OMG I hate this fridge. The ice and water dispenser is clearly a component that needs regular cleaning, and Samsung seems to have gone out of their way to make it “a whole thing”. The only component the manual instructs you to clean is the drip tray.
None of the pieces are easily removable. I ended up having to unplug the fridge, remove the screw that held the control panel on, pry it off, unclip the wiring harness to remove it, and set it aside (and clean separately).
Once that was off, the outer ice chute is still not removable without further disassembly of the dispenser unit, and that’s where I drew the line - everything started getting all wire-y and gear-y past that.
Luckily, I was able to pull the water line up/out and clean it really good. With the panel removed, I was able to clean a bit deeper into the ice chute and get it mostly sanitized (had to get some of it from the top/inside the fridge.
Why, Samsung, why is a procedure that should be routine such a nightmare?
Fuck Samsung… We have their appliances as well since they were here when we moved in.
Sorry but I have to rant. This post has re-awoken my rage…
Here’s what it’s like when you need a repair, say when the refrigerator is freezing your food:
First call around the local appliance repair places to find out they’re not “authorized repair agents” or whatever. Give up, call the support line and relay the problem. They state a tech will notified and dispatched in the next few days. From half way across the state of course…
Tech arrives, and obviously hasn’t been told anything because while relaying the problem to them, they know what it is immediately without even opening the thing, so clearly Samsung support hasn’t told them shit.
Because they drove out instead of being told the problem by Samsung, pay the bill including the $150 travel cost and wait for the additional $150 part that is a cheap-ass plastic piece of shit to arrive. Then pay for all that again for the install, but hey! If you’re lucky they’ll give you a “discount” on your bill and it’ll be only slightly cheaper than if you bought a new fridge that isn’t absolute garbage.
Fuck Samsung.
Hey at least they came back to fix yours. Exact same thing happened with us except they never came back to actually fix it. We just got rid of it and got an LG. Best decision. Haven’t had any problems with it, except the door ice dispenser gets clogged if you don’t use it often enough but that’s minor compared to defrosting your fridge every month.
Yeah, that tracks with the other horror stories I’ve heard about Samsung appliances.
I’m in the same boat: only have them because they came with the house. I’d never have bought them of my own volition, and I’m both dreading and looking forward to the day they fail. Looking forward to is only so that I can replace them and stop worrying about when they fail.
Have a Samsung fridge as well. Every time the water/water line gets gross I just run some vinegar through it and let it sit a bit. That cleans it out well.
Cleaning vinegar is always something I forget to pick up at the grocery store.
I’ve seen that recommended a few times when I was looking for cleaning tips. How do you run it through the line? AFAIK, it just uses water pressure from the line and doesn’t pump / “pull” the water into the fridge lines.
Pretty much just get a big bottle of it and stick the water line in the vinegar bottle and put it on top of the fridge. It should siphon through slowly when using the water dispenser. Another option is to use a turkey baster or something to push vinegar into the line but that doesn’t work nearly as well.
Thanks. Makes sense. I’ll give that a shot next time I give it a thorough cleaning. I don’t have it in me to disassemble that again for at least another month.
