Why is your fridge tripping off the electric?
A fridge is one of basic electric home appliances to be found in any household. We all know that it has to be working properly to preserve the quality of cold or frozen food. While your fridge is able to remain cold for several hours without power to it, it may be the cause of a few niggles in the meantime, especially when it decides to trip off the electric. In this article, we will tell you the reasons why a fridge can trip your circuit breaker.
WARNING
Before carrying out any work on your appliance, make sure you properly disconnect it from the mains electricity supply.
RISK OF ELECTRIC SHOCK
THE POTENTIAL CAUSES FOR THIS FAULT:
A faulty Compressor
A fridge may trip off the electric if there's an earthing issue with the compressor. To find out whether this is or isn't the case, you need to check the connections. You can also test it by disconnecting the compressor's electric connectors. If the electric no longer gets tripped off when you then plug in the appliance, then it is very likely that the compressor is the issue.
For your own safety, we would advise you never to touch electric wires without first having unplugged the device from the mains.
A defrost heater Malfunction
There's a defrost heater in all No-Frost fridges.It defrosts the fridge and prevents any potential ice formation. If the fridge trips off the electric, it could be because the defrost heater has an earth leak. Check all the defrost heater's connections to check this element isn't causing the fault. If you notice that the issue occurs mainly when the mechanism stops, open up the casing of the thermostat (or the circuitboard), unplug the defrost heater's wires and start the appliance again. Wait for the power to cut out again. If everything works again normally, you can safely assume it was the defrost heater and you can go ahead and replace it. On next-gen appliances, unplugging electric elements can make them go into fault/safe mode (error code). The fridge will no longer work if this element is not reconnected. If this is the case for you, you should use a multimeter to check that each of the components isn't conducting electric current to the appliance's framework. To check this, place one of the tester's tips on the component's lugs and the other on the appliance's metal structure. While you're doing so, you should also check that the defrosted water drip tray is intact (with no holes in it) because it is never a good idea to let water drip onto electrical wiring.
Purchase a defrost heating element for a fridge
A fan issue
On No-Frost fridges, the fan is designed to distribute cold air around the fridge. Check this element's electrical wiring in the same way as previously described. It is entirely possible that the earth leak is coming from the fan. You should use this opportunity to clean the fan. In fact, fridges work better with clean fans.
A thermostat malfunction
Haven't noticed any anomalies till now? The earth leak is probably related to the thermostat. Even though this fault is fairly rare, we advise you to check this element as well as its connections. Get out your multimeter and select the Ohmmeter mode. Then place one of the two tips on to the earth lug and the second on one of the thermostat's other lugs. If you detect continuity then you definitely need to replace it.