I can tell just by the tone of your voice that you were having a blast with this one. What a rare find.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks, and yep I rally enjoy these projects!

Thank you David for sharing the first startup. Its incredible and so awesome it started cooling. Makes one really appreciate the craftsmanship and engineering that went into our appliances so many years ago.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Definitely mad respect for the engineers back in the day!

Fascinating that you got a pre-WWII GE fridge going in minutes and many $5k+ Samsungs etc. dying in a few years these days! 🤨🤦. Thanks for sharing this it was awesome to see. I am more of an electronics guy, but really enjoy these videos and I enjoy learning more about the older refrigerators and equipment. Including the stories they can tell when you take the time to look for it and you show what to look for. I really enjoy the channel content! Thanks

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks for your comment! It is always fun to figure out the stories these tell. These newer fridges are engineered to fail. Sam sung is famous for phones which people replace every couple of years because the company advertises the next model and people think they have to change. They don't know how to build a long lasting product. Only a fool would buy a major appliance from them.

The cigs lol!!!! As a reformed closet smoker, this really gave me a good laugh.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

That was funny finding those!

What an incredible find and who would have imagined we would see this cooling!

Really cool!! I’m not sure why I stopped getting notifications for your videos, but I’m glad I looked.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks for the comment! I don't know about the notifications. Seems that I don't get them either, for my subscriptions. May be an e-mail spam filtering issue.

Yes I enjoyed it as much as you did watching this. Such wonderful old technology. I think I would prefer it over the Frigidaire belt driven fridge with the motor on the bottom that you featured a while back. Look forward to seeing the remaining videos.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks for the comment! This is a very neat piece, and definitely rare to find complete and working.

Winston tastes good like a cigarette should! Winston gives you real flavor, full rich SO² flavor Winston's easy drawing too, the filter lets the SO² through... Yes, Winston's tastes good like a cigarette should.

@dianabradley8349

5 ай бұрын

😂😂😂

@garrettdavis8469

5 ай бұрын

haha!

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Hilarious! Nothing like an SO2, oil and Supco S88 cigarette first thing in the morning!

Very cool detective work there. I find that on a lot of old radios I work on, a lot of repairmen back in the day were total hacks. Could have been some guy who read a book on refrigerator repairs and did repairs on the cheap. Whoever worked on that motor clearly wasn't an expert.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Yep, they really weren't an expert! Not only reversed but the end bells rotated all wonky. That would have been visible well before they got it back together and found it not to cool.

Thanks for sharing! What a great find.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks!

Back when companys cared about quality

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

This is true. Very different world.

They made belt-drive units for DC mains power, since DC motors needed brushes and electronic inverters hadn't been invented yet, but they may have had a surplus of the compressors even after they stopped selling DC models, so sold them with AC motors instead.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

They did use DC belt drives, for sure. However, GE in the early 1930's had a DR series Monitor Top and possibly a CK series which were DC hermetic. The hermetic motor was four-wire two-phase, and there was a rotary converter underneath the cabinet to convert the DC mains to the correct 2-phase for the motor. I wish KZread had a way to attach pictures to comments, because there is a neat write up and pictures in the manual about this.

WOW! Can’t say I’ve seen anything like it.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

I think there are 2 others known to the online collector world, neither have the rotary compressor still in place.

There must've been enough stodgy old bastards in 1938 that didn't want none of that new-fangled monitor top nonsense to justify making these.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

I think you are correct!

David this is great technological archeology! Thank you for another great piece of technology from our past! I really appreciate the great work you do! Keep the videos coming!

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thank you!

Very interesting...

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thank you!

This thing is cool glad it being repaired on not thrown away thay definitely don't make them like that used to stuff today won't last half as long as this.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thank you!

Whoa! I never would have imagined it would have had enough charge to do anything once you said it smelled of SO2 when you turned the flywheel, let alone a full charge and fully functional! That seal evidently held perfectly up until the flywheel was moved. Incredible.

@davida1hiwaaynet

9 ай бұрын

It is amazing it held like that!

Was just digging thru some of your slightly older video uploads here, in an attempt of seeing if possible, you might have come across &/or messed with an early DR-3 unit yet.. one which incorporates a “start capacitor” in a rather large metal box, mounted directly behind the condenser coiling, as that’s the type I have, on the cabinet that was called GE’s “deluxe” model, for a single door fridge; model P-72 & is ONE HECK OF A BEAST! I found this fridge’s inner workings very ingesting as well, for all of the same reasons you pointed out… I felt compelled to leave you a comment, of after hearing your last bit of dialogue, explaining how even that relatively small cabinets’ parts, have now taken over most of your shops’ available space.. that got me laughing!! I’ve already FULLY dismantled every single part of my early P-72 DR-3 Monitor Top, with all intentions of going over each part, to fully clean, refurbish, restore, revarnish &, remake what wood door opening trim is bad… yes, most definitely, does this type of project TAKE OVER ‘ALL’ AVAILABLE SPACE IN SHOP!!!!!! I’ve watched/listened to all of your videos to get schooled up on all-things I can, pertaining to these Monitor Top fridges, to assist my restoration efforts. And yes, I’ve “liked/sub’d” your YT chan oh, about 3 years ago now.. THANK YOU for all of the vital information you’ve relayed over the years!

@davida1hiwaaynet

2 ай бұрын

Hi Sean. Thanks for your comment. The capacitor box on the DR-3 is a transformer-capacitor unit. It performs as a start capacitor and a run capacitor by selecting between two turns ratios of the transformer. The capacitor its self is operating on a very high voltage and they tend to go bad over time. We normally remove the transformer-capacitor setup and replace it with a separate start cap and run cap in the same housing. These do expand and take over every possible bit of shop space, that is for sure!

