Refrigerator door left open accidentally for 2 days - now fridge does not seem to be cooling. Help!?

Turn off the frig for at least 24 hours to allow the excessive ice build up on the evaporator coil to melt. It's blocking the airflow to the refrigerator section. The motor or compressor isn't bad if it's blowing cold air. Leaving the door open just caused the coil to accumulate too much ice.

If that doesn't work, there is an outside chance that the defrost timer is bad or the defrost drain is clogged up.

18 years in the business

It is possible that the evaporator coils accumulated an excessive amount of frost on them during the period the door was open.

It is also possible that the compressor overheated and has shut itself off and refuses to start while it is still hot. This is more unlikely from your description.

It is possible the unit will correct itself eventually. The defrost cycle will eventually remove the excessive frost if it is there.

To speed up the process and since you have no savable food

to cool you can turn it off and leave the FREEZER door open overnight. This should be enough to thaw the evaporator coils or cool the compressor. This should also be long enough to cool the compressor if it is overheated.

The coils are located on the floor of the freezer section. If the freezer fan cannot blow air through them the refrigerator section will not cool.

Most people tend to turn up the controls and this will also prevent cool air from reaching the refrigerator. How you say?

There are usually 2 controls. The freezer control is a butterfly baffle that either opens or closes off air flow between the refrigerator section and the freezer section.

The other control usually called the refrigerator control is regulated by the refrigerator temperature. It controls the amount of time the compressor is running.

If the controls are turned all the way up, The freezer control is trying to keep all the cold in the freezer section.

You should set the controls for normal operation and leave them there. Normal is usually midrange for the freezer (baffle) control and less than half way up for the temperature (refrigerator) control.

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RE:

Refrigerator door left open accidentally for 2 days - now fridge does not seem to be cooling. Help!?

I was away from home for 2 days and when I came back, I found that the refrigerator door had been ajar the entire time I was gone. Needless to say, the food inside is ruined, but my concern is the refrigerator itself.

The freezer is working fine and the fan inside is blowing lots of cold air. ...

Fridge Door Left Open

Refrigerator Door Open Alarm

You may not have ruined anything. Its possible you have "iced up" the cooling coils. When a cooling unit works constantly, it sometimes does that. The idea of turning off the refrigerator part is a good one, but you need to leave it off for a few hours. to give the coils a chance to thaw out. I would unplug it for 2 hours, then plug it back in again. Then like another person suggested, leave the door closed while it is trying to cool.

If it isn't cool by morning.....

Your freezer is fine because nothing thawed out inside because the door was closed.

The refrigerator uses the same compressor/coils for the freezer and refrigerator part. The cold air blowing in the freezer was just a recirculating fan.

I left a GE Profile with bottom freezer door and refrig french doors open over nite. the alarm had been turned off by accident. As a design flaw the RH dorr does not close easily like the left and this is the door that was open. Light was out and the upper shelf food was warm. Closed doors and checked temps. below freezing in freezer but 74 at top shelf of fridge. food on bottom shelves cold probably due to light warming food on top shelf. Dumped all the food there. left doors closed. about 2 hours later heard motor going. open doors, lights came on and could feel cold air coming out of vent in back. Looks like that will take care of it. Frozen food still solid. escaped with <$50 in refrigerator food spoiled.

Hard to say. See if it starts cooling off by putting a thermometer inside and check it after a couple hours. Don't keep opening the door the cool you may have in there is just escaping. If it does not cool off in 2 hours you may have burnt out the cooling unit. Don't keep turning the knob, keep it at a normal setting.

Try turning the Refridgerator Off with the thermostat in side. Let stand for at least 5 minutes and then turn it back on to your normal setting. Allow 24 hrs. to come back to proper temp. If it doesn't in that time, call a technician.

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