This is a series of videos where a 1953 Coldspot fridge gets some long-standing problems sorted out. This thing has some amazing styling! It also has the ThermoDefroster system which is interesting in and of its self. That is a form of hot vapor defrost but it uses a dedicated defrost heater to boil refrigerant; instead of the compressor heat as with GE. It's manually actuated, as well; with a pushbutton. This was bought because it is a childhood appliance the owner remembers from his family and he wants the nostalgia.
The outline of the story given to me by the owner is as follows. It was bought non-cooling on eBay and shipped directly to a well known antique appliance repair business. After a 2.5 year waiting period, it was returned to its owner and found to be operating improperly (I don't remember the details). It made a second trip to the repair facility and was kept 6 months this time. It was returned with only the first two passes of the evaporator cooling; and an epoxy repair on the evaporator. In an attempt to remedy the low frost line; the repair shop asked the owner to place two 100W light bulbs in the evaporator; which melted the plastic door and did not improve the cooling.
The owner reached out on a forum for troubleshooting advice. Eventually; it was shipped to me "to get to the bottom of" the problem. I don't know and didn't ask what the first repair shop charged for the attempted repairs but it doesn't look like much time was spent actually working on the unit. I have the owner's side of the story and have full confidence that he tried his best to work with the previous shop. I wasn't there when the repairs were done and don't know any more backstory than this. All of us who work on antiques take a risk when attempting to make repairs to an old unknown unit like this; and nobody is successful 100% of the time. Therefore I am not going to mention names because that is not going to serve any purpose other than foster hard feelings. I'm all about just getting along. But I think the videos will share some useful lessons which can help others solve similar problems.
The video series is several parts.
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3:
Part 4:
Hope you enjoyed these, and found it helpful.
Sincerely,
David
PHOTOS
1, 2, 3 - Detailing of the Coldspot styling. 4 - Frostline developed after months of running at owner's house. Note only 3 passes of evap frosted, with heavy frost?
5, 6 - Frostline after repairs. Notice the frost reaches the suction accumulator (round tank-like part top right of freezer.) Less frost because has only been running a week or so; but the frost covers more of the coil.
7, 8, 9 - New condenser chimney cover. Lost by previous repair shop. Newly cleaned and painted condenser and compressor. New drier. 10, 11 - As-received condition of condenser.
I know the mention of refrigerant is "evil" in some circles and you typically gloss over the subject ..... but what refrigerant did you use in this unit? Or did I miss it? I see the shop before hand used some atypical mixture?
Bud - Atlanta
Post# 1114896 , Reply# 4 4/17/2021 at 17:38 (1,115 days old) by turbokinetic(Northport, Alabama USA)
Hi Bud. Nothing evil about refrigerant. I did say in the video that I used R152A and even mentioned the exact amount of 5.5 ounces which seemed to work best.
This was originally an R12 system. The previous shop had installed R417C which is an official R12 replacement for certain systems. It may or may not be compatible with the Seeger high-side dome systems. Some of my private contacts seem to think it is a poor choice for these systems for several reasons. R417C is a blended refrigerant. The compressor has a large volume inside its housing; on the high side of the system where the lower pressure components of the blend can separate and become logged. Also it tends to do a similar thing on the low-side in flooded evaporator and suction accumulator systems. That leaves the higher pressure components circulating. This leads to an excessively high head pressure, and excessively low suction pressure. This high pressure ratio creates an extremely high discharge temperature. The separation can come and go, resulting in unpredictable performance.
This and other R12 substitutes were engineered to support R12 equipment still in common use at the time the R12 phase-out was happening. It was for systems which still had a lot of service life left. During those years, the R12 equipment which still had a lot of service life was more than likely larger semi-hermetics and larger complex hermetic systems; with expansion valves. The blend was designed to provide a certain degree of oil solubility for these systems. It also works with the existing expansion valve calibration for those systems.
R152A is not a blend. It is a single-component refrigerant the same as R12. It is very close to R12 in temperature-pressure relationship but not an exact match. For that reason it is not a drop-in replacement for any expansion valve systems. It also has some mineral oil solubility but not complete miscibility as R12 had. Therefore systems with a large amount of tubing could have some concerns with oil getting trapped. This system is a good candidate for it since it doesn't use an expansion valve (it has a capillary tube) and it is a small, low HP system with short lines.
