De-ice your freezer (laidback-style)

Now, what to do when a roommate leaves the door to your freezer open over night, then realize what's been done and close the door without telling you.
You'll want to get rid of the ice, won't you? Well, this is how its done. Laidback-style.

Keep in mind, we are dealing with water, water is wet, water is hard (if cold), and water may cause damage to property and so on. Your landlord might be a little grumpy if you spill a lot of water in your flat.

I have been instructed to tell you that:
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! IF YOU MESS THIS UP, IT'S ON YOU.
Now, lets get to "work".

Step 1 What you'll need

Now, the case here is what do you need to de-ice a freezer. Some might use heat, from a reversed vacuumcleaner, or perhaps a hairdryer. However, this requires actually having to stick around, and working to get the ice off.

Here is what I think you'll need:
- The freezer (preferably without food)
- A bucket
- Gaffers tape / duct tape / electricians tape (this actually works best)
- A refuse bag, the big sturdy kind.
- A bottle, empty. 1,5 liters will suffice.
- A can of Coke. Or two....

Comments

[son0fhobs]

If you pour salt on the ice, it'll defrost a lot faster - without the freezer needing to be as warm either. About as much salt as sips you took and you should be golden.

[aussie_in_mo]

That's not how you spell liquid... At least I assume you were going for liquid and not lucid...

[froggy1562]

Tried this method and it totally worked. Even though we taped the bag to the fridge, there was still leakage on the sides of the mini fridge. So we put down rags inside on the sides to get the water and put a large towel underneith the bucket for any unexpected leaks. We also taped a hair dryer to the door pointing at the biggest chunk of ice. Let it sit for 20 minutes with the blow dryer on hi heat, then started to hack at the ice. The heat made the hole process take 30 minutes all together. Clean fridge! Just be careful of the little cables and tubes if you have any.

[velvet_skin]

i don't have time to leave something half way done, when i do it i gotta finish it, so i use the hair blower to warm up the inside. the blocks of ice just slide off.dry with paper towels, blow it some more to dry it well shove food back in and i'm set for the year.

[godofal]

an iron for clothes works faster ;P
note, i have tried it, and it works, just watch out for the plastic behind the ice (if any)

[Matt D655]

laid-back style what do ya mean?

[trebuchet03]

Truly Laid back compared to my method :D

Repairing the Girlfriend's Mini Fridge/Freezer

[trialex]

I fill up my supersoaker with hot (not boiling) water, then cut away the sections of ice imagining I'm using a waterjet cutter.

[PKM]

I know it's called "laid-back method" but doesn't work so well if the freezer is full of food you'd quite like to keep. If your freezer ices up over time and you want to keep the food that's in it, pack it all together in a cardboard box with about 4" of folded towels between the food and all the sides of the box- your food will keep cold for hours. If you throw salt around the inside of the fridge or mix up a spray bottle of very salty water, it hugely speeds up the melting process, and is compatible with the "tape the bag there and leave it method" if you're in no hurry. We had to get inventive with a similar method when the freezer in my student house iced up so badly that food was stuck in the "glacier" around the cooling fins, but stuff in the middle was melting.

[Theodor]

Excellent point. In my case, this was a freezer I was going to take back home with me from my student house, and so it was already emptied. But yes, if it is stacked, you will need somewhere to dump it all, and yes this requires work. Sadly...

[KeenBeanMachine]

I would suggest turning the freezer off to expedite the process!

[Theodor]

Heh... You make an excellent point. I've edited it in. Also mentioned that this works best with a freezer without food, seeing as the food probably will thaw by the time you are done...

[KeenBeanMachine]

Ya, i had a mini fridge who's "freezer" (which consisted of a little metal box that couldn't hold much more than an ice cube tray) would build up ice that would fill up the entire freezer portion. Anyway, some times i used this thawing method, but other times i would just hack away at the ice with a hatchet. It worked well many times, until one day, i was hacking away and punctured the metal. A quiet hissing and interesting smell told me that a had a serious coolant leak. Mini fridge, Rest In Peace. The moral of the story? Use Theodor's thawing Method!