Can anyone help with a strange fridge problem?

[Brian Elfert]

I bought my Whirlpool french door fridge in March of this year. Last night the fans that move the air around when the compressor is running came on and stayed on continuously. (Compressor was not running.) About 3 am I unplugged the fridge and plugged it back in, but the problem continued. I figured I would call someone this morning, but the problem seems to be gone now. The fridge seems to be hold temp fine. The fridge is set at 35 degrees and my digital meat thermometer says it is 39 degrees inside. I'm not sure the meat thermometer is 100% accurate.

Any ideas what happened?

[Chuck Wintle]

could it be part of the defrost cycle...?

[David G Baker]

What Chuck said. Wait until you look at your fridge during the defrost cycle while the room is dark. There will be an eerie light emitting from the fridge. The defrost cycle uses a light to generate the heat that is distributed through out the freezer to keep frost from forming like it did in the old model fridges. The compressor is not operating during the defrost cycle.

[Brian Elfert]

I would think I would have noticed it before if it takes all night to defrost, but that very well could be it. When I went to bed it was hard to get to sleep because there was a faint noise that sounded like someone playing music with lots of bass. I even opened the windows to see if the noise was coming from outside. The noise was still there at 3 am when I noticed the fan in the fridge was running. By morning the noise was gone.

My previous fridge had an actual heater strip for defrost instead of any kind of bulb. I know this because it quit cooling and the tech had to replace the heater as the coil was iced up.

[Andrew DiLorenzo]

Fill a glass with ice cubes and water and put your meat thermometer in there. After a few minutes, turn the nut on the bottom of the thermometer to adjust the dial to read 32 degrees. Now it is calibrated! Measure the temp again in your refrigerator to verify. Hope this helps.