If your fridge-freezer has developed a fault where the freezer has defrosted, or is not getting cold enough and it’s in a garage, and the temperature is very cold, it could just be that it isn’t suitable for putting in a garage..
.. A surprising number of fridge-freezers in the UK end up in a garage or in an outbuilding. However, did you know that many are not capable of running properly if the temperature surrounding the appliance drops too low?
When winter comes, many people find that their freezer starts to defrost. However, it’s also possible for unrelated faults to cause the freezer part of a fridge freezer to defrost or not get cold enough, so don’t automatically assume the cause is as described in this article
All refrigeration has what’s called a climate class rating, which states the minimum and maximum temperature the appliance is designed to work within. I believe the overwhelming majority of consumers have never heard of climate class so surely its the responsibility of retailers to advise customers about it when selling refrigeration?
Which fridge freezers can defrost in a garage?
It’s combined fridge-freezers. If a combined fridge freezer has only one thermostat (or sensor), which is sited inside the fridge section, it is likely to be affected by this problem. If the ambient temperature of the room it’s placed in gets to around freezing, then the fridge thermostat is likely to shut off. When this happens on appliances with only one thermostat the freezer also shuts off. If the temperature remains cold for several hours then the fridge thermostat will not come back on.
It doesn’t need to because inside the fridge compartment will be plenty cold enough. In really cold weather it is possible for the fridge thermostat to stay off for a long time. Whilst ever the thermostat for the fridge remains off the compressor will stop running and the freezer will eventually start to warm up, at least to roughly the ambient temperature of the garage, which although cold, is not cold enough for frozen food.
As a rule of thumb I would say that if you can set separate temperatures for your fridge and the freezer section I would assume there are separate thermostats controlling the freezer and therefore this issue shouldn’t affect your appliance. (Article continues below..)
What about chest freezers?
Chest freezers should not suffer from this specific issue because they have their own thermostatic control and do not try to control the temperature of two separate compartments. However, if the temperature in the garage significantly exceeds that of its climate class it can’t be guaranteed to work without any issues. Also, if there is little ventilation and or condensation it can cause premature rust and even damage to components inside. I have seen many chest freezers in garages over the years that seem to fair reasonably ok although modern ones may not be so well built.
Is this a bad design? – Problems below 10 degrees?
Manufacturers would say they design them to be installed in a kitchen. However, to me it does seem less than ideal to rely on only one sensor or stat to control two different parts of the appliance (just to save money). Many fridge freezers do have separate stats. As saving money is the only possible advantage I can think of it’s therefore presumably more likely to affect the cheaper range of fridge freezers.
Also, there are reports that many refrigeration appliances are not guaranteed to work properly if temperatures drop below 10 degrees centigrade. I would imagine many people have appliances in parts of their homes and even in some kitchens where the temperature can drop below 10 degrees during the night or – what about when on holiday in the winter when the heating may be left off or on low enough only to prevent freezing?
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If an appliance is installed in a kitchen and temperature drops during the night or holiday periods cause it problems I would say that’s a design issue. You cannot be expected to keep the heating on 24/7 to keep an appliance running. However, if installed in an out building or garage I would think you have much less of a claim other than why weren’t you asked at the point of sale where you would be installing the appliance?
What can be done about it?
A fridge freezer with only one thermostat operating inside the fridge compartment is not suitable to run in a particularly cold environments. If affected you need to either exchange it for a fridge freezer with two thermostats controlling the fridge and freezer independently, or swap it for a separate fridge and freezer, or you need to somehow stop the environment from getting below 4 °C (which is likely to be impractical).
Do I have any comeback if my fridge freezer doesn’t work in my garage?
The short answer is probably not, at least not with the manufacturer, you have placed it in an environment it is not designed for. If it was me I might be annoyed though that the person I bought it from did not enquire as to whether I intended to place it in a garage or not. I would argue this problem is in no way common public knowledge, but most retailers are well aware of it because they get called out to them all the time.
All manufacturers and aftersales engineers also know about this issue because they too get called out lots of times under guarantee and have to tell the customer there’s no “fault” on the appliance and it’s not covered under guarantee. Some might say it’s the responsibility of the shop you bought it from to advise at the point of sale that it is not suitable for fitting in a garage or other outbuilding because the companies (not necessarily individual sales staff) know that so many people place them there. I don’t know whether trading standards would agree or not.
