More of a WWYD - dead fridge and dying freezer

[RhodaBorrocks]

Hi all,

I noticed in the week my fridge wasn't as cool as it should be. Despite turning it up it became obvious it was broken as the walls inside were warm and dry. I set up a large box full of ice to store our milk, juice and cheese and that works OK. I booked a repairman to come on Wednesday as I'm off work then and figured it would be no big deal to live out of the freezer for a few days, so bought some bits in Iceland.

Except tonight I've noticed the freezer is now struggling too. Some stuff is still frozen, but some had to go although it was probably good to have a clear out anyway.

My WWYD is this - should I go out tomorrow morning and buy a cool box, fill with ice and keep what I can in there, or should I cook up as much as possible and put in the fridge, which is relatively ok if I keep it well topped up with ice? My parents live up the road, but are away on hols. Their freezer is pretty full, but I've just bought a box of Fabs and don't want to lose them - DS is still up so should I go round and cram them in their freezer?

The other thing is I'm renting. My landlord okayed the repair and will pay for it, but should I message again if it looks like the freezer is going too? It's 5 years old - is it worth attempting a repair or should he just replace it for me? He replaced the oven when the element on it went last year (he'd already repaired it once when I first moved in) but I don't know how fixable fridge freezers are?

Help, I'm a lone parent so I'd rather not lose £40 of food overnight!

Not a frost free freezer is it? We had the same with it struggling to keep things frozen, and discovered it just needed defrosting, and although there was no visible ice, vents hidden away had got icy and blocked.

Ours is in a dampish laundry and condensation freezes on the outside of the cooling coils. Defrosting it over several days gets it going again. Maybe worth a try.

I would see how much you can put in your parents freezer. Take things out of boxes if needs be. Also if say you have meat in yours and they have bags of veg I'd be tempted to sacrifice some of that ( it will be cheaper to replace)
What's the call out fee for the repair man?

It is frost free and I did wonder about doing a complete defrost as I've not done one since January when it was last empty. Should I just turn it off? What do I do about the food if it needs a few days?

My Fabs are currently doing OK and my ice cubes are refreezing. If I have to have a second Fab before bed I'm sure I'll cope. I told DS he can have one after breakfast so I'm now the best mum ever. Perhaps removing some of the ice build up earlier has helped? I'm going to my DParents house tomorrow lunchtime as my DSis is using their absence as an excuse to host a barbecue. I can take stuff then.

Repairman is a flat rate of £60 and only charge extra for parts at cost rate. It's quite a big local company and I think they make enough from all of the call outs for little issues to enable them to balance the books for the bigger jobs.

And luckily I'm vegetarian so the only meat in there is DS' fish fingers and chicken dippers, hence wondering if I'd be ok to cook things and keep them chilled. Far more meat in my DParents freezer!

I should have just lived off pasta and let DS have beans and sausages on toast for the next 4 days! No doubt he'd think I was awesome for that too.

Happens to mine annually ( stoopid freezer ). In the heat it goes into overdrive keeping cool. Mine actually feels hot on the outside. This causes ice to build up on the cooling fins. I unscrew the plate from the inside back and lift it away from the fins. I point a hair dryer on the fins and sit there till the ice melts off, then screw the back plate back down and turn it back on. Off it goes. Its done this every year for about 8 years now.

I do live in the USA and have no AC so the room my freezer lives in does get very warm.

Thanks all, especially Trout I took all the drawers out of my freezer to see if I could get to the back and there was a thick layer of ice on everything. We're talking sinking several Titanics here! I couldn't even get the shelves out as they're iced in.

So I've switched it all off and have 2 kettles worth of boiling water spread over a washing up bowl, wok and large cake tin strategically placed on several shelves now and it's currently raining in my freezer! Any chunks of ice breaking off are being tossed into the fridge box.

My food has been stacked in reverse order in its drawers still and covered by a doubled over, king size, thick woollen throw.

Let's see how much damage limitation I can do before the morning.

Sorry this wasn't as interesting of a dilemma as sex lube and a fish slice, but the night is young!

Am slightly distracted by thoughts of lube and a fish slice (?!?!) but wanted to add that if the freezer is really a frost free one (not all are), then it shouldn't have any ice built up in it.

Suggests that maybe it isn't working as well as it should anyway and perhaps the hot weather if you've had it, has pushed it over the edge.

I recently had a similar problem and found that the ambient temperature was just too high to keep things cold even with ice and a cool bag, so after finding some too warm defrosted spinach the next morning (bleugh) I would cook and eat and store elsewhere, rather then hope to keep much.

Funnily enough, I was also worried for a box of Fabs at the time - I'd bought a sneaky box of 4, and ended up having to eat them all in one day! Shame ;) Might have to have a Nobbly Bobbly next time!