Hi all, I finally got around to replacing the cooling fan on our AB Cold Machine Fridge.  When we bought the boat last year the fridge fan was noisy, so much so it made it hard to sleep at night with the fridge on.  Not to mention that the bad bearings were adding friction and probably drawing more current.  Not good.  So I thought I would share the steps I took:  

NOTE:  I am barely 5'6" tall.  Being this compact is a huge help, not sure I would have been able to do this with the components in-place had I not been able to get right in to the locker.  

I made a call to Dometic in VA and got a tech support guy on the phone to confirm my suspicions and talk about buying a replacement fan.  The fan is only available from a distributor.  The replacement part number is:  290000217, according the AB tech support guy.  I lucked out and a marine refrigerator tech in CT happened to have one in stock.  He said it wasn't the exact p/n but it would work.  Cost $90.  Ouch, I had found cheaper ones that looked compatible for $24.95.  But bird in hand...

My arrangement is typical, the fridge components sit on a s/s tray on top of the shelf in the fwd part of cockpit locker.  Even with the vent grill in the galley removed, I still couldn't get at the 4 small screws that hold the fan housing to the frame.  So I removed the 4 bolts that hold the s/s tray to the shelf, to allow the entire assembly to slide around.  This also required removing the retaining keepers that held the copper tubing coil up under the shelf, providing me a bit more wiggle room to move the assembly around.  In doing this, I was able to get my stubby screw driver to the screws that keep the fan to the housing.  After getting these screws out, I was able to angle the entire assembly just right (fwd and to stbd) and lift the fan (in its housing) up, and to port.  The wiring for the fan was a bit of a pain.  The fan is wired into the BACK side (fwd facing) terminals labeled AUX FAN.  This of course required me to remove the two screws that held the terminal (the part with the diagnostic LED on it) on the s/s tray.  This allowed the ability to pull it out and gain access to the back holes where the wires from the fan went in.  Loosening the screws on the port facing side of the unit allowed the wires to slip out.  

Once the fan and housing were out, I removed the four screws and popped the old fan out of the housing.  A spin confirmed the noise.  The wires emanating from the new fan interfered with the bottom left plastic of the housing, so I used my drill and drilled a small hole to allow them to come out.  The new fan's wires came with spade push-on terminal ends, but I snipped these off in order to wire it back the way I found it.  Note:  the tech support guy at Dometic stated that the new fan wires would simply go on to the F and + spots on the Danfoss control unit.  But I discovered that doing this would have bypassed the fuse, bad idea.  So I got the new fan in the housing and fed the wires down through the small hole I drilled and then slid the heat shield back on the wires (came with the fan).  I reveresed the process and rotated the fan housing up and into position.  It was a wrestling match but I was able to get all four screws back in their spots.  

Resetting the terminal block back to it's home, replacing the 3 (the most fwd, stbd bolt was never installed on my unit) bolts back through the s/s tray, screwing back the 4 keepers for the copper coils coils underneath and the vent back in place and it was all put back together.

Moment of truth came when putting power on and it worked silently.  Fridge got cold too!

OEM fan details according to Dometic support:

-  Must be < .5A or the danfoss will have problems.
-  The fan dimensions are 120mm x 120mm x 25.4mm thick.
-  82.67 CFM
-  2500 RPM
-  .23amps

Googling around you can find computer fans that seem like the might work, and I might have gone down that path.  I happened to find a marine air conditioning/refrigeration guy near me that had one in stock.  

Here is the fan I would have bought had I not found the one near my home:
http://www.rparts.com/product_info.php?cPath=72_77&products_id=497&osCsid=6epdhci49h0e839em8uilhjli1

The pics are tough, sorry for the quality.  PM or email with any questions.

Mike