Defrosting a Small Non-Defrosting Refrigerator Freezer

I just defrosted my chest freezer in the garage a few days ago. It wasn't too bad, thankfully. I couldn't reach the bottom of it because I am too short, so I had to enlist hubby's help to get fallen ice out of the bottom and give it a wipe with some vinegar solution.

Newer appliances will help with energy costs. It's unfortunate that they aren't built to last the way older appliances were.
 
A few years ago me & wife spent 3 or 4 days cleaning & tidying the apartment of a friend who (sadly) could not look after himself very well

He had a fridge - freezer that was in a poor state
The top, fridge, half had a lot of frost, and lots of part used & spilled packets & cans, with hardly any room for new stuff, even if you wanted to
The bottom freezer part was almost completely solid with ice and ice - encased packets & bags, and also the expansion tubes? at the back & underneath were solidly encrusted with ice
And the whole thing had a lot of spilled food and general muckiness
I think he used to keep on putting things in, but never cleaning or emptying it out; and as it became worse, so it must have taken more & more electricity, and therefore money, to keep it cold
Some of the packets were very old, with use by dates of 5 or 6 years before

So one morning we just laid down some old towels then switched it off and unplugged it
It took all day to melt, & remove the ice & mop up the water, and throw out the old food
Next day we gave it a good clean & wipe over, and a warning to be more careful in future
Don't know if he did or not as we lost touch after that

On a lighter note, I had another friend who was a technician in a hospital lab
One night there had been a fault with the fridges, and they went into freezing mode
She, and the rest of the staff came in the next morning to discover that all the samples had frozen solid

Typical of their macabre humour they asked around to see if anyone fancied any faecal lollipops, but got no takers.....
 
I have a negative thing about chest freezers - I hate them.
1. chest freezer takes up more square footage of floor space than an upright with the same capacity
2. I have to remove racks and baskets to get to what is on the bottom
3. I forget what is on the bottom
4. It is more difficult to clean
Self defrosting vs manual defrost - self defrost for the refrigerator's bottom freezer. I store products that will be used in a reasonable amount of time. Things I plan to cook within a month and of course ice cream, ice, frozen veggies.
The two 21 cubic foot freezers in the shop are manual defrost by choice. Food can be kept longer in a manual defrost freezer than in a self defrost model. The defrost cycle will cause freezer burn much faster than a manual defrost. I really struggled the last time I defrosted the freezers. It had been at least two years since the last defrost - much too long.
 
flyinglentris said:
Let me give you all something to laugh at. :woot:

I have a small refrigerator with a small part dedicated to a freezer section. I went to get something and found the freezer door frozen shut.

So, I set about defrosting the hard way, with a hammer and chisel to break up the ice. For a small freezer section, I got about three buckets of broken ice, three hours of work and a broken plastic door hinge to the freezer section. The metal of the ice chest is bent here and there, but when all was done, the damn thing still works.

This amounted to most monumental project I have engaged in, almost all year.

These little refrigerators are cheap and maybe, I ought to go get one that automatically defrosts. I had put a desiccant canister that is safe for food in for a while, but forgot about it and the great freeze-up was the result.

This sort of freezer defrosting is worse than taking out the garbage or hand washing my pickup truck.
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Be careful with the chisel. Never use it to try to remove the ice from freezer surfaces!!! It could damage them, causing the refrigerant to leak out, creating an expensive recharge!!!! :headshake:
 
ElizabethB said:
Food can be kept longer in a manual defrost freezer than in a self defrost model. The defrost cycle will cause freezer burn much faster than a manual defrost. I really struggled the last time I defrosted the freezers. It had been at least two years since the last defrost - much too long.
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Is self-defrost the same as frost-free?
I've never heard that food keeps longer in a normal freezer...if anything I would have thought there was less chance of freezer burn in a frost-free freezer as there is less moisture in the air inside.


Edit:
I've just googled, and it seems self defrost is the same as a normal freezer, it just defrosts itself automatically. I'm not sure if we have these types of freezer in the UK, I don't recall seeing any marketing for them.
We do have frost-free freezer though....they don't require defrosting because they have no frost build up inside at all.
 
The thing about replacing ( even a small ) a refrigerator for an old retired disabled Vet, is that the results of wrastling out the old fridge and wrastling in the new fridge is a heck of a lot of muscle pains in the back and torso that remind me of how one atrophies those muscles over time.

I got a good healthy workout and the pains will go away in time. I got some clumsy, uncoordinated weight lifting, some preposterous calesthetics (bending, twisting, stooping, etc.) and lunatic walking about. And all of that was eventually followed by some unconventional Yoga, sitting in front of the Wide Screen, watching a couple old 1950s movies, "Them", "It Came From Beneath The Sea" and "The Creature From The Black Lagoon."
 
flyinglentris said:
The thing about replacing ( even a small ) a refrigerator for an old retired disabled Vet, is that the results of wrastling out the old fridge and wrastling in the new fridge is a heck of a lot of muscle pains in the back and torso that remind me of how one atrophies those muscles over time.
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I always use a company where they deliver, remove the old one for safe disposal and install the new one for you.
 
flyinglentris said:
The thing about replacing ( even a small ) a refrigerator for an old retired disabled Vet, is that the results of wrastling out the old fridge and wrastling in the new fridge is a heck of a lot of muscle pains in the back and torso that remind me of how one atrophies those muscles over time.

I got a good healthy workout and the pains will go away in time. I got some clumsy, uncoordinated weight lifting, some preposterous calesthetics (bending, twisting, stooping, etc.) and lunatic walking about. And all of that was eventually followed by some unconventional Yoga, sitting in front of the Wide Screen, watching a couple old 1950s movies, "Them", "It Came From Beneath The Sea" and "The Creature From The Black Lagoon."
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I had a workaround for that. I would post the old item on Craigslist or Freecycle so somebody else had to do the heavy lifting if they wanted the item. I would always list a price even if I was giving something away just to avoid being bombarded by people just looking for free stuff.

Then, I'd grab a neighbor and one of his friends to move the new item in. I would just get them a case of beer for the trouble.
 
When we purchased a new washer and dryer the old ones were still functional. We donated the pair to a local non profit thrift shop that supports local charities. They picked up the machines. When we replaced the fridge, not functioning, Lowe's delivered the new one and took away the old one. We recently replaced a toilet. G brought the old one to the Habit for Humanity Rehab Store.
We bought a new mattress and box spring for our bed in '16. Most charities will not take beds. In '16 we had major flooding in many parts of the city. We found a Church affiliated organization that took the bed. They picked up.
Let Go is a good site to sell stuff. So is Craig's list. Word of warning - NEVER make the sale at your home. We meet buyers at the Murphy Gas station on the Walmart parking lot. The canopy is convenient if it is raining. We never meet at the Walmart closest to us. Never go alone.
 
Burt Blank said:
Here it's like it was in the UK 50 years ago. Two guys driving a flat bed truck with a speaker drive through the neighborhood twice a week. "
bilo koje staro gvožđe"
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU0d8kpybVg&ab_channel=DerekLee
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Burt you are delightfully sick. On a more serious note if people do not take personal responsibility for wearing masks, washing hands and practicing social distancing we may see something that gruesome. Refrigerator trucks are parked outside of hospitals to store bodies of people who have died from Covid. I can not tell you how many people insist that mask and social distancing are an infringement on their personal rights. Ignorant, selfish, childish people who think only of themselves and have no consideration for others. I could throw up on my favorite pair of shoes.
 
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