Strong Smell in French Door Refigerator

TME4TLS,

Allow me to also apologize. If you could tell me what model number is, I may have a more specific suggestion. But here's a general one: have you tried baking soda?

-- HD Tech

The unit is a RF268AB purchased at Lowes in March 2010, serial number 43FB4GBSB00360D

We have tried baking soda, vinegar, washing with a dishwashing detergent and crumpled newspaper as the technician from A&E suggested. Nothing works. The smell is as strong as ever with an alcohol smell which has permeated all the food inside. If I could afford to do so, I would roll it out to the street and buy something American made.

TME4TLS,

I took a look at your model, and there are bunch of places for a spill to have gone down into. So perhaps when you have the tech come out to fix the other things, you can ask him to disassemble some of shelving so that you can clean all of that and get into some of the nooks and crannies of the fridge.

-- HD Tech

We have:
1. Removed all the shelves in the doors and washed them with hot water and dishwashing detergent.
2. Removed all the shelves, drawers and drawer slides from inside the refrigerator including the long drawer at the bottom and its slide and washed everything with hot water and dishwashing detergent.
3. Washed down the inside of the box with hot water and dishwashing detergent.
All this has been done twice and it is cleaner today than it was when it was built. Quite frankly, I am tired of washing the box out only to have the smell return.

I am ready to remove the drain tube and replace it with something else if flushing it with Clorox doesn't work. The box stinks and the alcohol smell is getting the best of me. If you can suggest a real fix instead of just telling me there are a lot of places for spills to hide, I would appreciate the help.

TME4TLS,

Just thought I'd clarify this, but you only smell this when you open the fridge, right?

-- HD Tech

Yes, we only smell the strong odor when the upper doors are opened. No smell in the freezer.

Hey TME4TLS,

I'm going to assume you've eliminated likely cracks and nooks. And I'm going to point out some harder to get to places that you should consider cleaning if you haven't already. Please consult the images below:

https://docs.google.com/open?id=0BzzXizm5KBLQYW16XzZMbEk3cmM
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0BzzXizm5KBLQUTVUOWFWbV9sclk
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0BzzXizm5KBLQaGxydU03NlBCVkk

Please let me know whether this helps!

HD Tech

The links provided were absolutely no help whatsoever. All I got was three ads for Google Drive, whatever that is supposed to be.

As for the cracks and nooks, we have cleaned this box until we are blue in the face. The smell persists despite all the cleaning efforts we can muster. Maybe you can do better. Let me know and I will provide my address so you can come clean the box.

BTW Heard from another Samsung refrigerator user about 90 miles away who has the same strong smell intheir box. Surprise, Surprise! I'll bet Samsung knows exactly what causes this stink.

The oder you are refering to is most likely caused by decayed broccoli,coliflower,or lettece. As they let off a gas that reacts with the poly liner . The smell & taste in other foods & ice cubes is discusting. I have ran into this in all brands of refrigerators. There is no for sure fix. I am a appliance tech with 30 years experance. You can try a mixture of warm water & vinalla extract wipe out whole ref. Also can put a few pieces of charcol (do not use the type that has lighter fluid in it) The charcol will absorb oders.In most cases I have encountered The smell lingers for years.
At one time the company I worked for sent the fridge back to manufacture. There response was as stated above Spoiled Food. Once this smell starts it most likely will not go away.

However I'm in the USA without any odd PC issues. Try PhotoBucket next time if they can't see these.

The smell we are all referring to is petro-CHEMICAL, not biological.

Same. Strong chemical smell that gets into food, especially butter, eggs, cheese, anything high in fat. Four boxes of baking soda and thorough washing didn't help. I finally turned the unit down to below 38 degrees and the smell went away. That was a year ago. Now it's back, stronger than before. It fills the room with the odor of... solvent or a plastics plant. I turned the unit down again, to no avail. I'm sure Samsung would just stall; they're not going to replace a $2400 fridge, and they're not going to re-manufacture all of plastic components.

No food spill causes a plastic smell. We didn't spill benzine or paint thinner in our refrigerator!

So, technology that pollutes what it is supposed to preserve. Why am I surprised?

Hi KenDay0407,

I'm very sorry for the inconvenience this has caused you. Unfortunately, this sounds like it may need servicing. Here's the thread where you can get details on setting that up: http://forums.cnet.com/7723-13973_102-542437/service-issues-click-here-for-help/

HD Tech

Of all the times I called Samsung for help, I received little if any direction. KenDay0407 posts once and Samsung is more than helpful with a reply. In the future, I will choose where my dollars go for appliances a lot more closely.

BTW If anyone wonders why A&E is so slow to set up a service call, it isn't that they are busy. When I went by the Sears service center this afternoon, I counted 7 idle A&E trucks on the lot.

Hi TME4TLS,

I'm sorry that you felt as if I was inattentive. Your description seemed different from the Ken Day's. If your still having problems, you can complete a service request here for you refrigerator: http://www.samsung.com/us/support/service/request

HD Tech

This odor penetrates into the butter, veggies, everything. I have emptied the ice trays several times. I have cleaned out the unit from top to bottom. I just makes the baking soda smell after a week.

We are having the same issue. I bleached my refrigerator, baking soda + soap & water!! Smell is still lingering..and I see there’s a water drip inside the frig under the tray!!

We purchased a Samsung RF263BEAESR from Sears four months ago...Initially we were very happy with the product, raved about it, recommended it to friends.....Than the mystery smell hit about a month ago...As many of you had done, we'd taken everything out of the fridge, cleaned the the interior with bleach and vinegar water, placed baking soda inside, all to no avail. At least now I know that we're not responsible for the smell. I will contact Sears and Samsung tomorrow...I'm very disappointed with Samsung...I have several Samsung TVs, and a tablet, and I've been very happy with the brand...The way they chose to respond to the issue will determine my future appliance/electronics purchases.

I am glad to announce that after more than a year of putting up with the smell from the refrigerator, the constant dripping water from the upper cooling coil, multiple service calls and replaced parts and those blasted gnats which fly up from the drain tube, A&E has agreed to replace the Samsung under the terms of their master service agreement. A&E dropped the ball more than once and made more excuses than I expected but finally relented once I was able to speak with a real manager who immediately agreed to the replacement. The new model will not be here until June so we will have to continue to mop up water from the bottom of the refrigerator, something I can live with just so I will no longer have this $2200 Samsung boat anchor in my kitchen.

Poor design and even poorer service from Samsung is not a good business model. As I read over the entire thread it looks as though the Samsung rep who reads here probably has knowledge about the drainage problem but isn't about to admit it or offer a solution, offering instead stupid ideas on how to clean the interior or other bogus or misleading hints. We bought their defective product and now they expect us to simply live with it.

As for me, I will not buy a Samsing branded product even going so far as to do without should theirs be the only product on the market. No more foreign made products for us, the new refrigerator is a Whirlpool, which I am sure has some foreign made products inside, and we will continue to purchase only American made goods and consider the foreign made only as a last resort. I have had enough of the poor quality often found in the foreign made goods.

Enough of this rant. I am patiently waiting for the Whirlpool to arrive.

This is so helpful!! Same issue happening to us. Ridiculous

the issue is the water drain in the fridge..I have the same issue taking it apart now. they are in class action law suit pending for this issue they know what the problem is the lower crisper has water under it and the smell is from the plugged frozen drain.

videos on you tube do much more than Samsung ever did!!!!!!

We are having the same problem, and after reading all the posts I'm not sure it's even worth having a service call. Can you post the you tube link to fix this problem? Thanks!