Amana Defroster problems

[bassman99]

We have a 3 year old Amana bottom freezer refrigerator. The defrost is not working properly and I have had to defrost by taking off the back plate of the freezer. The resistance of the defrost element is 30 Ohms which is okay, but when I measured the voltage to the element in forced defrost mode it was 30 Volts. The element does not warm up. I assume that the voltage to the element should be 120 Volts (which would provide about 500 Watts through the heater). Does anyone know how to find the defective part? I don't want to put out $125 for a new ADC unit unless I am sure that it is the source of the problem.

Thanks for your help.

[daddyjohn]

try bypassing the defrost limit thermostat and see if the voltage improves, if not trace back to the circuit board and check the output there. Can you post the model #?

[bassman99]

Well, I took everything apart today. Put the fridge in forced defrost mode. Disconnected the defrost heater and measured 120V! Measured the defrost heater at 33 Ohms. But when i put the connectors together, no heat. At this point the only thing that makes any sense to me is that the pins are not making contact within the connectors. So, I connected one side and measured 120V across the other side. When I reconnected the second side and opened up the first, I get 120 Volts. This does not make any sense to me at all. Anyone have any ideas? At this point, I am considering cutting out the connectors and soldering the wires together to see if that helps. I would appreciate any ideas.

Thanks.

[daddyjohn]

Look at the other post for my reply. Kindly choose one post or the other, multiple postings for the same thing are confusing. Thanks.