At one time, Comet, one of the largest UK retailers of such appliances carried out a survey where they found that around 15% of call outs to fridge freezers were caused by them being placed incorrectly in a garage or another building subject to very cold temperatures. This being the case, I would have thought it common sense for all their sales staff to be instructed to ask any customer buying such a fridge freezer where they intended to site it but they never were.
This is not only in the customer’s interest but in the interest of the retailer as any customer affected by this problem is likely to be pretty upset about it. At the end of the day it’s unlikely that any retailer is legally obliged to check on these matters but personally I believe they should because it’s very common for people to site fridge freezers in their garage and they should know that.
If affected, is my appliance damaged, or will it recover if moved to somewhere warmer?
If the freezer is defrosting due to the room being so cold it switches off the thermostat inside the fridge – and the fridge freezer is only controlled with one thermostat in the fridge (no stat or sensor in the freezer) then no damage should be inflicted. The freezer has only stopped working because the fridge stat has stopped working. Once temperatures increase it should work normally again. However, make sure you don’t wrongly assume this is the cause of a defrosting freezer as of course faults can occur causing freezers to stop working too.
Could a fridge-freezer start to defrost in a kitchen during winter months if the heating isn’t on?
This question has been asked a few times and I am presuming yes, there could be a problem if you have a fridge-freezer with only one thermostat controlling both the fridge and freezer and you go away on holiday when its cold. I’m not sure how most people do it, but normally when we go away we leave the heating off but we’ve never gone away in winter. If you went away and didn’t leave the heating on low (say around 14 – 15 degrees) then potentially during prolonged cold periods if the ambient temperature in the kitchen drops low enough (around 0 – 4 degrees C or colder) the fridge thermostat or sensor is likely to shut off as the temperature in the fridge becomes cool enough.
This won’t be an issue for the contents of the fridge because of course it’s reached the correct temperature. But if the freezer compartment is also controlled by the stat inside the fridge then this will stop the freezer coming on too. Therefore if the temperature remained cold enough to not require further cooling inside the fridge compartment then freezer compartment will not get any further cooling and after sufficient time has passed will start to thaw out.
The chances are if this did occur then unless you have an appliance with a warning light or sound to indicate the temperature of the freezer has warmed up enough to adversely affect the quality of the frozen food you might not realise the food has partially defrosted compromising its quality.
My advice would be that if you think you could be affected then if any food inside the freezers seems a little off when you thaw it out to use then throw it away. If you do have a fridge freezer that sounds or displays a warning if the temperature has been compromised you should assume the food has been partially defrosted even if it is rock solid when you come back.
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Ladies and gentlemen, I think we have a result!
The final word has arrived from Beko and pretty well matches what Eileen (#72) was told.
“All products manufactures after January 2009 are suitable for the low ambient lockout, therefore all current stock will be suitable. The difference is the style of the external door, the / models have a bevelled design. The / is situated on the rating label which is found inside the cabinet on the left wall. If you wish to discuss this please call our Service Department on 0845 600 4911 and we can explain.”
I assume by the ‘/’ models they mean as in ‘/1’ or ‘/2’.
Just remember though, it’s ONLY their combi fridge-freezers and not ALL fridge freezers that work in garages and outbuildings. Do check the brochure before purchasing.
Thanks for all your input on this.
This article was extremely helpful. I bought a 6month old Zanussi fridge/freezer and put it in my conservatory to test it for a while. I switched it on last night for the first time (frosty night and the conservatory is in the shade during the winter) and all seemed well as the motor started up and ran. When I checked it this morning the frezer would not go lower than -10c. It was cold enough to freeze my test water container but not as cold as is recommended, about -18c.
I had a funny feeling that the cold room temperature in the closed off, un-heated, conservatory ( effectively it was outside temp wise) might have had something to do with it so I moved it in to the main house. I then started to do some searching on the internet and found this article; it confirmed my suspicions could be correct and, very helpfully, explained why it was happening. I had never heard of the ‘climate class’ before so I checked to see what it was and sure enough the minimum room temp required was 10c – much warmer than my conservatory. The fridge/freezer is now indoors and the freezer temp is down to -20c!! How cool is that – excuse the pun lol!
Many thanks for taking the time to do the article.
We moved house at the start of the summer and our fridge/freezer has had to live in a brick lean-to/ utility space. The cold snap we are currently enjoying has killed it off (it is literally freezing out there right now) and from my research – helpfully confirmed here – Beko ‘frost free’ seem the only safe option as a replacement. Glad I checked it out though, we could easily have wasted our money.
