How To Change the Direction your Refrigerator Door Swings

Handyman here again and in this do it yourself walk through I am going to be showing you how to reverse the direction your refrigerator door swings. If you have a small kitchen like I do and the refrigerator door doesn't swing the direction you want it to its very easy to change, by no means do you have to be an expert handyman to do this as long as you have the right tools this should take about 30 minutes to an hour even for the beginner. If you have a drill with the right bits and you have done this a couple times it should take about five to ten minutes. But now why would you want to change the direction your refrigerator door swings? Take the picture below for example, this is my fridge in the kitchen and it has a left side swing.






The left side swing for this set up is good for me because I am constantly grabbing beers and the direction that it swings is perfect for me, I don't have to walk all the way into the kitchen I can easily open up the refrigerator door, grab my beer, and be on my way until 5 minutes later until I need another one.



But however this swing isn't good for when my girlfriend is in the kitchen trying to cook dinner, because shes constantly getting stuff out of the fridge and freezer and she has to walk around every time that she needs to get something out. So I decided to change the direction the refrigerator door swings to make it easier for her, I will suffer the extra 1 second it takes me to get a beer out, oh well.

This particular refrigerator is a new GE model, although you may need different bits for different brands every refrigerator is the same principle for changing the direction of the door swings. This GE refrigerator uses Phillips screws for the handles and No.20 star head bits for the 3 hinges.

First thing I do is grab my drill and put a Phillips head bit on, because I am going to remove the refrigerator handles first. You can also do this with a screwdriver but I know that its gonna save me time if I use a drill. On this GE refrigerator there is 1 screw on top of the freezer, and 2 below the freezer. 2 screws on top of the refrigerator handle, and 1 screw in the middle. I am going to disassemble the handles 1st because I wanna try and limit the amount of heat that is let inside why I'm doing the refrigerator door direction switch.








Once I have all of the screws loose I can easily just pull the refrigerator handle off.



Once you have the handles off you want to remove all of the screws that are on the side you want the hinges to be on or the same side that the handles were on. There should be a couple screws in the middle, a couple on top, and a couple at the bottom. Remember all we are doing here is taking the hinges from one side and placing them on the other side. Most modern refrigerators have screws on both sides for the very option of reversing the refrigerator swing.











Now we have open holes on the side we want the swing to be to screw the hinges into. Next step is to start unscrewing the hinge thats on top of the freezer. Once all of the screws are loose you should be able to lift the freezer door off of the middle hinge.










Set the freezer door to the side somewhere. After you have the freezer door off start unscrewing the screws that are holding the bottom hinge on. You might need a longer attachment in some cases so you can get a good torque on the screw.



Once you have the bottom hinge loose you can remove the refrigerator door then set it to the side for now. Please dont mind my ugly mug in this pic, another bad hair day.





Now you unscrew the screws that are mounting the middle hinge and once you have it loose simply move it over to the other side of the fridge and mount it. On this GE model it looks like you might have to flip the hinge rods but you don't, it doesn't matter, just mount it on the other side. Only mount one screw at first and dont screw it in all of the way, for the reason that we will have play with the middle hinge which we will need.




Secure the bottom hinge fully. Then set the refrigerator door on the bottom hinge and work the middle hinge into the hole, once its in you can continue to secure the middle hinge fully. Now back to the freezer door, on this GE model the bottom of the freezer door has an attachment that helps it stay on the middle hinge, just simply move it to the other side of the door.









Set the freezer door on the middle hinge then take the top hinge and attach it.




Now just simply re-attach the handles to the refrigerator and freezer doors !



Thats it ! I'm done, now whenever my girlfriend cooks she can easily access all the stuff she needs from the refrigerator and freezer !




Refrigerator, Freezer, Door Swing, refrigerator door swing, do it yourself