Defrosting the freezer

Bongedone

I use tea light candles floating in bowl of water.

If you have just slowcooked a chilli for batch freezing them put that in there to cool down.

Primrose

I use a combination of saucepans of just boiled water and a hairdryer, used carefully, aimed at the sturbborn "difficult to get at" iced up areas.
Before starting I also put some newspaper or an old towel on the floor to catch all the inevitable drips of melting ice & water which escape.

zippychick

I've merged this with our main thread on defrosting freezers

pupsicola

In a bid to save money (and because we couldn't get out due to snow) I have now used up everything in my spare fridge freezer.

I noticed that there was way too much ice forming in the freezer so whilst empty I am defrosting it. Feel that if it is running at optimum level it will save me cash in long run.

Have turned off at mains and cleared out all the draws. Put towels down and left doors open. I have never done this before so dont know how long the process takes or if there is anything else I should be doing. Feels like a silly question but know if I overlook anything basic I will be annoyed with myself.

Any advice much appreciated.

Sarah

carriebradshaw

I put some plastic tubs of hot water on the top shelf if you have one, if not put a drawer back in and put them in there,it really speeds up the process.Once it starts to thaw you can start to carefully scrape at the ice with a plastic scraper and that will hep as well, but if you're not confident about that just leave it to drip.I also put a tray in down in front of the open door to catch any overflow instead of towels but towels are better if you can't keep an eye on the tray to change as it gets full. I did mine yesterday and it was pretty bad,but I had it done in less than an hour

david39

We have a fridge and a freezer. Both are controlled by the same front panel switch, so they can only be turned off together - one off, both off! Crazy, really!

When the freezer needs defrosting, having reduced the contents of both as much as possible, I transfer the contents of the freezer into the fridge. This keeps the freezer contents as cold as possible while helping to preserve a low temperature in the fridge.

I then scrape off any loose frost from the inside of the freezer and stand a fan heater in front of it, blowing warm air into the inside.

After about 20 minutes, this melts the ice and frost and, with a cleaning and drying, the freezer is ready for use again.

The whole process takes about 30 minutes.

Penelope_Penguin

pupsicola wrote: »

Have turned off at mains and cleared out all the draws. Put towels down and left doors open. I have never done this before so dont know how long the process takes or if there is anything else I should be doing.

I chip away at the worst of the ice, then leave the door open to allow the rest of the ice to thaw. I drain any water away through, and remove more ice as necessary.

I like to start this first thing, and hope to be refilling the freezer before lunch

As this has fallen from the front page of OS, I'll add it to the existing thread to give you more ideas.

pupsicola

Thanks guys for all your helpfull tips on this thread. Its helped me make an easy job of defrosting my freezer today :T

clintskeeey

Addiscomber wrote: »

I aim to do mine in the spring and autumn. This way I get it sorted before winter and Christmas, when I need to have good stocks of essentials as I cannot go out shopping in bad weather, and I get to clear it out at the end of winter too. I find a hairdryer helps with any build up of ice.

Brill, just done it with the hairdryer :beer:

leandygandy

I hope this is the right place for this, it seemed to be the most appropriate to me!

I have decided to defrost the freezer today as the drawers are so iced in it's almost impossible to pull them out.

The drawers are full and have been out since 8am.

At what point does food need to be thrown away, and which foods can be kept? Can the food be left out all day as long as it's in a cool place? I want to avoid as much waste as possible but I'm guessing that not everything will survive? (I suspect I'll be having a pick n mix tea of all the things that couldn't be put back in the freezer :rotfl:)

This is the sort of thing I'd have asked my mum but as she is no longer here I'm at a bit of a loose end...help me, oh wise ones!