Dometic Refrigerator inoperative

[Les_Balty]

We have been back & forth our Dometic fridge in our 2015 Montana 5er. It quit working properly in early June. The dealer replaced the cooling unit and it worked for 24 hours then back to temps in the 50s and chunky milk. It has been back to the dealer to have all sorts of baffling and insulation added as well as another fan. No rhyme or reason to its functioning. It will be good 30s to low 40s for a day or so, then back to 57 for 2 or three days. The problems commenced before Keystone warranty expired & a year to go on the Dometic before our service plan kicks in. Dometic blames Keystone. Keystone blames Dometic. I want a functional fridge!

[Les_Balty]

So... We took Donn0128's advice. We dumped the Dometic boat anchor (all it is good for) & had a new GE residential fridge installed by Mitch Holland of Infinity Upholstery of Nacogdoches. The Electrical work installing 1KW inverter & 2 deep cycle AGM batteries was done by Isaac Anderson at Old Town Motorcoach, also of Nacogdoches. We view this to be an elegant upgrade to our Montana. Severely disappointed in Keystone & Dometic's lame warranty service over a 3 month period though happy with our improvement.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

After the final cooling unit in my rig did the same - operated for about 2 weeks then failed to cool. But resumed normal operation after sitting 48 hours unfired I trashed the Norcold. But Sal and I at KOOL FUN an absorbsion WD and cooling unit rebuilder in Inwindale CA chopped open the new cooling unit at my expense. The 3rd warranty replacement unit.

We found welding slag inside the tubing. About a thimble full that escaped being evacuated upon depressurization of the unit. This was the autumn after the great events on the Yucatan peninsula.

Bottom line: Sal theorized the slag percolated upward slow but sure and managed to plug an orifice. A tech rep from Norcold examimed the refrigerator and my rig. He said nothing was done incorrectly on the install. This is absolutely aside the unit temperature "issues" I experienced for four months. When I moved to San Cristobal de Las Casas elevation 7,000 ft the refrigerator temp dropped to acceptable level. But it did not stop nor did anything else stop the 2 week periods of operation failure with the original nor THREE NEW Norcold cooling unit replacements. The tech supervised the last install.

[Chris_Bryant]

If you are working with Dometic, maybe you could talk them in to a new DMC compressor model, which would be a direct swap out, same door panels, built for travel and cabinet installation- no inverter required.

[Denny___Jami]

A easy way to figure out if it's the cooling unit or the control is to take the electric heater wires and wire it directly to 120 volts. If the unit cools properly it's a control problem if it doesn't it's the cooling unit. If when the dealer changed out the cooling unit and didn't seal around the outside area where the cooling cools are the unit will not work like it should.

Denny

[Les_Balty]

Have decided to take donn0128 advice. If Keystone or Dometic want to be reasonable & pony up a little $ that would be good. We have been dinking around with this thing for 3 months now. Replace it & go happy is great advice. More than a little disappointed with these RV equipment manufacturers though. Will let you know if they make good on their guarantees, but not looking back.

[Les_Balty]

Have decided to take donn0128 advice. If Keystone or Dometic want to be reasonable & pony up a little $ that would be good. We have been dinking around with this thing for 3 months now. Replace it & go happy is great advice. More than a little disappointed with these RV equipment manufacturers though. Will let you know if they make good on their guarantees, but not looking back.

[Bird_Freak]

donn0128 wrote:

dougrainer wrote:

donn0128 wrote:
Dump it, install a residental refer and go happy.

You really think this helps anyone??????????? Doug

Yea, I do. Makes perfect sense. There are numerous horror stories concerning absorbition refers that it makes sense if Keystone refuses to fix it, and Dometic cant figure it out.

That will not work for everyone. I know it would not for us.

[Les_Balty]

Same for LP or electric. No correlation to outside temperature. All baffling & insulation installed. Genuinely considering dumping it for a residential & inverter. It did however work fine for 11 months.
Thanks for the comments!

[donn0128]

dougrainer wrote:

donn0128 wrote:
Dump it, install a residental refer and go happy.

You really think this helps anyone??????????? Doug

Yea, I do. Makes perfect sense. There are numerous horror stories concerning absorbition refers that it makes sense if Keystone refuses to fix it, and Dometic cant figure it out.

[dougrainer]

1. Is this refer in a slide room?
2. Has the LP pressure been checked?
3. What is the AC line voltage if running on 120 volts? Doug

[dougrainer]

donn0128 wrote:
Dump it, install a residental refer and go happy.

You really think this helps anyone??????????? Doug

[beemerphile1]

Is this with all power sources or only one?

[midnightsadie]

X2 I found a loose wire on mine one time installers just don,t do it right.

[Old-Biscuit]

Dometic is blaming Keystone because Keystone is at fault.......ie: dealer having to install baffling/insulation/fan

Majority of RV Fridge lack of cooling issues are due to RV MFGs failing to properly install the fridge in the first place.
Dometic (and Norcold -- Atwood) have specific requirements concerning clearances, baffles, fan ----air flow---draft, insulation.
When RV MFG. fails to follow those requirements the fridge WILL have cooling issues and then they end up being blamed for being junk.

Just do a goggle search for 'Dometic XXXX (model number)Installation Instructions' and see the specific requirements.
Then show dealer and Keystone representative that it wasn't followed as evidenced by one NEW cooling unit failure, another cooling unit failure, baffling/insulation/fan added and STILL cooling unit failure

Or post which model you have?