Have been away over weekend and returned to find that the fridge side of the unit is not working it says its at 1 degree but is considerably warmer, milk and meat have gone off. It has come up with an error code of 7 Refridgerator defrost error but we have not touched anything to defrost it.

Do you see any ice buildup on the center of the rear wall in the freezer?

Start lowering down temperature, you may need to defrost fridge overnight.

Hi,

Many times a freezer and/or refrigerator do not work right because of a dirty condenser coil...there are also many other things that can go wrong.

If you are hearing a clicking or buzzing then check out the last two tips.

If your refrigerator is running but warm, then...

Check out these tips that I wrote about that... it is a great place to start trouble shooting your unit...and something that you can do rather then calling a repair person to do a simple thing for you...

Refrigerator Condenser Coil Cleaning Refrigerator Repair

Refrigerator Troubleshooting Refrigerator Compressor

Refrigerator Compressor Start Capacitor and Start Relay

Refrigerator or Freezer not Cooling or Getting Cold

heatman101

Check the fridge cooler unit behind the cowlings inside. The problem is you have to empty the fridge. Remove the light cover by pulling it away and remove both screws. Take the unit out after removing the connections. Simple clips that will fit back only one way. Remove the lowar covers from the fan housing and take out the four screws. Ease the unit away breaking the ice seal. Defrost with a hairdrier or similar and repeat on the fan unit you have removed. Clear away some of the insulation from the fan drain and when dry and clear re assemble. Good luck. By the way it has to be done whenever you hear the fridge fan founing. Paul.

Good day,
Turning the thermostat to a warmer setting should not have caused the machine to quit cooling. Actually, the engineers give you far less leeway than you might think.
The controls are more in a class of fine tuning, otherwise people would be getting themselves into trouble. The manufacturers simply design the warm and cold parameters in a fairly narrow range.
The best setting is normal. When away, the machine will run far less simply because of no door openings. Opening a door lets in large amounts of air every time it's done, which is where your cost to run it exists.
Two things. One, if the temp in the kitchen exceeded 90 degrees for any length of time, you are operating it beyond it's design range, however two, it sounds as if the thermostat hung up, causing your issue. You may want to have it replaced, but it would be useless to call anyone when it's performing normally.
There is no test on thermostats other than by observing their action when the machine is not operating properly.

try and replace the thermastat control.
turn both knobs to the off position and listen i the fridge for the cold air damper to close it is located top left side rear of the cabinet in the fridge if the door does not close then you may need to replace the damper

There are two things you need to make sure before you declare the fridge at fault. Firstly, make sure that fridge isn't overloaded with items and that any air vents aren't blocked. Give it room to circulate the inside air. That helps it to cool evenly/at all. Next, find the thermostat. This will most likely be inside the top of the door frame when you open the door on newer fridges, or somewhere along the back or side walls. There'll be a setting for the freezer, and a setting for the fridge. The knob might use letters, numbers, or an arrow that says COLDER. Set the knob to slightly warmer, then leave the fridge alone for 24 hours. I highly suggest putting a suitable-type thermometer in the fridge and adjust the temp until it's around 34-38 degrees F. Do NOT allow the fridge to become warmer than 40 degrees. Between 40 and 140 degrees F is the "danger zone" where microbes thrive in food and are much more likely to cause food poisoning. You must never let food sit in the danger zone for more than 4 hours.
If cleaning the fridge and adjusting the thermostat don't work, you'll definitely want to have a refrigeration professional take a look at the fridge. It may as simple as adding coolant or "freon".

it sounds like the refrigerator evap is frozen up causing the compartment to get too hot. shut the unit off and let it thaw out. then take the screws out of the cover to check the stryrofoam on the back side of the cover to see if theres broken spots on it causing the air to bypass the evap causing it to freeze. Theres two screws behind the light cover and two at the very bottom of the cover and two behind the decorative plugs about 1/2 way

I called KitchenAid and they are sending a service person to check it out.

likely the compressor... we have the same fridge and had the same thing happen. It was sporadic...would work, then not. Finally had GE out to repair - not cheap. Part and labor was almost $300.00 and took 2 attempts to repair.