Maytag refrigerator freezing food

Measure before you adjust

Put a glass of water on the middle shelf with a thermometer in it and read it in the morning. Somewhere between thirty-seven and forty degrees is right; a reading in the low thirties explains everything without any part being involved. Look at where the frozen items were sitting — directly under or in front of a vent is the answer more often than not, and moving them a hand's width solves it. Check the temperature setting itself, because these are easy to knock, and note whether the cabinet is unusually empty. A refrigerator with very little in it has nothing to hold its temperature steady and swings much further between cycles.

What it usually means, by the kind of machine

One complaint, several machines. This maker still sells a top-load washer with an agitator alongside one without, a front-loader, and a stacked pair, and it sells the same oven as a range and as a wall unit in gas and in electric. The behavior you can describe is identical on all of them; the first hour of the repair is not. A front-load washer has a drain filter the owner can open and a top-loader has nothing to reach from the front, and that single difference decides how the same afternoon goes.

• Side by side — The cold air enters through vents on the tall back wall, and anything pressed against them freezes. It is the layout where placement matters most.
• French door bottom freezer — Air enters at the top rear, so the upper shelf at the back is the cold spot. Milk kept there will develop crystals while the same milk in the door will not.
• Top freezer — The vent sits at the top of the fresh food space directly under the freezer, and the shelf immediately below it is the coldest place in the cabinet by some margin.

Twenty-four hours between changes

The commonest mistake with this complaint is adjusting the setting, checking in an hour, and adjusting again. These cabinets respond slowly and a change made at breakfast is not fully expressed until the following morning. Two adjustments in a day usually end with a refrigerator further from right than it started, and it is why we ask people to make one change and wait.

The cheapest fix on the site

Moving a bag of salad six inches is not a repair and we are not going to charge anybody for suggesting it. If the frozen items are all in the same spot and everything elsewhere in the cabinet is fine, the refrigerator is working correctly and the layout is the problem. That answer is worth a phone call rather than a visit, and it is the one we give most often on this page.