Why did I have to de-ice my freezer with a hammer?

So, the alarm went off to say I hadn’t shut my freezer drawer. The freezer is a separate unit in the fridge, a drawer under the refrigeration section.

Tried to shut the drawer and it wouldn’t shut.

“Hmm,” sez I to myself. That happens when food is jammed in the drawer and keeps it from closing. So I started emptying the drawer and trying to shut it.

Empty the drawer out completely, still won’t shut.

“Hmm. Maybe something fallen behind the drawer?”

Pull the drawer all the way out. Don’t see anything. Except the back is sort of shiny.

I get a flashlight. Yes, the ice on the back wall of the freezer compartment is very shiny.

“Wait! Ice?!? Why is there ice on the back wall?”

There’s some sort of unit in the back wall. Is that where the heat exchange happens? At any rate, it looks like that’s where the ice started forming. And then it drained down to the floor of the compartment and froze under the drawer.

So I start tapping on it with my hand. I’m a prairie boy, who’s gone through many winters. I can tell right away that this isn’t a light coating of ice. It’s thick.

I reach in and try to break off the ice. No go. I sigh and get a hammer. I start tapping gently on the ice. Don’t want to crack the casing and release the freon, or whatever it’s called nowadays.

I didn’t need to be so gentle. This is hard, hard ice. I continue tapping until it finally starts cracking. And I start pulling out the pieces of ice. The biggest piece is about 6 inches long, 3 inches back to front, and about 3 inches deep! Other chunks are almost as impressive.

After much tapping and scavenging, I’ve filled my biggest mixing bowl, the one for bread dough, twice! Empty the bowl into the side sink, filling it up with chunks of ice.

And now the light starts to dawn. Twice recently, I’ve found puddles of water by the freezer. I’ve blamed it on the exuberant water-drinking habits of Piper Dog, whose water bowl is right beside the freezer. But was that water actually leaking from the freezer?

I see two options:

  1. The drawer was sticking open a bit, and that let water vapour start to congeal into ice, which kept the door open a bit more, and the cycle accelerated , with water condensing and forming more ice and then liquid water leaking out the open drawer, until finally the ice was so thick the drawer wouldn’t shut, triggering the alarm.

  2. There’s something wrong with the heat exchange and water is leaking directly into the freezer, causing the ice build-up, blocking the drawer open, and leaking out.

The difference is that if it was Option 1, cleaning out the ice should have solved the problem.

But if it’s Option 2, I need to call The Fridge Repair Squad, at considerable monetary expense.

Counting in favour of Option 1 is that the food in the freezer is all frozen, which I don’t think would be the case if the heat exchange weren’t working.

What say you, Learned Dopers?

Had the same problem with a 2008 LG. It was a frozen condensate drain during the defrost cycle. It froze on the bottom of the freezer though (maybe 1/4" thick). Took a hammer to it once every week or so. Then the compressor went out.

I’m on my 3rd LG. First 2 crapped out and were replaced by Home Depot. They are junk. This one fights with me daily. Wasn’t cheap either. I got a nice snailmail letter from the company after the second one died. I wrote a nasty letter back. I’m sure they are sending electronic messages through my fridge to mess with me;)
My Aunt had a fridge for something like 45 years. Sure, she had to defrost manually and fill up ice trays. But dang that thing kept water ice cold.
OP, are you under warranty?

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Water+in+Freezer

Is there a water line in for an icemaker? First easy thing to try diagnostically is to shut if off. That’s what the source of my ice formation was, the icemaker leaking. I don’t know how easy it is to fix, because I didn’t fix it, I don’t use the ice maker often enough to care.

Well this 'ere unlearned doper is trying to get his mind around the notion of a Canadian needing a freezer and ice-maker … isn’t that the default climate setting up your way?

I had a similar issue several months back. It caused a drip onto the front of the freezer interior causing ice to form on the drawer hinges( it is a pullout bottom freezer door )and eventually push it open.Thick ice steadily spread everywhere. Unplugging the fridge and thoroughly defrosting the freezer for a day managed to solve the problem and it has been ice-free since then.

My last (Samsung) fridge had a problem with the heater that was supposed to defrost, partially stopped working. Defrosted water soaked into the insulation at the back and the first indication of a problem was that the cold water stopped working. When I looked, there was a load of ice visible, and a load more out of sight behind the back panel. I paid to have it fixed (it was out of warranty) but it only lasted a couple more years. Internet searches found dozens of users (mainly in the US) with similar problems - there was even talk of a class action.

