Kenmore Freezer 253-9237383 tripping GFI Circuit

Question

We have a Kenmore 253-9237383 upright freezer and it keeps popping the Ground Fault Interruption circuit that its plugged into, when I reset the circuit it runs fine for a day or two then pops the circuit, reset, same again. Other than that it keeps everything frozen if caught soon enough.

Any ideas what to do or the cause might be?

Answer 1

If this freezer is in a garage and you use the receptacle for nothing else, then I would switch the GFCI duplex receptacle out for a single receptacle without GFCI protection.  Very often the surges created by a cycling compresor will damage the internal mechanism which make a GFCI receptacle work.  It's also possible that the freezer has an internal short to ground that only occurs intermitanty.  Either way, changing out the plug should fix the problem or reveal the larger problem with the freezer.

Answer 2

It is not the freezer the gfi outlets are all over the house inside and out water is getting in from a sprinker or ants in tripps the breaker, my gfi does it in a hard driving rain.

Answer 3

How many things are running on that circuit?Did you recently plug in a new item on that same circuit?Cause to much electricity used on 1 circuit will cause overload.

Answer 4

Refrigeration is not supposed to be on a circuit with GFI. They tend to draw  too much power to start.

The timing does sound about right for it to be something in the defrost circuit. It could be the wattage of the element or maybe a wire with some ice on it grounding enough to trip the GFI. Hard to say from here.

It takes a meter and checking the different circuits to ground. Some of those models use a circuit board and rheostat for the thermostat and they had a little problem with icing up, some shorted. They even had to come out with a different part and better shield for keeping them dry.  That is a good place to start.  

Good Luck.