Suspected Design Deficiency in This Viking Refrigerator

Purchased this refrigerator with other Viking kitchen appliances during kitchen remodel in my home in Huntington Beach, California. It was installed on 6/17/02. Within 2 months started experiencing cooling problems. Technicians from authorized repair shop discovered ice clogged ducts in unit and defrosted. This did not help. After additional phone calls, was told my technician that in discussions with distributor (Sues, Young & Brown) that the unit needed a heater kit for the ducts. Technician arrived and installed parts out of a subzero box. This did not help. I wrote detailed letter and mailed to Viking, Sues Young & Brown. They replaced the unit on 9/24/02. After a couple of months, there was some frost showing up in the veggie tray which I documented in a letter to distributor. Didn't appear to be working perfectly but couldn't bear the thought of another hassle with arranging service calls etc.

This past month (Aug 2005)water began appearing on floor. Defrost tray under unit was dry. No obvious leak. Ice was begging to build up in the bottom of the freezer. Called technician who manually defrosted the freezer. Indicated that I might need high voltage panel or heater kit. He needed to go back to shop to make final recommendations. I called the distributor and complained about the issue and he agreed to cover the costs of all parts. The freezer is now going through warming cycles (goes up to 40 deg F) and water continues to show up on floor. In a call to the service shop to try and get status on ordering parts, the receptionist indicated that a number of these refrigerators were having problems and needed heater kits and a number of them had to be ordered. In a call back to the distributor (Sues Young & Brown), the Viking expert said that was not true and he would call the repair shop (Executive Appliance Repair)to find out what they were talking about. As of this moment, I am still awaiting status on the parts order and follow-up service call to implement the fix. If I could pull this unit out and exchange it for a Sub-Zero, I would.