Why did I have to de-ice my freezer with a hammer?

You didn’t. You could have used all sorts of heavy or pointed objects to de-ice it

Or patience. The one in the hotel had four fingers wide ice and it took me half an hour to defrost it without using any sharp or heavy objects. No risk of causing a leak that way.

I suspect, as has been mentioned, that something is blocking the condensate drain. I’ve had that happen before and had a similar result.

Next time it happens, turn the unit off (find somewhere else to put the frozen foods, refrigerated foods should be fine) and let the ice melt naturally. you might need towels to soak up the water. It is best to let it melt naturally so you don’t break anything and so that you are sure all of the ice is gone. In my case, there was a blockage in the drain pan directly beneath the evaporator coils. It was too far away from the defrost heater to melt during a defrost cycle, so on each defrost cycle, the blockage would grow.

Once you have thawed it out, it may be fine, but check periodically to see if the ice returns. Again in my case, it would take two to three months for the ice to return. I lived with that, doing a periodic freezer defrost every couple of months until the ice maker stopped working. I ordered a new ice maker and when I installed it, I had to disassemble the back wall of the freezer compartment. There, I discovered a penny in the drain pan which covered the drain hole. I removed the penny and never had another problem with the water.

Obviously, being in Canada, I doubt your issue is a penny, but similar object may be the culprit, or the drain line may just be fouled by mold or mildew. In any case, allowing all of the ice to melt might fix the problem.

A failed defrost heater was the cause for my refrigerator/freezer (side by side doors) problem, too. Mine had failed altogether and I didn’t notice until food in the fridge felt warmer than usual. The entire back wall of the freezer was covered in inches of glacier. The food in the freezer was was ok but the fridge got too warm and I had to toss a lot.

After unplugging it overnight, the ice melted and left a messy puddle on the kitchen floor. The failed heater & wire harness were easy to get to with just a screwdriver and a quick check with a multimeter verified that the resistive heating element had failed open. I ordered the part and had it installed in minutes. Scrambling to keep the freezer stuff frozen and dealing with the ice melt was a hassle but it was otherwise pretty easy.

Thanks for the comments everyone. I will keep an eye on it and see if it starts to build up again. If so, will call the Fridge Squad.

The ice I took out last night still hasn’t all melted! Still some chunks in the sink.

I tried a banana and then a pointy stick, but they didn’t have enough heft.

It’s been my experience that entering the model number into a youtube search will turn up a host of helpful repairmen and DIYers showing the troubeshooting and solutions for all the common problems with the unit. We recently had a wall of ice form at the back of our icemaker, which pushed the ice drawer out just enough that the thingy couldn’t turn and push the ice out to the dispenser.

Using the above method I learned that this is a common problem, and there is a sneaky way to force a defrost cycle to get rid of it. The problem was so bad that we had to run that cycle four times, supplementing with towels heated in the microwave over the course of a whole evening.

Sadly, no solution was given for the obnoxious beeping that Samsung, in their “great and unmatched wisdom” decided should occur throughout the 20-minute forced defrost cycle.

Harrumph!

Anyway, there may be some similar piece of genius out there for your problem. Ours is expected to be ongoing, but if we keep running the cycle once a month or so it should maintain functionality indefinitely.

Thanks for that suggestion. I will take a look.

The ice is now finally all melted in the sink…

I had a bottom freezer LG with this common problem, and as above, it was a plugged drain tube. I thought of designing a small heater to keep that “tube” a bit above freezing. I wonder if a small incandescent bulb could be placed close enough to act as a space heater?

Yes, thanks to your furnace & the fuel you paid for.

(Next time, throwing the ice chunks outside will save a tiny bit on your heating bill. Dump them around the base of a tree or shrub.)

My sister-in-law once replied to a similar comment when she was living in Sydney: “We’re sensible in Canada. We keep our cold outside.”

A buddy of mine sent me this which he got to fix the same problem on his. They redesigned the drain tube.

https://www.appliancepartspros.com/diy-story-water-leaking-bottom-freezer-maytag-mfi2569yem0-diy498438.html?gclid=CNK-_au14dQCFYW4wAodRfED_w