Oh, you know, I mis-remembered the Bluestar requirements. The requirement isn't for 3" extra hood capture on each side, the requirement is 3" lateral clearance to upper cabinetry. In other words, with a 30" range, the upper cabinets on either side of the range must be 36" apart. Once you're clearing the way for a larger hood, there's no reason not to get it (unless you've already got a smaller hood that otherwise meets ventilation requirements -- which I do not have at the moment). In any case, this will be a piece-by-piece remodel, not the all-at-once remodel we did in the last house in 2006 where I got the larger hood and the Bluestar at the same time we replaced all the cabinets. If we do appliances before cabinets, I won't be able to install a Bluestar. If we do cabinets first, then I can get the larger hood to keep our options open for the Bluestar. My memory is failing me on how low the Bluestar simmer burner would go -- how does it compare to the 350 btu simmer on the fivestar (assuming a large enough pot for the fivestar). I'm assuming it's better than the CC simmer on those 23K btu burners.

My home is under construction so I am not yet using my appliance choices. I am going with Blue Star. I have never used Capital so I can not comment on that. I have had the Wolf cook top and wall ovens, viking range and thermador range in past homes. Of those I would say that Wolf AND Viking were equal. However, Wolf is having issues with the interior ovens cracking, I am sure you have read all that. Viking is just making a comeback so who knows. I did have to open the Wolf oven to turn my food for even cooking. The Wolf cook top is not that powerful. I think with Wolf in particular you are paying for the name. It lacks power. It is pretty, and you will get the best service. So if that is the most important thing for you then Wolf is your best bet. Thermador was a very big disappointment for me. The oven cooked unevenly and the griddle took a life time to get hot and never actually did get hot enough to enjoy cooking on it. The Viking was a work horse and eventually had issue with the screws on t the door. Not a big deal. I know they had issues with this but it really was not a big deal. After I had mine the company sort of went down hill and got a bad name. I am going with Blue Star Platinum range top and the new electric wall ovens. I want the the open burner. (personal preference) For me, I also want the 25K BTU burner for wok cooking. It does offer a true simmer. I will be able to throw the griddle on where I want and getting hot enough is not going to be an issue with the high power burners. I am not a trained chef but I love to cook and do A LOT of it. I have not heard any feed back on users of the new BS electric wall ovens but I like that it has a pizza stone in the bottom. I am hopeful that this feature will prove to be wonderfully useful with pizza and rustic breads. It fits a full sheet pan and has 5,000 watt Infrared broiler. My top priority was a wall oven with French Doors. I think I found an oven that had even more than I was hoping for. All in all, just consider what is your number one most important thing to have and go from there. Then just consider how you cook and what you really need or want. You will find comments positive and negative on everything. Wolf will give the best service, or so everyone says. If that is the most important thing for you then just prioritize the other things on your list and see what you are left with. Coming to my decisions were gut wrenching for me. I changed my mind what seemed like a 100 times. I finally figured out what was important to ME besides the french doors. Once you really consider how you work in the kitchen one should start to rise to the top. Trust your instincts.

Interesting - I phoned Capital this morning and they confirmed what you said Trevor. When the burner grate is flipped over the combustion changes and some of the gas outlets can be blocked. Quite unbelievable, isn't it? You would think the salesperson would want to sell a wok ring instead of discouraging an extra sale! Thanks again

Trevor - I'm hoping you can help us determine if Capital has made any important updates to their ranges in the past 4 years. The reason for asking is that we just moved into a new custom house where we had the builder install a 48" Capital Culinarian Self/Clean Range, Model-CGSR484BG for which we paid over $11K. Unfortunately, in a few short days, we managed to break the oven latch and when we called Capital to arrange a fix, we learned our range was built in 2011. This came to us as a shock as we would have expected to get a 2015 range. I've read other threads where you commented that the simmer issues have been resolved in the newer models. Do you know when that fix was put in place? Have there been other major issues that were resolved in the current models? We're trying to get answers from our builder, who has put us in contact with their appliance distributor, but I'd like to get your independent comment if I may, as I'm sure they have an invested interest to convince us our range is identical to later models. The Capital representative also downplayed the years differential. Any feedback you can give us is much appreciated.