xcxeon
04-11-2009, 10:47 PM
Hi guys, I'm (obviously) new here, and forgive me if this is the wrong place to be asking for help, but this was the first website I came across that looked like it had some people that could help me, so, here goes:
I have an older minifridge from 1998-ish. I received it as salvage, and was told it didn't work. Awhile back, I pulled it out of the box and plugged it in. Compressor ran, nothing happened, so after some fiddling I discovered it had no coolant in it.
I couldn't figure out how much coolant it was supposed to have in it at the time, only that it was r134a.
As well, I've never charged an appliance that small before, and I noticed it didn't have lps and hps connectors on it, just one fill port on the compressor.
So, I brazed a fitting to it, and put a little r134a in it, and plugged it in. It ran, and the evap got cold, so I packed it up, and forgot about it for awhile.
Recently, I pulled it out again, and started messing with it. I know it didn't have a leak because after a year or so, it still has the r134a in it, so I'm not sure why I received it with none in it.
Anyway, here is my current problem:
I plug it in, and the compressor starts up fine, starts running, and seems fine. After about 10 seconds, it starts to make some really weird hissing noises, similar to a normal refrigeration unit, but MUCH louder. Loud enough I can hear it from across the room.
It is a skin cooled unit, so the condenser is built into the outer casing of the fridge, and after running for about five minutes, the outside of the fridge is so hot you can barley touch it, and the drier/capillary tube is hot enough to burn you. The compressor however is barley warm, and the evaporator is cold, but not enough to even condensate.
I've noticed that it seems like the evap starts getting cool MUCH faster than any fridge I've ever seen (in about 5 seconds), it just doesn't get cold enough to even condensate that I've seen.
Did I charge it the wrong way? Or is it overcharged or undercharged? Or do you think the compressor may be bad?
It's an LG NS30LACG compressor.
Thanks for the help in advance, and again, sorry if this is the wrong place to be asking for appliance repair help. :(
I have an older minifridge from 1998-ish. I received it as salvage, and was told it didn't work. Awhile back, I pulled it out of the box and plugged it in. Compressor ran, nothing happened, so after some fiddling I discovered it had no coolant in it.
I couldn't figure out how much coolant it was supposed to have in it at the time, only that it was r134a.
As well, I've never charged an appliance that small before, and I noticed it didn't have lps and hps connectors on it, just one fill port on the compressor.
So, I brazed a fitting to it, and put a little r134a in it, and plugged it in. It ran, and the evap got cold, so I packed it up, and forgot about it for awhile.
Recently, I pulled it out again, and started messing with it. I know it didn't have a leak because after a year or so, it still has the r134a in it, so I'm not sure why I received it with none in it.
Anyway, here is my current problem:
I plug it in, and the compressor starts up fine, starts running, and seems fine. After about 10 seconds, it starts to make some really weird hissing noises, similar to a normal refrigeration unit, but MUCH louder. Loud enough I can hear it from across the room.
It is a skin cooled unit, so the condenser is built into the outer casing of the fridge, and after running for about five minutes, the outside of the fridge is so hot you can barley touch it, and the drier/capillary tube is hot enough to burn you. The compressor however is barley warm, and the evaporator is cold, but not enough to even condensate.
I've noticed that it seems like the evap starts getting cool MUCH faster than any fridge I've ever seen (in about 5 seconds), it just doesn't get cold enough to even condensate that I've seen.
Did I charge it the wrong way? Or is it overcharged or undercharged? Or do you think the compressor may be bad?
It's an LG NS30LACG compressor.
Thanks for the help in advance, and again, sorry if this is the wrong place to be asking for appliance repair help. :(