Refrigerator Maintenance

[Navigator]

Just saw an incenerated AS on another thread. The caption read "See what happens when you do not give your refrigerator regular maintenance?

Please pardon my ignorance, but:

Now I'm starting to worry. What was that guy talking about?
What do you have to do with a 3 way refrig. to keep it from self destructing?
Dick

[thenewkid64]

I believe the story on that one was that the refer was on gas, and lit. The cooling unit popped and the ammonia gas leaked out. The ammonia gas IS flammable, and heavier than air. The gas caught and the result is in the photo. There is a chance of this happening to any older absorption refer. Maintenance really would not make a difference unless you added scraping the rust off the cooling unit and re coating it with a rust preventive as part of the plan.

The point to remember is that if you smell ammonia shut off the gas and GET OUT or the other way around, GET OUT and kill the gas at the bottles. This is the first picture I have seen of this, but I have heard of it happening in other brand RV's too. It is just a factor of the age and condition of the refer.