So, in a nutshell; R417C was engineered for a specific type of system and works very well in them. The Seeger high-side dome system predates the systems for which R417C was designed. Therefore they didn't take it into account when creating this blend. R152A has been proven in Frigidaire and Seeger high-side dome systems so that is what I used. I would only use this, or go back with R12 in one of these systems; never any blend - never. Guys in the field longer than I have warned me about this so I chose to learn from their experiences and save headaches.
Post# 1114924 , Reply# 5 4/17/2021 at 20:26 (1,115 days old) by norgeway(mocksville n c )
Dave, you are a true technician and an artist. I went to vocational school for household refrigeration, and the quality of your work, along with your knowledge, just blows me away.
Post# 1114999 , Reply# 8 4/18/2021 at 15:59 (1,114 days old) by jamiel(Detroit, Michigan and Palm Springs, CA)
I agree 100% with what Ken said. It's clear that you enjoy what you do and will take on any challenge you're presented with. Your attention to detail in troubleshooting and repair is truly admirable.
What a beautiful refrigerator, that after 68 years has received a proper repair for a likely factory defect! Great job! You rock!
So now a question: Do you know how this manual push-button defrost system differs from the one Westinghouse used via a button-activated counter mechanism that tracked door opening/closing activity? Besides that part, I mean.
Once again, I am completely awed by your knowledge, skill, talent and tenacity.
Ralph
Post# 1115045 , Reply# 10 4/19/2021 at 08:22 (1,113 days old) by turbokinetic(Northport, Alabama USA)
Thanks again guys, I'm happy you enjoy the videos and found them helpful!
As for the defroster; I haven't dealt with Coldspot's freezers. I would guess (purely a guess!) that if they developed and patented this system they would have used it across multiple models and types of machines.
As for the Westinghouse system, with the door-closure counter; again no experience. I'm aware of it but haven't really looked at how it applies heat to the evaporator. I would think something would be different though. With this Coldspot system; you would need to take the frozen food out of the evaporator so that the ice could melt and not end up melting the frozen foods, and then sticking them to the freezer once the defrost cycle ended. For that reason you would want to be in control of when the defrost cycle was initiated; to have a chance to take the food out first. I would guess the Westinghouse has a fan circulating cold air instead of an exposed evaporator; because you wouldn't have an opportunity to move the food out of the freezer before the defrost came on automatically. But again not familiar.
Post# 1115078 , Reply# 11 4/19/2021 at 12:59 (1,113 days old) by ozzie908(Lincoln UK)
David, you made a point that I was anticipating the need to share: frozen contents become stuck due to the defrosting process.
My '52 Kelvinator has a faulty cold control and will fail to cycle once in a while. Lately it's been doing it on a daily basis. A good solid rap with my fist at the top of the door as I pass by the fridge, or opening and closing the door gets it to kick in. I'm afraid to extract the control out of concern that something vital will fall apart and I'll be fridge-less as a result, at least where cold beer and soda are concerned.
As you described above, even though there's nothing crucial in the Kelvy's freezer section, it's all stuck and I have to wait for the fridge to be in self-inflicted defrost mode to extract anything. Still, for 1953, Coldspot's feature of simply emptying the freezer's contents and waiting for a short period to put them back (after wiping down the interior) was a real time saver. Considering it provides its own heat source, that makes it even more convenient than a frost-freely GE Combination. Maybe others familiar with Westinghouse can provide details on how their system worked.
Post# 1115434 , Reply# 13 4/24/2021 at 00:26 (1,109 days old) by Stan(Napa CA)
Said it before David..
I think you could fix a rainy day!
Love the way you filmed this... it was like I was there with you.
Thanks for taking us along for the discovery and repair journey!
Post# 1115685 , Reply# 14 4/26/2021 at 23:50 (1,106 days old) by norgeway(mocksville n c )
The westinghouse system does not have fan forced circulation, It just melts the frost, My Aunt has a 55 which im going to pick up soon, when new the water was standing on the freezer floor and freezing packages to it, the factory fix was to drill a row of holes in the bottom of the freezer lol She said it worked perfectly after that,
Again thanks for the positive feedback on the repairs!
I hope to have another “failed repair investigation” series soon. I need to be vague about it until the unit is here on site; and the owner has expressed that he is OK with it being shared. It seems these sort of videos are well appreciated so I hope we get the go-ahead!
Hans; that’s interesting about the drilling of the freezer floor for defrost water. I hope they had a template where you wouldn’t end up drilling any refrigerant lines!Also I guess that wouldn’t let water go into the insulation space!
(Northport, Alabama USA) 
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