The short answer for this family
On the Criterion CBMR refrigerator family the first question is not why the icemaker stopped but whether these models carry one at all: not every model on this roster carries an icemaker, and the spine does not mark which do. Where one is fitted, the fault splits cleanly into a water side and a cold side, and the mould tells you which. Check your own code against the three in the table below.
What owners of these models actually see
- No ice at all, and the mould is dry — A dry mould means no water is arriving: supply, valve, filter or fill tube. A wet mould that never harvests means the cold side instead.
- It makes ice, but far less than it used to — Reduced output with correct cubes is nearly always a cabinet running warmer than it was, or a filter at the end of its life.
- Ice forming in a solid mass where loose cubes should be — A clumped mass usually means the cabinet is warming and refreezing between cycles rather than that the icemaker is faulty.
- NEAR MISS: the cabinet is also not holding temperature — Ice output is the first thing a cabinet gives up when it runs warm. If the compartment is warm too, read the cooling page first.
Ranked causes for this family
- No water is reaching the mould — Where the cabinet is plumbed this is the most common real cause: a closed supply valve, a filter at the end of its life, or an inlet valve that no longer opens. The dry mould is the tell.
- The compartment is not cold enough to harvest — An icemaker will not cycle until its mould reaches cut-out, so a warm compartment gives slow ice or none with nothing wrong in the icemaker. A freezer holds food safely at 0 °F (-18 °C) or below.
- The fill tube has frosted and is diverting the fill — Second where the cabinet is plumbed: an iced tube narrows the fill, so cubes come out hollow and water runs down the back wall. It returns unless the cause of the frost is found.
- Ice forming where it should not, rather than failing to form — On this family the question is usually the other way round. Ice growing on a panel, in a duct or around a fan is airflow being converted into a blockage, and it usually arrives with a cabinet that is slowly warming. That is the version of this fault most owners of this family actually meet.
The checking order on these models
- Establish whether this model has a factory icemaker at all — Check your model number against the roster below and look inside the compartment. Where the roster mixes plumbed and unplumbed variants, this is the check that stops a fruitless diagnosis. Each step rules out a cause the next one would inherit.
- Decide whether the mould is dry or wet — Dry means the water side: supply, valve, filter, fill tube. Wet and unharvested means the cold side or the module. That one look halves the causes above.
- Check the compartment temperature before the icemaker — A compartment sitting above where it should be explains slow ice, clumped ice and no ice with nothing wrong in the icemaker itself.
Before any panel comes off
Safety
Unplug the appliance or switch off its breaker before removing any panel or icemaker assembly; a capacitor can hold a charge after the power is off. Where the cabinet is plumbed, shut the water supply off before touching a fitting, and never thaw a fill tube or a frozen line with a flame or a heat gun: hot air melts the surrounding plastic long before it clears the ice. Do not chip ice off any surface with a screwdriver, because the tubing behind it is soft aluminium.
Models in the CBMR family
Reference| Model number | Family key |
|---|---|
| CBMR187*#* | criterion:refrigerator:cbmr |
| CBMR187*** | criterion:refrigerator:cbmr |
| CBMR187M4* | criterion:refrigerator:cbmr |
When to call a technician
Where the line falls here is worth stating plainly. Checking the supply, the filter, the bail arm and the compartment temperature is owner work. Call when the mould is wet and never harvests, when the fill tube re-frosts within days of being cleared, or when the ice problem is really a temperature problem, because that moves the job into the cold path. On this platform the cabinet has to come away from the wall before most work can start, which is a two-person job on a loaded cabinet.
Other problems covered for this family
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