'American Style' Samsung Fridge Freezer (merged threads)

Tigermaid

Hi mwddrwg
No I actually meant the gas pipe in the fridge! Gas leaked throughout the fridge/freezer making it impossible to repair. The engineer was in such a hurry to repair the known fault with the Samsung RS21DCNS that he ended up putting a screw through the internal gas pipe which wrecked the compressor. This resulted in a contamination of oil round the unit. When they come to repair your fridge make sure you watch what he is doing. I ended up without a fridge/freezer for 23 weeks last year and was even prepared to take Samsung to court to sort out the mess they had made. In the end they admitted that it was their fault and as stated before gave me compensation. What is so annoying is that the fault with the build up of ice was happening back in 2006 but instead of repairing all the machines then they just left it hoping that everyone's machine would be over the extended warrenty of 5 years. The fault however puts extra pressure on the compressor making it have to work overtime. This is still only covered by the two year warrenty. I will never, ever by a Samsung product again.

Gliderguider_2

What a godsend this thread has been for me! I heard the grinding noise, but put it down to maybe a bit of plastic packaging having got into the fan mechanism somehow. It got gradually worse then all of a sudden stopped altogether! Wrongly, I presumed that the fault had cleared itself.

At least 2 months after the noise first started, the fridge section has just started to report an increase in temperature over the last couple of days. Armed with the instructions on this thread, I have just given then unit a good thaw and clean. I was shocked at the amount of ice that had built up.

I haven't widened the outflow hole as when I put my serial number into the Samsung website it appears that I am entitled to a home-visit! This is just to get me through the next month or so until the engineer arrives.

Thanks to all that have provided an input into this thread, very much appreciated!

GG

mwddrwg

Another update... engineer came yesterday and changed the panel from inside the fridge which had the fan at the back. Should be OK now. When you get it done don't panic (like I did!) when the fridge doesn't start up straight away to lower its temperature. Takes about 30 minutes ish to kick in apparently. Frdige now back to normal. Happy days! :j

bombyxmori_2

Engineer to turn up Friday this week to repair broken compressor. The company told my wife that Samsung should have informed us about a recall of our particular model due there being a fire risk. We certainly received no notification. We were also told that because of the problems (noisy compressor/compressor shutting down/ice formation in fridge), Samsung extended the warranty to 3 years. When I contacted Samsung yesterday, I was told that we weren't to worry, they would fix the problem as a "goodwill gesture". I will be getting back in touch with there customer service department to get some clarification as to what is their position re any more problems further down the line.

Tigermaid

Samsung will tell you that the compressor is not covered by the extended warranty, even though its the build up of ice that causes the compressor to break down. Note everything down as they tell you so you have some come back if necessary. The build up of ice puts a strain on the compressor.

Brosly7

Just like to say thank you all very much. This advice has just saved me a fortune and has only cost me the price of two liters of milk. I was on the point of calling a repair man when I read this forum. I have solved the problem. I have had my fridge/freezer for some ten years now and it is the first time this has happened. Took two days to reach temperature after I got rid of the ice but working great now.

DIY_Duncan

June_S wrote: »

First of all, after the problems I’ve had with my Samsung American style fridge freezer, I have to say what a relief it is to find such a vast wealth of information from others on this website.!

My husband and I started to get the noises from the fridge section until eventually it started to run warm and the water stopped coming through the drinks dispenser. After reading lots of different advice, we tried calling Samsung who weren’t interested as it was out of warranty. They were far more helpful a year or so ago when we had a safety modification done on it following on from the BBC Watchdog programme, but this time, we were referred to another company, who gave us an estimate for the work to be done. Like many others, we weren’t really happy with the idea of paying a large sum of money for a repair that appears to be an inherent problem on these American style Samsung models. We tried calling the retailer, but soon realised that they didn’t want to help us, and that they seemed far more interested in offering us a ‘great deal’ on a new model, so we gave up on that idea as well. We tried phoning other local refrigeration engineers who mostly said they won’t touch Samsung appliances, or they referred us back to Samsung or advised us to buy a repair kit and fix it ourselves as it would work out much cheaper in the long run. Until I read the posts on these forums, I actually thought that was sarcastic advice. We recently tried switching it off for a couple of days, and that did cure the problem – for almost a fortnight only though!
. When we told one of the engineers we had done this, he told us that this can actually escalate the problem, and the only way to fix it properly is to replace the required parts.!