Good article, Thanks :)
To all of you who have stuck with this thread, especially “Washerhelp” & “David Penn”/”Eileen”… A great big thank you.
Do you know I’ve transported my 18 month old Zanussi from Bournemouth to my birth place in Gloucestershire (to see a trusted repair shop) to have it looked at. To be told that there is nothing wrong with it, for me to take it all the way back down to Bournemouth only for it to fail again and ruin another freezer compartment full of food!
I feel pretty let down by the sales people at Comet and even more of an idiot for not really getting in amongst the finer details myself (i was a mechanical engineer in the army for many years & should know better!) :-)
Cheers
Here’s a summary of the situation as I see it –
Comet, and all the major retailers are very much aware of this problem because all their service departments constantly get called out to these affected fridge freezers installed in garages or other cold places, which fail during cold weather, and have done for years. They tell customers their problem isn’t covered by their guarantee and there’s nothing they can do. They presumably even charge plenty of them for the privilege.
However, I don’t believe any of them would deliberately sell these appliances to their customers knowing they wont work as that would just be stupid.
I believe the reason the sales person rarely if ever ask a customer where they intend to put the fridge freezer with a mind to advising them that certain a fridge freezers will only work in a warm kitchen is because the retail side doesn’t seem to have been told by the service side.
The reason I suspect the service side (or head offices) haven’t advised all their sales staff about this issue, and instructed their sales staff to make sure people aren’t sold inappropriate fridge freezers when they intend to place it in a garage or other cold environment is because the companies are NOT suffering financially with the status quo and could even be profiting on the service side.
I believe the retailers are negligent in selling these appliances to thousands of customers for many years when at least part of their company is very much aware of the problem.
I think if you buy a fridge freezer that doesn’t work properly when installed in a garage or other cool place you have no responsibility for the error and could never have known that there is a specific type of fridge freezer design that (to save money) only has one sensor or stat controlling two compartments doing totally different jobs, which means it will stop working if the temperature drops low enough to turn off the fridge stat. Clearly the sales person was equally unaware of the problem or did not inform, which proves that customers cannot be held responsible for this. If they say you should have known you should say why – when your own staff don’t even know? But if they then say ah, but if we didn’t know how is it our fault you say your company does know and has done for years. If they haven’t told you they are responsible for the continuation of this issue. Many people have had fridge freezers installed in these places for years and were unaffected by this issue because most fridge freezers have separate sensors to control temperatures in the fridge and freezer.
Whether you can successfully claim compensation, or a refund is down to how all this is interpreted by a small claims court or trading standards and other consumer groups.
Test cases needed
As a final practical comment from myself, I am pleased to confirm that the Beko combi-fridge freezer that I bought through Currys in June is still working quite happily in my garage even though the recent cold snap has meant the temperature in there has hovered pretty much around freezing for the last few days.
Hi everyone I wish I had found this thread last winter and it may have saved me money. My old fridge freezer worked pefectly in my garage until last year when the temp. dropped. (we have had mild winters before that) I thought it had just packed up so dashed out and bought another one ( old one worked fine after cold spell) which worked fine until this last cold spell. I have had to taken the newest one out of my garage and I now have it in my dining room. Looking at all your comments which were extremely informative and helpful I now know the problem and it looks like I will have to invest in a seperate Beko freezer for my garage and buy a fridge which I have room for in a walk in cupboard. More money! I hope that will solve my problem for next winter as the winters seem to be getting colder here. Thanks once again.
This article is so helpful, thank you! Our fridge freezer in the kitchen defrosted in late November during a prolonged cold spell that made it difficult to keep even the main living areas up to 19 degrees. The kitchen was and still is much colder, and after reading this article I suspect this is why it stopped working. We will try to improve the insulation in the kitchen and see if we can’t get it working again – and hopefully have saved ourselves the cost of a new unit. Many thanks!
A relative has a Bosch fridge freezer in the kitchen and the room temperature is often below 18C for weeks at a time. The instructions state that, if the room temperature drops below this level, the superfreeze switch should be switched on for 24 hours. I doscovered this when it bacame apparent that the freezer had cut out and all the contents had thawed! We turned the superfreeze switch on and the freezer kicked back into life within an hour.
My question is, is it OK to leave the superfreeze switch on for several weeks continuously? The instructions seem to assume that any dip below 18C will be temporary and short-term only, which is patently ridiculous!