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caitlinmagner

I think I've finally decided on my refrigerator!

caitlinmagner
11 years ago

After agonizing between SubZero and Liebherr, I think I have decided to go with the Liebherr SBS 24I1 built in with custom panels. It has exactly the kind of space I need (3/4 fridge, 1/4 freezer) and I am intrigued by the biofresh technology, since frozen/limp/spoiled produce drives me nuts.

I was happy to get an all refrigerator SZ and have built in fridge/freezer drawers by the vitamix station, but my husband really wanted some additional freezer space in the kitchen (because walking 10 paces to the chest freezer in the garage is taxing).

Comments (11)

  • cookncarpenter
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Keep us posted! I had it narrowed down to SZ and Liebherr, and I'm planning on ordering a Liebherr in a month or two, and would love to get feedback before I pull the trigger

  • vickinbobyo
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I just bought a Liebherr refrigerator a week ago, it runs sixteen hours a day and sounds like a bunch of angry bees. I have called the service department six times now, with them telling me they will call me back and never getting a call back. Called again today and now they say they can't find a service person for this area. It is now Christmas and I do not know what the hell I am suppose to do, my only option is to send this piece of junk back to the store. Make sure you can get service. I am extremely frustrated.

  • sprtphntc7a
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    sorry you are having problems, vickinbobyou, i have the FD model and it is very quiet, so i think you definitely have a problem...when we bought ours, the store has a service rep from liebherr and if we have a problem, we are suppose to call the store and they will do all the legwork to get service to you. we had one small issue with the doors not closing on their own and the store handled everything and it was fixed promptly. we just talked to service company to set the service date. hope this info helps you.

    you can't even hear ours running or clicking on. the only thing you hear is the water running for the ice and ice dropping in bin.

    we have had ours over a year and thankfully no internal issues. we love it.

    good luck with the service and from our small experience, liebherr was very good to work with. hope you can eventually say the same.

  • philwojo99
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I have the exact model (Sbs-24i1) that you are looking at. We just finished our kitchen remodel and so far we LOVE LOVE LOVE this unit.

    We were going to go with the SBS-24i3 model which had the full freeze and full fridge as opposed to the 3/4, 1/4 setup on this model and we just thought that it wouldn't be enough fridge for us.

    One thing to keep in mind is that the SBS-24i3 model has the Bio-Fresh drawers in the main fridge unit but the SBS-24i1 does NOT have that, they are just normal drawers with the Bio-Fresh drawers only in the smaller 1/4 sized fridge above the freezer.

    This actually works out good for us, but we did overlook that during our searches. We were very close to buying the SBS-24i3 at first, like I said, and didn't notice this detail until after the units were installed.

    We have two minor issues with ours so far, first there is a strip to cover up screws on the main fridge unit that just won't click in, no big deal, doesn't affect anything at all just looks.

    The second issue is that the ice maker will not work. I tried everything I could to get it to work with no luck so we had to have a service call on it. The guys came out and they think it is a bad valve, secondary valve they said. They found that the wires were not connected on it from the factory, they put them on but they think that the first valve might have burned out since it kept trying to make ice and would fail and run the valve dry. Not sure on their explanation, but we will see what happens once they get the part in.

    Overall we really like it so far, but we have only about 3 days of actual use on it as of now. It has been installed but we hadn't been keeping anything in it up until this weekend as our kitchen remodel was still wrapping up. It is fairly quiet, but you can hear it running if it is very quiet in the room. If there is a radio/tv on or any other noise we don't hear either of the units running.

    I have tried out the "super cool" feature on the freezer which takes the temp down from zero (0) to a minus twenty-two (-22) to help freeze things faster. This also forces the compressor to run constantly on the freezer unit. Even in this mode to us it is not very loud.

    One other thing to keep in mind is that we had our custom panels made so it looks like it is four (4) doors and not just two. Since the one unit is a fridge/freezer combo you have two (2) doors on that any way. So we made the full fridge door look like two as well. When the installers when to put on the custom panels the one panel for the small fridge would not lineup with the full fridge panel at the top. They had to alter it in some way to get it to work, not sure what they did to be honest. But, from looking at things my understanding was that since the fridge/freezer combo is actually two doors it has two areas to slide two panels in to it. The full fridge is only one area to slide in a full panel. So when our cabinet company made the full panel they put a space in there to simulate the two door look and it was fine, but they did NOT account for the actual gap left from having two actual panel spaces and not just one on the combo unit. Again, our installers/carpenters were able to fix it, just wanted to point that out.

    And while I am at it one other thing just popped in to my head, the smaller fridge is at a constant 34 degrees and the full fridge is at 41 degrees. The smaller unit is at a lower temp due to the Bio-Fresh drawers so just another thing to keep in mind.

    One thing I wish they would have added would be some lighting to the freezer section, there is none in there. But having the full extension drawers helps with that.

    Phil

  • lexmomof3
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    That might be a good choice for us since we need a big refrigerator but not a lot of freezer space. I looked it up on AJ website and it's listed as discontinued. Do you know if they are discontinuing this model?

  • philwojo99
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I do not know if they are to be honest. One thing that I probably would have done differently is to pair the "fridge" unit from the SBS-24i3 with the fridge/freeze combo unit from the SBS-24i1 model. Essentially these models are just two separate 24" units that are joined together with a kit that you have to buy.

    So, if they do discontinue it they might still offer the individual units on their own, just not as a pre-made kit.

    Phil

  • vickinbobyo
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Service finally came out and replaced the fan, which is much quieter than before. This refrigerator runs constantly. 30 min on, then 30 min off, then 30 min on, then 10 min off, then 1 hour to 1 hour and 10 min on and the cycle starts again. My new power bill is higher. I guess I will have to call service again.

  • firstmmo
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Phil:
    Can you post a pic of your panels? I am interested in how you balanced the look of the panels!

  • philwojo99
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    First, I will see what I can do, I am on the road for work all during the week right now. I will try and take some pics this weekend when I am home and then post them for you.

    Phil

  • philwojo99
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    OK, sorry for the delay on posting this, here is a link to some pictures I took with my cell phone.

    Fridge Pics Link to see all 4 pictures.


    Phil

    Here is a link that might be useful: Fridge Pics

    This post was edited by philwojo99 on Wed, Feb 6, 13 at 6:40

  • caitlinmagner
    Original Author
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    thank you for the responses! I think I have changed my mind to SZ lol