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Old 05-09-2021, 05:28 PM   #1
TazMcren
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Dometic Fridge Not Cooling

Good evening folks. I have a 2018 Cougar 310RLS with a Dometic RM1350SLMX fridge that does not on electric or propane. The trailer is plugged in to my house. We are heading out Tuesday for a 2 week trip. When we turned the fridge on Auto it went to electric. After a few hours we noticed that it has not cooled at all. I switched it to LPG, the burner lite up but again not cooling. Propane tank is full.

The fridge has power (light comes on when you open the door) but just does not cool. Is there a fuse that may be blown that controls the cooling of the fridge?

I'm no electrician but do have limited knowledge.

Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks all.
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Old 05-09-2021, 05:39 PM   #2
chuckster57
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If the fridge is on, go outside and remove the bottom access panel. GENTLY touch the chimney, it will be HOT!! If it is, then move to the left and feel the rolls of coils. They should be warm to the touch. It will take about an hour to feel heat in the coils. IF you see ANY yellow powder, DONT TOUCH, and unfortunately your cooling unit has failed.
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Old 05-09-2021, 05:59 PM   #3
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Originally Posted by TazMcren View Post
Good evening folks. I have a 2018 Cougar 310RLS with a Dometic RM1350SLMX fridge that does not on electric or propane. The trailer is plugged in to my house. We are heading out Tuesday for a 2 week trip. When we turned the fridge on Auto it went to electric. After a few hours we noticed that it has not cooled at all. I switched it to LPG, the burner lite up but again not cooling. Propane tank is full.

The fridge has power (light comes on when you open the door) but just does not cool. Is there a fuse that may be blown that controls the cooling of the fridge?

I'm no electrician but do have limited knowledge.

Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks all.
The fact that the inside light comes on puts a kink in my thinking so let's ignore that for a moment. At the back of your fridge, on the outside, at the bottom there is white plastic 4-connerter block about 1inch square. On one side there is pos and neg coming FROM the fuse/circuit breaker panel. Check that with your DVM and make sure 12v is "coming INTO" the fridge at that point.

On the opposite side from those two wires are pos and negative that should "go out" and feed your fridge. The negative probably goes to a screw with about 6+ negative ground wires. Not much to check there. But, from the white block positive position, the positive 12+ takes a journey. First it goes to a sort of round thermal fuse on the chimney stack of the fridge. If the chimeny over heats, the fuse opens. It may or may not have a reset button in the middle of it. Check to see if you have 12+ on both sides of that fuse. The chimney gets hot regardless if you're using propane or 120vac. It just shouldn't get TOO HOT.

If 12+ is successfully passing through it, the juice then goes to another thermal fuse. Follow that red wire and it should come to a place where its covered with a sort of cloth like flexible fiberglass straw, and it's folded under a soft piece of metal on the back of the fridge. Pry that open, pull the wire free, slide down the fiberglass fabric straw. You'll see another thermal fuse. When this one blows it is not resettable, You have to buy a new one. They're cheap on Amazon. Check again with your DVM and make sure you have 12+ coming out of that thermal fuse. That red wire then, finally, goes to the circuit board on the back of the fridge to power the fridge. The fact that the light comes on inside makes me think the two thermal fuses are okay, but I would check them anyway.

On the back of the fridge, take the cover off the back of the circuit board. You should NOT need to remove the screw you see at the top or bottom. Look closely at the the left and right sides of the cover. You can stick a flat screwdriver into each one and sort of pop the cover off. Either on the circuit board, or sort of in front of it, there will likely be two small glass fuses. If there are, check both of those to be sure they're not blown.

I think your fridge is too new to have leaked out the ammonia, if it did you'd see a ton of bright yellow talcum like powder all over everything on the back of the fridge.

I'm at a loss to suggest anything more. Maybe some other folks will have more ideas.

Edit: some guy named Occum said something about trying the easiest thing first. Make sure the temperature setting thermister inside the fridge is properly located and not just hanging down. It should be on the first or second cooling fin from the right inside the fridge. It should be slid all the way to the top to make the fridge cold. If its low on the fin or hanging even lower, the fridge will not chill.

