Chosen Solution
Hi all, I bought a used fridge, one of the classic large ones made in USA in the 90s. It’s in pretty good shape except for rust on the lower back plate of the freezer (when you open the freezer door)
- How normal is this?
- on a scale of 1 to 10, how bad is this issue for the general functioning of the fridge? Much appreciated
Update (02/16/2020) Here are the pics of the freezer guts, I took an inclined pic of the inside of the backplate show how water falls to the lower part. That seems to be the cause of rust, just want to know whether it’s normal.
Post some images of the problem. Here’s how to do this.. Adding images to an existing question Rust in the freezer compartment is indicative of standing water over a long period of time. This is usually caused by the drain pipe which is under the evaporator unit which is behind a panel at the back of the freezer compartment becoming blocked, so that the meltwater from the frost (ice?) covering the evaporator unit (due to the action of the auto defrost cycle) cannot drain into the evaporator pan which is located under the compartments (on the outside) near the compressor unit. The water has to go somewhere before it refreezes once the defrost cycle is over. The rust won’t cause too many problems depending on how severe it is but if the drain pipe is not clear then you may have cooling problems in the refrigerator sometime in the near future as the evaporator might become iced over and with it the evap fan which will stop functioning, stopping the flow of cold air throughout the refrigerator. You may end up with warm fridge, freezer OK problems at the least. This could be rated as a 8-10 problem ;-) Of course if the fridge has a cold water dispenser or ice maker then you may want to check out the water supply lines in the refrigerator for leaks as well
