Everyone thinks when their RV’s fridge stops cooling that it has a refrigerant leak. 

Here’s how to test to find out if this is the case for you. 

(By the way, my name is Emily. I'm a certified mobile RV repair tech. And THIS is RV Repair Woman.)

All you're going to do to confirm if you have a refrigerant leak in your fridge is perform the see smell hear test. 

We don't need any fancy tools. We can just use the tools that your mama gave you when you were born. 

Open up the back access panel for your fridge and take a look around. 

We are going to look for a yellow dye. If you see bright neon dye anywhere in that bottom compartment, you have a leak. They specifically put in that dye in the refrigerant just to try to make it easier to detect leaks. 

But sometimes your crack in the cooling unit might happen higher up, where you can't see the dye come out. So in those instances, we're going to use two of our other senses. 

So we're going to try to smell for ammonia. If you get a really strong ammonia smell out of nowhere, out of your fridge, you most likely have a cooling unit leak. That's a go-to sign. 

Your refrigerant is made up of 4 main ingredients and one of them is ammonia. If it gets out there’s a good chance you’re going to smell it. 

And then the final thing you're going to do is listen for a gurgling noise. 

It's going to sound kind of like a babbling brook. Normally, these fridges should be almost silent. So if you hear a babbling brook working its way through the back of your fridge, it means that air has gotten into the coils of the cooling unit. 

In order for air to get in, refrigerant must have gotten out. It's a two-way street. 

So those are the three main things you're going to keep an eye and an ear and a nose out for. It's called the see smell hear test. It is a common test that techs run all of the time. 

If you decide that you do have a cooling unit leak, you saw the dye, you smelled the ammonia, or you heard a gurgling noise, then do not run your fridge. 

Here's why. 

The refrigerant in your fridge is made up of 4 main ingredients. Ammonia. Sodium Chromate. Water. And Hydrogen. 

That's the same hydrogen that we put in the Hindenburg balloon. You know, the crazy video we've all seen and the guy going, "Oh, the humanity," as the dirigible came down. 

That balloon was filled with hydrogen. Hydrogen is even more volatile than propane. So think about all the safeties that we do to keep propane away from flames and away from igniters. 

We're going to want to be even more careful about keeping hydrogen away from flames and igniters. And it just so happens that we have an igniter in the back of your fridge. 

So if we have a leak, we don't want there to be any chance that the hydrogen inside of the refrigerant can get out and get to that igniter. So as soon as you realize you have a refrigerant leak, do not run the fridge - especially on propane. 

Honestly now your options are either to replace the cooling unit or to replace the fridge. 

Right now there isn't a fantastic way to recharge a cooling unit on a fridge or put more refrigerant in. 

You need to take the whole cooling unit out. Locate whatever hole allowed the refrigerant to get out in the first place. Weld that hole closed. And then get more refrigerant into the system. 

There are a very, very small handful of techs in the country that will do that for you properly. And they charge a lot of money because of how niche their work is. 

So you can try and look around and see if you can find a tech near you that does it. I really doubt it. 99% of the time you’re looking at either replacing the cooling unit, which is just that back guts of the fridge or replacing the entire fridge entirely. 

If you didn’t see any dye, smell any ammonia, or hear a gurgling noise but your fridge still isn’t cooling at all here is the next test I want you to do. 

Look at this tube on the side of your fridge and very carefully see if it's getting hot. 

If your fridge isn’t cooling but that tube is getting hot then that’s another sign that your fridge has a bad cooling unit. 

I would look into making sure your fridge is getting good ventilation and that your RV is level. These are too things that these absorption style fridges are really finicky about. But other than that, all signs are pointing towards a bad cooling unit. 

If that tube isn’t getting hot that’s actually a really good sign that whatever your problem is is actually a much cheaper solution than replacing your cooling unit.

Something in your fridge isn’t working electrically and electrical problems are much easier to solve than cooling unit problems. 

If you’d like you can head over to rvrepairwoman.com/fridges where I have a course that will walk you through step by step how to test every part of your RV’s fridge like a pro. 

It costs less than what most techs are charging for a single call and you’ll have this information in your back pocket for whenever you need it. 

You Got This.