Note that it's usually a white covered wire. When you look at the circuit board on the outside of the fridge (see above) make sure that same white wire is still properly plugged into the circuit board. If the circuit board doesn't get a reading from it, the board won't do it's thing and chill your fridge.
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Old 05-09-2021, 07:34 PM   #4
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Thanks for the quick response Chuckster. The chimney is luke warm and the coils are cold. I removed the outside panel to the freezer part of the fridge and the coils were hot (29.5C)
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Old 05-09-2021, 07:53 PM   #5
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Thanks Mike for your quick response. There is 12v coming from the whit plastic connecter. There is 12v on both sides of the reset button on the chimney. I noticed that the reset button does not have a 'spring release' feel to it. Is this normal? I traced the red wire to the top of the fridge where I noticed the freezer coils were hot (29.5C) Both fuses of the circuit board OK. The thermister is screwed to the top shelf near the fins. It is not the style where it slides up or down. The white termister wire is connected tight in the circuit board.
I'll have to see if I can get a mobile tech tomorrow or toss the fridge on the front lawn and put a temp. one in...lol.
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Old 05-09-2021, 09:00 PM   #6
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Thanks Mike for your quick response. There is 12v coming from the whit plastic connecter. There is 12v on both sides of the reset button on the chimney. I noticed that the reset button does not have a 'spring release' feel to it. Is this normal? I traced the red wire to the top of the fridge where I noticed the freezer coils were hot (29.5C) Both fuses of the circuit board OK. The thermister is screwed to the top shelf near the fins. It is not the style where it slides up or down. The white termister wire is connected tight in the circuit board.
I'll have to see if I can get a mobile tech tomorrow or toss the fridge on the front lawn and put a temp. one in...lol.
Sorry to hear none of that helped solve it. Let us know what the mobile tech says.

BTW, and if I recall right, I don't think the reset button feels springy until it trips from too high heat. Then spring like pressure pushes it out and you feel the spring like pressure pushing it back down to reset it.
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Old 05-10-2021, 06:22 AM   #7
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Thanks Mike, at least it sounds like the reset button is OK as well. I will let you know what the Tech finds, if I can get one.
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Old 05-10-2021, 09:38 AM   #8
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The dometic rm1350 series are notorious for having bad cooling units.
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Old 05-10-2021, 10:12 AM   #9
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The dometic rm1350 series are notorious for having bad cooling units.
Where did you get that information?
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Old 05-10-2021, 10:22 AM   #10
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I owned one and after a lot of research into why it wasn't cooling that is what I found out. Fortunately mine was still under warranty and was replaced.
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Old 05-10-2021, 10:25 AM   #11
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I was wondering, because I’ve been working on RVs for over a decade and have had very few cooling unit failures. IIRC some years back Dometic did have a batch of bad cooling units, I only personally saw 2.
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Old 05-10-2021, 04:30 PM   #12
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FOLLOW UP- Tech inspected fridge and is 99 % sure it is not cooling because of a blockage. Strange as I NEVER run the fridge when it's not level. Anyone know how to do an enema on a Dometic?
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Old 05-10-2021, 04:45 PM   #13
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I have heard of taking it out, turn it upside down for a day or two.
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Old 05-10-2021, 04:47 PM   #14
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That is the same situation that I had. After much research and adding extra vent fans dometic agreed it was a bad cooling unit and replaced the refrigerator. You can search this forum and others and find that this is a common problem with this model.
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Old 05-10-2021, 05:04 PM   #15
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The dometic rm1350 series are notorious for having bad cooling units.
Actually the RM1350 has worked like a champ in my 2014 Alpine since day one.

I have seen very few posts on issues with this unit over the years other than some having the fridge stay cold enough in extreme hot weather.

Ours maintains temps at 34 to 38 degrees .. 38 on a 100 plus degree day with sun baking the side that fridge is on…
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Old 05-10-2021, 07:30 PM   #16
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FOLLOW UP- Tech inspected fridge and is 99 % sure it is not cooling because of a blockage. Strange as I NEVER run the fridge when it's not level. Anyone know how to do an enema on a Dometic?
Well that's definitely a bummer. Especially happening right before your 2 week trip. Given that the only trick is taking it completely out to turn it upside down, maybe a second opinion from another RV tech might be worth it.

I don't know what kind of camping you do, or if you have solar, or what kind of battery bank you have, but I recommend looking at what they call a residential fridge that is powered by a 12vdc compressor. Some styles of camping sort of require you keep propane powered fridge as an option. Other styles of camping could give up the propane sourced evaporative cooling for the residential compressor style fridge. I think if our fridge ever dies I'll replace it with a 12vdc compressor fridge.
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Old 05-12-2021, 12:38 PM   #17
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Hey Mike. Sure was deflating but in the bright side it we noticed it before loading up the fridge. My wife and I had that discussion and would tend to lean towards changing to 12vdc but we have an extended warranty so Keystone or Dometic will pay. We do not dry camp (DW needs full power) or have any solar or generator.
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Old 05-12-2021, 12:53 PM   #18
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Taz, OK... you paid a pro tech to come out and diagnose. He said the refrigerator was "blocked". Did he say what was blocked or what it would take to fix it? Why not just say, "I don't know what the heck is wrong" and take your payment and leave?
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Old 05-12-2021, 01:19 PM   #19
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When I was having Dometic issues in a previous 5th I wondered about this:
https://www.arprv.com/amish-cooling-unit.php
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Old 05-12-2021, 01:24 PM   #20
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Yes it's blocked on the return. He explained how the gases etc. start from the bottom and travel upward in a circle then downward to complete the cycle. Two options. Remove the fridge and turn it upside down for a few hours then reinstall fridge. If this doesn't work then the gases were over cooked. The cooling system would need to be replaced. Thankfully we have extended warranty so the fridge will be replaced under warranty.
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