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Now depending on the brand of the refrigerator will depend on what type and fitting you will
need to connect the tubing to the hook up on the fridge itself, so the good news is that your ice
maker kit should contain a couple of different fittings to connect. Most units these days now have
the fitting in the unit, so that you can just connect the line. So at this point you will either
have the fitting in the unit or you will need to take a fitting from the ice maker kit and thread
that into the female threads, The fittings that come with the ice maker kit will be male threads on
one side and a compression fitting on the other side.
Step
Two:
Now that you have you have got the fitting in the back, you are now ready to take your ice maker
tubing and connect it to the fitting. What you will want to do now is to loosen the compression nut
on the fitting a few turns and make sure the Ferrell is also lined up inside and you can now stick
one end of your ice maker tubing into the fitting, and making sure that the tubing goes all the way
down to the bottom and then you can tighten the compression nut.
If you are using a plastic tubing you will want to make sure that the Ferrell inserts you are
using are not metal, you will want to use plastic Ferrell’s and if you are using copper ice maker
line you will want to use brass inserts. This is very important because if you don’t use the right
type you will have leaks and can damage the tubing.
Step
Three:
Once you have the tubing connected to the back of your refrigerator you will now have to make a
game plan on where your going to get your water supply from. The ice maker kits comes with a saddle
valve which makes taping into a water supply very easy, But you will need about 6 inches of space
on a half inch water copper line. The saddle valve can only be used on copper water lines and can
not be used on pex.
If you have a space behind your cabinets or you have a basement then you could drill holes
through your cabinets or a small hole in your floor that would get the tubing into the basement,
and either way would work. So the game plan is for you to find a way to get the tubing to a 1/2
copper line and hidden if possible. Once you find a place to run the ice maker water line and have
the other end at the water supply then you can continue to the next step.
Step
Four:
Now that you have successfully got your ice maker tubing to your water supply you going to need
to hook the tap into the water supply with your saddle valve. Your saddle valve will have a clamp
with two parts and two screw you will have to tighten. So what you will want to do is place the one
side of the saddle valve on the pipe and then place the back part on the other side of the pipe and
then insert and tighten the two screws on each side to clamp the saddle valve to the pipe. Once the
saddle valve is secured and tightened move on to the next step, do not turn the valve handle
yet.
Step
Five:
Now that the saddle valve is connect to the pipe you will need to connect your other end of the
ice maker tubing to the valve and this is done the same way as you did earlier when you connected
the other end, but as a refresher you will want to loosen the compression nut and slide the tubing
in and then tighten the nut with your open end wrench.
Step
Six:
This is now the time you will want to turn on your saddle valve so that you can have water to
the ice maker. To turn on the saddle valve simply turn the handle all the way in and the needle
point will pierce the copper pipe and you will now have water.
Step
Seven:
Now that your water is on and your all hooked up, it would be a good time to inspect all your
fitting and connections to make sure you don’t have any leaks. If you have no leaks you have
successfully hooked up your ice maker. Enjoy your ice!
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