Fridge/Kitchen Problems

[turner46]

Ive been living in my new Keystone Alpine 3700 RE for about a month and a half now. Yesterday I went to grab something out of the freezer and noticed it wasnt running. Luckily I didnt have too much in the fridge and freezer. I refilled my propane bottles tonight and turned my fridge back on and so far the freezer is very cold but I dont think the fridge is working.

Later on I noticed my laptop battery going low when I was plugged into the kitchen Ive been plugged into for a month and a half now, I then checked other plugs and realized all 4 outlets in the kitchen dont work.

Also now the fridge/freezer starts humming every so often.

[Geoffwhite18]

My fridge is hooked up to a gfi outlet right in front of the front door. When little kids come in the house and see buttons they end up pushing the test button and cutting power to the fridge. Check your gfi s and see if one is tripped.

[JRTJH]

Geoffwhite18 is right(shore power) and probably a GFI as well are your most likely problem. Double check the circuit breakers to make sure you have 110VAC to the refrigerator plug on the outside behind the lower referigerator vent. The easiest way to check is to take a table lamp or other small 110VAC appliance and just unplug the refrigerator and plug in the lamp. If it turns on, you have power. If you don't have power, start looking for the GFI to reset.

There is (at least there was) a problem with some Dometic refrigerators. They didn't cool once they reached operating temperature. In other words, they would cool and things were good, but when the refrigerator started warming up, the reefer would start to cool again but not shut off when it reached max cooling. That meant that it would overheat and stop cooling.... Happened to mine about 4 or 5 weeks after we bought it. Dometic replaced the cooling unit and all has been good since then.

As for the "humming" you hear. that's the cooling fan for the outside cooling unit. It is actually a small computer fan that is located just below or just above the top of the cooling unit outside the rear of the box. It's about the same height as the bottom shelf of the freezer.

[SteveC7010]

Can't help with the propane; that's just one of those things that you have to keep a close eye on all the time.

There are two basic electric systems in the trailer: 110vac and 12vdc. The 110vac has standard circuit breakers just like a home. It also has some GFCI outlets that are chained to other outlets. If a breaker or GFCI trips, you'll have no power, same as in a home. You troubleshoot it the same way. This gets discussed a lot here and on other RV forums. Experienced RVer's know where the breakers and GFCI's are located and will check them first if there is a problem on the 110vac side.

The 110vac system charges the battery via the converter. If you are hooked up to shore power, the converter can also power the 12vdc fixtures in the trailer along with the battery. If the fridge is set to Gas only, loss of 12vdc because of a rundown battery will shut it down. In gas mode, the fridge needs a bit of 12vdc to run its circuits.

There is fan on the backside of the fridge that is connected to a thermocouple. If the cooling fins on the back get too warm, the fan comes on and moves air through the fins to cool them. We're all getting into warmer weather now so this is normal. You can cut the noise level by keeping the fan clean and free of dirt. (There is a thread here somewhere that I posted in last fall about accessing and cleaning that fan.)

It takes anywhere from 12 to 24 hours for the fridges to get down to standard operating temps. If the freezer is getting cold, the fridge part will too as they are both cooled by the same circulator.

Also, if you have a tripped GFCI, the fridge may be on that circuit. If you have the fridge set to Auto, it will switch to Gas. Then, if the propane is out or there's no 12vdc, it will shut down.

[turner46]

Thanks everyone, yeah it must be a tripped circuit, I went outside and tried plugging in my cell phone and it didnt read it just like my outlets in the kitchen, I now just have to find where to reset it, I shall do that in the morning when there is light, Again thanks again everyone for the great and timely help.

[geo]

Last autumn, I posted a problem I had with the shore power cable. The wires had come loose in the cable (female) plug attached to the Alpine. One hot lead (red wire) was partially out of the lug and the neutral wire was totally out. Besides the obvious fireworks that could (and thankfully didn't) happen, it also "killed" one half of the Alpine's electricaly - the same half as yours with the refrigerator, convertor, etc. So, if you don't find the GFCI plugs are tripped, and you don't find the circuit breakers tripped, and your batteries are discharged . . . unplug the shore power cable from the pedistal first! Then unplug it from the Alpine and check the internal connections of the power cord at both plug ends.

See http://www.keystonerv.org/forums/showthread.php?t=4567

Ron