Dometic Fridge

[rocket19682]

I have a 2006 Damon Astoria 3773 with a dometic fridge. It's the basic fridge with the freezer on top and fridge on bottom. Between the fridge and freezer is the panel where you switch from auto (gas or electric) and gas only. Friday night I started the fridge on propane mode and Saturday morning it was cooled down to it's appropriate temperature. However, we left the house around 11 am for a 75 mile run down to the beach and by the time we go there the fridge/not the freezer was almost room temperature. The control panel had no lights working but it sounded like the burner was still powering the unit. I messed around with the switch and was able to get the lights on the switch back on but the fridge wasn't cooled down until I checked in the morning.

1. It appears I need to replace the board/switch on the front panel. Is this correct or is there something else I need to look at?

2. Is there a problem with motorhome refridgerators cooling going down the road? I had a fifth wheel and recently bought the motorhome so Im new to the motorhome game. My fifth wheel always worked well even when I checked after going down the road.

3. I ran the fridge on electric to see if that helped but it didn't seem to cool any better... I had the generator running so it was getting power.

Any thoughts or comments would be appreciated. Thanks

[RustyJC]

Did you have good 12VDC power to the remainder of the coach? The refrigerator's control circuits operate on 12VDC, and what you describe is similar to what a Norcold fridge in a previous 5th wheel did when the power converter failed and the batteries began to run low. As the voltage dropped, the front panel controls got very squirrely until they eventually shut down. This was despite the fact that the 5th wheel was in storage plugged into 120VAC power with the fridge running in the electric mode.

Rusty

[rocket19682]

There is good DC power in the coach since all other items are working properly. I can't say there is good DC power to the fridge since I didn't check. The lights only came on the control panel after some fanagling of the switch. It definitely appears to be a loose connection of some sort. I took the panel off but the connection look good to the board.

[GaryKD]

Hi rocket,
Before spending any $s, consider consider getting a meter and checking to coach batteries. Rusty's post is correct. The refer needs 11.9 VDC minimum to operate correctly. Choosing electric or gas is just telling the refer how to heat the cooling gas. The rest of the appliance runs off of 12 VDC.