@seanbatiz6620

2 ай бұрын

@@davida1hiwaaynet Thanks for response.. yeah, that is something I was already thinking of doing; that of, placing modern start & run caps in original canister. Of the “way-to-many-to-list” vintage/antique things I’ve taken on, refurbishing &/or, restoring, I’ve done replaced I don’t know HOW MANY old caps in whatnots.. restored a 1927(8?) Philco HighBoy radio a few years back.. suffered some fire damage from house it was in, that burned down, less a VERY FEW items that “somewhat” survived.. THAT radio’s chassis contained a RIDICULOUS number of old-school foil caps, all packed in that same type of black wax/tar junk! Took awhile but, got that radio working like new.. it’s cabinet is a different story however. That’s still a “maybe” someday wood project! Of this crazy beast of a fridge I have here, being the “DeLuxe” model, most definitely took up major floor space in my shop! Was able to carefully store every bit of cabinet parts into one large wood box on caster wheels, for now. Compressor top unit is secured to a separate caster wheel cart, waiting for attention soon. Mended the break of base of vertical control unit’s Bakelite frame; apparently an all-to-common a problem &, likely why GE moved on to using them horizontal control units. Mended break with J.B. Kwik two part epoxy.. so far, so good. It’s possible the bellows has no SO2 charge left in it, as I didn’t notice any significant change, when subjected to freezer v outside heat.. will perform modern charge port addition mod as u did in previous vid, if definitely no charge left.. Now, all that said and aside, this fridge IS missing something that really REALLY sucks! Both its main nomenclature plate, giving exact unit info/data &, the cool “GE Icing Machine” logo plate, over heater hole, at base of condenser coil. This unit is VERY early production, as its compressor is of that “semi-hermetic” type, being bolted together.. cabinet’s single door has THREE long styled hinges, like mostly found on bigger double door or more units of the early production models.

Dave, Excellent content. I believe that is not technically a General Electric model but 1934 HP-4/5 model from their marketing subsidiary, Hotpoint. Hotpoint's Chicago plant built the cabinet and put the GE sourced mechanism in it. It was non-hermetic as to not compete with the Monitor Top. Once GE introduced the sulphur dioxide "flat top" their Hotpoint brand went to a sealed unit as well. It was a goofy marketing arrangement for sure that went back to Hotpoint's founding. Undoubtedly it was all to satisfy anti-trust and merger issues.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for this info! This makes lots of sense, considering the front of the top panel having an extra hole not covered by the emblem. Lots of marketing craziness, I am sure!

@WC0125

5 ай бұрын

I found the cabinet in the parts manual. Depending upon the defrost position there were three different escutcheons.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

@@WC0125 Would you mind sharing a link to the manual?

@WC0125

5 ай бұрын

I'll email you a link to where I purchased the copy. It's not digital.

The only GEs I know of that have cabinets made by other companies were the later 3-door ones which had cabinets made by Bohn.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks, and yes those large Bohn cabinets are beautiful.... and heavy!

My guess for the reason of this design is that it could have been a value/low end type option since the full hermetic motors were likely very expensive at the time. Being belt drive and relying on a shaft seal, many of these were likely lost to time as manufacturers moved away from belt drive and also the war effort. Also since a belt drive has more places to leak (especially SO2 systems), which in turn required periodic maintenance, many may have been replaced by their full hermetic counterparts, this is only a theory however.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Evan, you are so right abou2 these being lost to time. There were many reasons, in addition to your explanation. There were ad campaigns about dangerous abandoned refrigerators trapping kids (may have happened once or twice and not a widespread issue) as well as scrap metal drives for the War Effort. There are still a few hiding, I am sure.

@evanchapmanfanman

5 ай бұрын

@@davida1hiwaaynet nowadays the amount of excessive safety features drives me crazy, what happened to “personal responsibility”.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

@@evanchapmanfanman This is so true! People are being dumbed down at an alarming rate.

Fantastic project on this antique general electric refrigerator

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks!

I thought you might end up working on one of these. The only other working one I was aware of was a Hotpoint, and I think it may have been in Australia. What can you tell me about that big commercial cabinet?

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

Thanks! As for that cabinet; it's a 50's Foster Thermo-Dynamic all-refrigerator. Has a Tecumseh 1/4 HP unit and runs like a top. Was a local find I bought to repair and resell.

@douro20

5 ай бұрын

@@davida1hiwaaynetThe only Foster I know of is an old UK company who makes commercial/industrial refrigerators and freezers.

@davida1hiwaaynet

5 ай бұрын

@@douro20 Same here. I think this was an American venture of the same company but not sure. There is very little about it online. Here is the part 1 of the video series about it: kzread.info/dash/bejne/oZOGtMajfcndoso.html

is this one of the earliest fan cooled evaporators?

@davida1hiwaaynet

3 ай бұрын

Hi; thanks for the comment! I think you may be thinking of the condenser coil with the fan on the motor. This is definitely an early example of a fan cooled condenser. Frigidaire started out with air cooled fan-coil condensers in 1925 or 1926 with their belt-drive units. The belt-drives generally have much higher HP and cooling capacity for any given cabinet; versus sealed units. For that reason, they need to have forced air flow to carry away the greater heat capacity. Have you seen my Frigidaire M5-2 with its non-finned air cooled condenser?

@Captain_Char

3 ай бұрын

@@davida1hiwaaynet I always get the two mixed up, lol