Keezer building ice but not staying cold

[healey68]

I've had this keezer with a collar for a couple years now with very few issues. The chest freezer is ~10 years old and I have a simple 2x6 collar built Ontop of it. It has one of the STC temp controllers to cycle the compressor on and off again. I do not have insulation or a fan.

I have the set point on my STC @ 3.5 deg C and it's been working fine like that for years.

Last week I pulled the kegs out to give the whole thing a good cleaning. I also unplugged the chest freezer from the STC at this time. While doing my clean out I found a very large chunk of ice in the back left corner of the freezer, basically situated on the collar. I removed the ice, put it all back together and turned it on again.

Since then (8 days or so) the chest freezer has been running non-stop, but the STC controller says that it hasn't gone below 11 C. Ice seems to be building up on the same location again as well.

I've tried moving the temp probe around, but it doesn't make much of a difference.

Is my chest freezer on the way out? Any suggestions on what to do here?

 

[day_trippr]

You freezer is in dire straights due to insufficient refrigerant.
The ice build-up in one corner is a classic symptom of what refrigerant is left flashing in the evaporator.
Time to look for its replacement...

Sorry.

 

[healey68]

Thanks for the response day_trippr. I was suspicious of my old chest freezer, I bought it used so who knows really how old it was.

The good news is that I replaced it this morning. For anybody looking, Best Buy is selling a 10.2 cu ft Insignia unit for $229. I have it in my garage now and can say it will easily fit 8 ball lock kegs (6 without a collar). Pretty good deal from what I found yesterday.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/insigni...9389.p?id=1219691054956&skuId=8389389&cmp=RMX