Defrost Heater - 500W 115V WP61001846

This is a problem in the defrost cycle. It is one of three items the heater, timer or thermostat.. I removed the screws from the back side of the freezer and romoved the sheet metal from the back which exposes all the elements. Below the evaporaro coils are two small plates which cover the heating elements ( two glass tubes conected to insulated wire), You may be able to look at it and tell if they are bad. Mine was burnt and obviously gone. If you disconnect from conectors you can check for conitinuity to tell if bad. Simply remove the four screws holding these in place and install new one the same way. quite easy. I did check the thermostat for continuity and relaced it also. It simply plugs into a clip on the back wall and two power connectors. If checking themostat for continuity make sure it is cold otherwise it will be open and you won't get a good read. The timer for this model is under \neather behind the grill on the bottom. simply turn the dial and if the motor stops it is probbably good. It runs 8 hr. and then will shut off for defrost heater to come on. Do this before closing up to tell that your new heater is working. It will get red quickly. Saved a lot of money on this one

The defrost timer was mounted in refridgerator by the temp. control. Just two mounting screws to remove. Tested this part as discribed in trouble shooting section. It needed to be replaced. Also found the defrost elements behind the rear wall of freezer, they were the glass tube type one was clearly blown. The freezer coils were a solid block of ice. No way the air could flow into refridgerator part. used a hair dryer to defrost also used a thicker wire ot unclog the drian that leads to pan under fridge. this one had two glass tube heaters that wear held in with two screws each. just unplug wires. I also replaced the thermostat since it was right there and it was the only other part listed that could cause the freeze up. bottom line its like i have a brand new side by side fridge. These kind are like $1500 to replace. So for $99 in parts and and hour or work I got my fridge back. Thanks for your help and getting the right parts here in just a couple of days.

Defrosted, removed old heaters and thermostat and installed new heaters and thermostat. Not a hard job at all.

unplug refrigerator. remove contents from freezer. remove shelves, trays, icebucket, light cover & bulb. defrost back panel w/hair dryer. remove screws from: ice dispenser motor housing, back cover. remove back cover. defrost evaporator w/hair dryer. remove heater leads from connector on feedthru. remove heater mounting screws. pull leads down thru evaporator while removing heaters. install new heaters on mounting plates. feed leads up thru evaporator. connect to feedthru. install everything else.

part was exact fit. same resistance as on schematic, leads were long enough. no problems encountered.

Tips from internet forums helped me figure out the problem: The defroster heaters were not working and the freezer side would frost up and prevent cold air from entering the refrigerator side. I removed the drawers, drawer slides, ice maker, then the back panel to expose the cooling coils. You can check the heaters for continuity before rempving them by disconnecting the two lead wiresonce you have the back panel removed. Not getting any continuity, I removed the old heaters after defrosting the coils. Removing the heaters was the most difficult part as they are a little "long" for where they fit, but with care it can be done, the same applies to installing the new heaters. I had to cut the connecting wire on one of the heaters to remove it, but got the new set installed OK. Works fine now, the bottom heater was defective, and since the are wired in series neither one will work independently. Everything works fine now, problem solved.

Unplugged refrig., emptied freezer, removed ice bucket drive, removed back wall of freezer, used blower side of vac to defrost coils, remvoed glass heaters and pulled a chase line thru as I removed old wires. Replaced heaters and chased new wires using chase wires.

Removed existing and installed the new part. The hard part is reaching to the back of freezer as it not very wide and is farily deep. Hard to get to arms in at the same time.

Turn off power. unscrewed and removed the panel in the freezer compartment exposing the defroster(6 screws). pulled off the two defroster wires from their lugs. Removed the two plates (4 screws) holding the two heater elements. unsnapped the two heater elements from the plates. installed new heater elements. attached the plates.attached the two wires to the lugs.done

Removing the old heater coil was a bit of a task as you need to take off all the brackets holding the heater coil and then remove the wiring from back of the coil. Installing the new heater coil assembly in the brackets and feeding the wirings back up to the top was a major task. Need to have long arms as the heater is located way back in the freezer compartment. The part was the exact match. The part was delivered in 2 days. Thanks alot. Will use your site again.

1. Removed food from freezer and unplug refrigerator or shut circuit breaker. 2. Removed freezer shelves 3. Unscrew all screws on inside back wall and removed back wall plate. Run a fan to defrost the coils. 4. Unscrewed 4 heater bracket nuts on front of cooling coils and removed heater elements. Mine were burnt so I knew I had the correct part. 5. Removed the heater wires from back panel. 6. Install new heater elements being careful not to leave oils from hands on glass tubes and connected 2 wires from heating elements to rear panel. Reinstall nuts to hold heater brackets. 7. Plug in and run refrigerator for 2 hours with doors closed. Remove upper rear panel on fresh food side then use a flat head screwdriver to turn red timer screw above refrigerator thermostat clockwise slowly until compressor shuts down. 8. Open freezer and waited a few minutes to watch defrost heater coils glow. If they don't glow you might need a new thermostat for the freezer which is located on rear panel or a new timer. 9. Unplug and reinstall rear panel and shelves. Plug in. It will take 24 to 48hrs. For temperatures to level out. Good luck.