A reader asked for advice about a frozen water line in the door of his refrigerator.

Reader Kim Jacob, of Feasterville, Pa., offered this:

“I had the same problem with my GE refrigerator. In my case, the line was frozen after only a year.

“This must be a design issue because the GE technician who came to my house told me he sees it all the time. He had some expensive fixes for me, but also suggested that I open the door for about an hour or two and use a hair dryer up and down the door. It worked like a charm.

“He also told me to turn off the water supply to the fridge when we are away for more than a week.

“We have had no problems since.”

Q: We had a regular, electric-powered fan in our previous home and the idea of the solar fan appealed to me. However, all the solar fans I saw were lacking a feature that the man who installed our electric fan said was very important: a firestat, to detect unusually high heat and shut off the fan in case of a fire.

That seems like a very necessary safety feature and I was surprised that I couldn’t find a solar fan that offered it.

A: A quick check on the Internet found one by Ventamatic at www.bvc.com/solarvent.html. A firestat (which Google tried to search as “fire station”) will shut system operations down when it senses that the temperature has gone above a preset level.

Q: I have a basement foundation of fieldstone. The house dates to 1835 or thereabouts. You mentioned that this basement construction made use of “Irish” plaster.

Can this fieldstone wall be sealed with Drylok or some other treatment?

A: I wouldn’t do it. Someone once told me that the Irish plaster was designed to allow air exchange and preventing it will cause the plaster and stone pointing to crumble over time.