers. They ALL have problems and failures, just like RV refers. The OP's problem, was, he was trying to do the work with NO knowledge or understanding of the Dometic refer and controls. He was able to muddle thru and finally get his refer repaired. BUT NOT, because there was a BIG problem, just his inexperience and trying to do the work himself. Doug

What is even more amazing is someone like YOU saying I have no basis for my post . I have over thirty years in this business dealing with this junk along with the home based product which certainly does have its problems but no where near the problems posed by the dometic or Norcold product. It doesn't matter whether the person was inexperienced and trying to fix something he did not know about. The fact is that he should not have to be putting up with substandard performance of that product. Guys like you are as much a part of the problem in dealing with this garbage as the people who built it and then get you to do their bidding for them in foisting it off on the public. How many of the vapor absorption product are the cause of fires that caused the total destruction or totaling out of RVs versus house hold units that burned down homes?? Regarding your comments on Consumer Reports. Everybody knows they are biased in their reporting, especially on their household reports. Shame on you!!

[JimM68]

dougrainer wrote:
The OP's problem, was, he was trying to do the work with NO knowledge or understanding of the Dometic refer and controls. He was able to muddle thru and finally get his refer repaired. BUT NOT, because there was a BIG problem, just his inexperience and trying to do the work himself. Doug

I did have a buncha help from Doug.

[dougrainer]

jwmII wrote:
It's interesting to hear the different problems people have had with their Dometic and Norcold absorption refrigerators over the past 25 years. Both manufacturers continually shoot themselves in the foot with their poor performing, poor quality, high priced, high maintenance equipment, forcing the customer to go to house hold type refrigerators where there is virtually no problem and nearly 100 % satisfaction with performance and dependability. And after all of these years of substandard performance in every way they are still in business and selling their junk to the RV industry who in turn shoves their junk out the door to the consumer. Once again, 25 years at least of this, and still in business. Just AMAZING.

What is amazing is someone like YOU, that has no basis for your post. I have a Basis. We have at least 2 residentials to be repaired under warranty a month and we are a medium size Dealership. READ Consumer Reports and see their ratings for Residential refers. They ALL have problems and failures, just like RV refers. The OP's problem, was, he was trying to do the work with NO knowledge or understanding of the Dometic refer and controls. He was able to muddle thru and finally get his refer repaired. BUT NOT, because there was a BIG problem, just his inexperience and trying to do the work himself. Doug

[jwmII]

It's interesting to hear the different problems people have had with their Dometic and Norcold absorption refrigerators over the past 25 years. Both manufacturers continually shoot themselves in the foot with their poor performing, poor quality, high priced, high maintenance equipment, forcing the customer to go to house hold type refrigerators where there is virtually no problem and nearly 100 % satisfaction with performance and dependability. And after all of these years of substandard performance in every way they are still in business and selling their junk to the RV industry who in turn shoves their junk out the door to the consumer. Once again, 25 years at least of this, and still in business. Just AMAZING.

[jerseyjim]

Boy....never had ANY kind of problem like this in all my years of RVing. Maybe I'm lucky? Discounting my first... a popup with an ICE box.....my first TT was a used Scotty 22 footer, bought in 1985 or 1986. Dometic, electric/gas with a manual switch-over. Then a 1990 TT (Dutchman 22 footer, bought new)had a Dometic with an "auto" switch feature, and now my current motorhome, also Dometic with the automatic switch-over.
Defrost? Never any problem. Takes an afternoon. Just use what's in the fridge as much as possible, fill the ice chest with ice, put whatever is in the freezer into the ice chest...turn the fridge off...wait a couple hours (depending on the temperature, clean up any melted water in the freezer, turn it back on, give it a couple hours to start getting cold, put the food, etc.back in the freezer (and fridge)take wifeepoo out to a nice dinner, and by the time you get back...all's well.

Simply sounds like an incredible case of tinkeritis to me...but glad the OP has it under control.

[JimM68]

19 days down the road, looking good. according to the display, freezer is 3, fridge 33.
Analog thermometer in the freezer says minus 7.
She's making lots of ice, and best of all, she is defrosting normally. No ice buildup in the freezer or the fridge.

[JimM68]

Regular milk froze too... lol.

Sunday, I replaced the thermisters in the freezer, and defrosted the freezer, which had again turned into a solid block of ice.
No error codes now. Unit recovered fairly quickly.

Now on Thursday, fridge is 33, freezer is 7. Did a travel day Monday, unit did not heat up terribly as it has in the past.
Wish I could get it as cold as I know it can, but it is set on 5 and giving me what it will...

[JimM68]

Thermister didn't come in today.

I did loosen up the fridge and pull it into the bus about 5 inches, got enough room to get behind thru the upper wall vent and replace the drain hose. I used clear vinyl, and put a big loop in the bottom as a trap.


Also took the hair dryer to the fridge fins, icing up pretty good.


Unit is still very cold. Ice cream is hard, making ice big time. Regular milk is fine but wife's almond milk was a block of ice this morning.

Thermister should come in tomorrow. Saturday will be another travel day, hopefully I'll get it done friday, but may hold off till we settle somewhere.

[dougrainer]

Analog round thermometers with metal probes are calibrated by immersing in a glass of Icewater. The Icewater will be 32 degrees. You turn the adjustment nut until the needle reads 32 degrees. Doug

[JimM68]

Thanks for sticking with me Doug.

I haven't ordered the thermister yet, moving day tomorrow and still haven't figured out where we're going...lol.

I have analog thermometers in both boxes, freezer shows minus 5, fridge 18. Accuracy of my thermometers is questionable, but the ice cream is hard, the milk is not.

Fridge is icing up some, freezer is not. Stable until I get the part, I think.

[dougrainer]

JimM68 wrote:

dougrainer wrote:
I do not know how you are testing the freezer temp. The freezer temp should be BELOW 10 degrees. Doug

By looking at the little red numbers on the fridges display...

Use a Digital thermometer and get the actual freezer interior temp for a correct reading. I think you are correct---the freezer thermistor is defective. Doug

[JimM68]

Stabilized for now at least.

The thermister assemblies are identical looking, but probably not identical functioning.

Both have 2 2 wire thermisters (one for fin temp, 1 for air temp) and a 4 pin connector. The fridge and freezer connectors are identical.

I swapped the connectors on the control board, connecting the fridge sensors to the freezer side of the board and vice versa.

The problem moved to the fridge side, a fin reading of "HI"
Connected this way, the logic was happy, and the freezer fans turned on with the door closed.

I put em back where they belonged, and managed to get the freezer side connector installed upside down, at least partially. So now I have a fin reading of 14, and an air reading of "HI" which satisfies the logic and turns on the fans.

After running all day with the fans going, my analog temp gauge in the freezer says 5, and the frost that was starting to form on the fins has vanished.

I'll need to buy a thermister freezer 3850680020, $119.95 @ Dyersonline.com, same place I got the other parts.

And then figure out how to replace it. I'll be able to get at where it exits the box through the upper vent (fridge is in a slide) and then snake the wire down to the board somehow.

Alternatively, google hit something called "snip-the-tip.com" which seems to be some sort of repair kit that doesn't require quite as much "doing", but seems a little "iffy" to me. Anyone have any experience with this thing?