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Well, it looks like we'll be putting our fridge buying on hold--my teenage daughter hit a pothole while driving home from her college classes and lost a tire and severely damaged the front end of her car....
Ouch. Sorry to hear that.
FWIW, we recently purchased an Amana (made by Whirlpool), and it has a freezer on the bottom and french doors. There is an icemaker, but only in the freezer, and the water dispenser is inside the fridge. Avoids all the problems with the dispenser on the door, but you still can get nice cold water (colder than the tap).
The fridge also has a water filter built in, which is nice, I suppose, but I don't really have a problem with regular tapwater anyway.
LG also makes refrigerators, including those with freezers on the bottom, but we decided to go with a US company instead of S. Korean.
Had good experience with zman's Amana and now a French-door Maytag (made by Whirlpool I believe) bottom freezer and water/ice dispenser. The latter has "alarms" that tell you when either door or the freezer is not shut. I think that's a great feature that prevents your food from melting down.
I bought a new fridge earlier this year. I was REALLY REALLY intrested in the French Door models w/ the freezer on the bottom. Wanted that WIDE expanse of shelf space in the fridge portion. Only feared the absolute mess the bottom drawer freezer would turn into w/ my family. I had visions of seeing stuff just dropped in and staying wherever it landed. Then me having to dig EVERYTHING out just trying to find something. Still wanted it though.
We have a very good trusted appliance store we have been using for a LONG time and have always been straight up honest with me. Even when they know I will spend a lot of money if I am getting THE BEST product I can they don't always recommend it. Like when I wanted and would soon be needing a new washer & dryer. Looked at the front loaders and after I answered a series of questions from them they said, "you won't get your money out of it. Your better off sticking w/ a good top loader for a lot less money".
SOOOooooo, I asked them to tell me the honest truth about the French Doors. They are seeing problems with them. Mainly due to the freezer being on the bottom. I wish I could remember exactly everything they told me about the problems ....... something about the location of the motor and the freezer and it having to work a lot harder to keep it cold.
I ended up getting a counter depth TALL side by side w/ the ice and water in the door (which we DID want - MUST have the ice maker) from Whirlpool and couldn't be happier.
My cousin has the single door w/ the freezer on the bottom w/ only the ice maker. Over there for holidays and family gatherings and I HATE IT!!! It is a royal PITA getting ice in the glasses w/ that for everyone. Even taking the ice maker tray out and sitting it on the counter and putting it back in is a PITA! It could just be her fridge as she has a small space to fit a fridge into and was probably restricted on what size she could have.
My cousin has the single door w/ the freezer on the bottom w/ only the ice maker. Over there for holidays and family gatherings and I HATE IT!!! It is a royal PITA getting ice in the glasses w/ that for everyone. Even taking the ice maker tray out and sitting it on the counter and putting it back in is a PITA! It could just be her fridge as she has a small space to fit a fridge into and was probably restricted on what size she could have.
The last time we had everybody for Thanksgiving, we had a big plastic bowl (had to make room for it) which we gradually added ice. This was my idea since I prefer cubes made from trays to ice we buy in a plastic bag.
I love the Frigidaire we got last year. It's a side by side, so maybe you're not interested, but the freezer seems to hold a lot and it stays nice and cold. The only beef is that the water dispenser actuator (the thingy you press with your glass to make water come out) broke off because my sister in law got tired of waiting for her glass to fill up - we reused an existing water line, which seems a little small - and cost about 60 bucks for the part. For a piece of plastic with a light bulb in it.
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