After much deliberation, we decided to save some money and do the same as many other people were doing on this and other forums that we looked on. As we had seen there had been nothing but praise for a company called Appliance DIY Repairs, we took the plunge and bought a repair kit from them to fix it ourselves. This seemed to be by far the most efficient and economical decision for us, and just as other customers have also reported, we too received an excellent service, we followed the simple instructions and did it ourselves for a fraction of the repair cost that we were quoted.!

As much as we enjoyed fixing it ourselves, and were genuinely pleased with the service and the price of the repair kit, I still find it hard to comprehend why for so many people like ourselves, it seems to be so difficult to either find a local engineer that can fix these properly, or receive a standard of service from the manufacturer that doesn’t appear to be consistent.!

As it happens, we decided to wait before posting any comments – just to ensure the repair worked, and I’m pleased to report that it runs like its brand new again.

!Again, thanks to all of you for your advice, and I hope this helps someone else.!

We contacted Appliance DIY Repairs to find out if our Samsung RSH1DTMH was still under warranty. We gave them the serial number, and they confirmed that it was manufactured 27 months ago. They asked if we still had the receipt - which unfortunately we didn't, so they advised us to contact Samsung to check if it would be covered.

Samsung told us that it wasn't covered under their normal or any extended warranty now, and gave us the contact details of our local repair centre. We contacted the local repair centre, and were quoted a substantial sum of money to repair the fault we were having. They knew immediately what the problem was when we described how the fan was noisy, but is now quiet, and the fridge is no longer getting cold.

Money is a bit tight at the moment, as I've just been told I'm being made redundant in 3 months time, so on top of a boiler repair I've also just paid out for, I could really have done without this.

I therefore went back to Appliance DIY Repairs and asked them if the shop that sold it to me would likely pay for the repair, after all they should assume some responsibility, but I was told it was highly unlikey but worth a phonecall at least. Not surprisingly, they told me to phone Samsung, and rather obnoxiously told me it was not their problem.

As we have been buying water filters from Appliance DIY Repairs for some time, we decided to go ahead and buy the repair kit from them as well, as this was by far our cheapest option. As other people on this website and several others have testified, it was relatively straight forward, and it's done the trick.

I'm still annoyed that the shop will not assume any responsibilty for this. I wondered if this was the particular chain that I bought my fridge freezer from, or if this was generally the case with all of them.

Also is it only particular models that Samsung will cover? I have read on here and other websites that Samsung have given some customers an extended warranty as a courtesy to cover this particular fault on some models, but lots of people are saying that Samsung won't cover their model when they contact them. Yet there seems to be no real pattern to it. Is it that as soon as the fridge freezer is over a certain age they won't extend the warranty?

On the post above, you didn't mention your model number or the shop you bought it from, and I just wondered if this has any relevance? If so, would you be able to let me know, as this may throw some light on the situation.

In all fairness, I can understand why the manufacturers have a cut off point for any warranties they provide, but aren't the shops responsible to act on the consumers behalf after a warranty expires? Surely this would be good PR for them, and under the Sale Of Goods Act, aren't they obliged to offer some kind of assistance in these matters? I'd be pleased to know your thoughts.

Duncan

Tigermaid

Hi Duncan. My fridge freezer was the RS21DCNS. Did you pay for your fridge freezer by credit card? If so why not go down that route and see if you can get money back. I spent five months argueing with Samsung about mine (spending all this time using a mini fridge and cool box). I did numerous research about the different models and all of them with water dispensers have the same, or similar problem. Go back to Samsung and keep at them, they due about the problems years ago. Their Head Office number is 08456202324 and Tech Support 01932455000. Good Luck.

gwynant

Unfortunately, things often tend to go wrong at the most inconvenient time.

mwddrwg

Tell me about it! Ours works fine now - like a new fridge!