Whirlpool WP2180353 Refrigerator Ice Dispenser Chute Door OEM Part

The ice dispenser chute door had not been sealing for years. The ice cubes on the lower portion of the ice bin would melt enough eventually to then freeze up into a big, amalgamated blob of ice due to ambient air coming up the chute. This melt-then-freeze would happen, to the extent the chute froze to its own closure. Despite service technician visits over a period of six years nothing they did resolved the issue. I opened the freezer door to reach into the bin from the top to extract usable ice cubes. I did the reach over until such time the ice blob grew to about two-thirds the bin volume. Then I used an ice pick to break up the ice blob and clear the chute. I had to repeat this process of clearing the bin with a pick every few weeks. Looking on YouTube I came across the AppliancePartsPro video that showed the steps for replacing the chute door for my refrigerator. The video was detailed and precise in the steps for demonstrating the simplicity for this repair/replacement. I decided I could try to replace the chute door myself. I had no confidence that any service technician could make the repair, nor did I want to pay ambient for a service fee again. Frankly, prior service fees had aggregated to the point they were more than the residual value for this older refrigerator freezer. I ordered the chute door, dispenser guide and door spring and by following the AppliancePartsPro video was able to replace all three parts. The chute door now closes! It is airtight. I did encounter a couple issues I had to resolve myself. The first issue: After removing the spring clip to eventually move the ice lever out of the way, I saw a prior service technician had used a small piece of electric tape to hold the ice lever in its restring place. Which prior service technician installed this tape I do not know, but eventually I figured out he had broken the plastic base (sort of like a clip that is molded into the core of the dispenser front [part #1) of the resting place. The resting place is a pivot point for the ice dispenser lever. It is a critical fulcrum-point for the lever movement. I quickly saw the new chute door would never close unless the resting point was repaired to fully contain the pivot movement of lever. There is no way a piece of flexible electric tape could hold the lever in place at this critical pivot-point. To solve this problem, I fashioned a thin piece of aluminum the same width as the dispenser lever retainer. However, I made the length of the piece of aluminum long enough to bend it by about 90 degrees to go under the right side of the dispenser lever. I affixed both the dispenser lever retainer and my improvised metal with the same screw. I fabricated a metal part the fixed the broken resting place and now serves as the dispenser arm strain relief. The second issue: Where the ice dispenser chute door contacts the refrigerator door, the seal on the door opening itself was compromised. The plastic was a bit gagged and could see the seal was not good. I used a small amount of Flex Seal Glue to seal any small gaps that could let air pass through the freezer door and to ensure the Ice dispenser chute door sits tight to the freezer door. I also installed a new dispense door spring and ice dispenser guide. So far, everything I did has resulted in an airtight seal! Appliance PartsPro.com enabled me to have the confidence (great videos) to complete this repair, myself.

Replaced Ice Dispenser Chute Door to stop water leak.

New motor and drive shaft. Very easy. Thanks for your videos. Paulette

Watched video on you tube then repaired door took less than 5 minutes

Replaced not only the ice chute door flap which was squashed from years of use but the mechanism and motor that operates the flap. The old mechanism seemed to work but it seemed a little sloppy or loose. I knew the flap was bad but for the extra few dollars I thought since I had to take the cover off anyway, why not replace the whole thing. I’m glad I did. The new motor and mechanism has been reengineered and is much tighter in the way it operates. The ice chute door seats securely and the ice no longer melts from warm air seeping into the ice dispenser. The repair took less than an hour and now works perfectly.