Less than 1 year old and the frig is broke...again

[Phydeauxman]

While for the most part we love our Reflection 323BHS...having been around campers all of my life (I am 49 years old) I feel like the quality in parts has only marginally improved over the years. We have had our camper less than a year and the frig has quit working on electric for the second time. Not a catastrophic issue because it still works fine on gas but very frustrating because of the inconvenience it is going to cause me to get it fixed. If I could fix it myself I would versus taking it back to the dealer and getting it fixed for free.

[Retread68]

Phyd - If you let Janice know your AC Heater is DOA and the rig is still in warranty she can have someone at Atwood overnight you a new AC Heater. Taking the old one out and putting in the new one is simple if you have a phillips screwdriver to remove about 10 screws. Disconnect two wires, pull the heater out the top of the heat exchanger, push new one in, connect wires, check fuses, replace covers and it's a completed job. Just be sure to disconnect main electric service to the coach and pull the positive lead from the battery before starting or a fuse might blow while working on it.

Quality of parts marginally improvements? - - ok - I'm still trying to find one (and yeah, I'm a bit older). There are more conveniences than we had in our 1961 Shasta Airflyte, but "parts quality" ? - - I'm old and metal parts back then just beat all the plastic stuff today and the refrigerator back then ..... held a nice 20 lb block of ice to keep things cool !

Have a wonderful day.

[Phydeauxman]

Thanks for your very helpful tips Retread68. So, are you saying from experience that with the issue I am having the likely culprit is the AC Heater? I posted something on the Owners group on Facebook and Chris Bennett (Warranty Service Rep) called me today. He did not mention anything about the AC Heater but was more concerned about why I might have the problem twice in less than a year. He was very supportive in getting the issue fixed thru the dealer but if I can fix it myself...I would rather do that.

[Retread68]

Phydeauxman - I'm assuming you have an Atwood model HE-0801 (which could be wrong). If it still works on LP my first guess would be the AC Heater. If you have an ohm meter, the quick way to find out is to remove the black cover from the controller board (2 screws - upper right/lower left) (on back side of refrig where the burner is etc). Remove the black & red wires from their respective posts and see if there is any resistance between the positive & neutral wires (should be somewhere between 40-48 ohms). If zero, the burner has an open circuit and DOA. It has been a continuous problem for numerous folks.

To compliment the folks at Atwood, I will say they have been extremely responsive in replacing the part. Unfortunately they do not know how the heaters are made (in regard to spec's), but they know one of their suppliers sold them a bad batch. After taking the old one apart I found the wire had broken, probably due to expansion/contraction at a thin spot, but that's pure speculation. I just wanted to see how the son-of-a-gun was made.

[huntr70]

For future references, Grand Design has had enough of the Atwood issues and their response is to go back to Norcold refers and Dometic A/C units.

[Retread68]

Sounds like a good decision on GDRV's part. Unfortunately, Norcold and Dometic also have some issues just like any other refrigerator manufacturer that changed from using block ice for cooling !

[RamGunner]

I had an old Dometic fridge/freezer (12VDC or propane) in a Palomino hard sided pop-up and it was bulletproof while we had it. I've found their reliability to be generally pretty good.

It seems like all of the makes have cycles where they have issues, then they get resolved, and it goes round and round. It just seems like Atwood has had a very LONG cycle of problems with resolutions taking a long time.

We've only had ours for a few days, but the Dometic AC units and the Norcold fridge are working very well in high temperatures. Time will tell how well they hold up, but based on past experience I'm optimistic.

[Retread68]

The Crossroads Cruiser I had was complimented with Dometic brand A/C and refrigerator. In 10 yrs there was only 1 minor issue with the refrigerator and zero with the A/C. Like you said, it seems issues go in cycles which is understandable and eventually those issues are resolved for many moons.

Considering Atwood is trying to use a new cooling medium (He) and considering parts are made who knows where with little known QC, it's understandable that a new system design will have initial issues. How those issues are addressed in a timely manner is the test for any mfg regardless of the product.

[hoboshideout]

Yes on my 303.The atwood quit working on Electric,just on gas.Problem was the heat exchanger.switching from elec. to gas.
Had new one installed been working since Tuesday morning.

[JustinThyme]

For future references, Grand Design has had enough of the Atwood issues and their response is to go back to Norcold refers and Dometic A/C units.

Havent seen GDRV post up anything about that.

As of Oct 2014 Dometic bought Atwood.

http://www.dometic.com/USA/News/Dome...-Products-LLC/