The big recommendation is to get a handle on the terminology. Exhaust is the function you want done. Cooking produces rising warm (steam, grease, smoke) air. Hood is an upside-down sink or umbrella shape that the bad air rises into. The industry often mixes terms up, and it actually doesn't hurt sales. So they may say "Hood" when they mean a whole lot more. Canopy, as a term, works because it focuses attention on the Hood alone. Capture Area is another word for almost the same thing. Make-Up Air, MUA, is the air that comes into your kitchen when you blow bad air outside. It is a lot of air. It replaces the volume of air you sent outside. In cold climates it has to be planned for as part of the house system. Windows are often closed. Duct is the conduit / pipe / tube or rectangular shape channel that your bad air travels down. Liner is almost the same thing. It actually IS a liner if it matches a special shape of hood... but once again, the industry will use this term "liner" to mean anything that creates confusion. Duct is made of smooth metal, not corrugated. Never made of plastic (this is Kitchen Exhaust) Filter is the grease catch that you want to have at the front end. Filter could be Mesh. Filter could be Baffle. Filter can only be that, in outdoor exhaust situations. Charcoal is not an option here. Blower is the motor that grabs that air and blows it outdoors. Blower can have spinning propeller blades. Blower can be squirrel cage. Insert is a combination of a few things, built as a package that you insert into a hoof and liner. Insert is a package of blower, filter, switches, lights, etc. The industry often mixes terms up, and it actually doesn't hurt sales since they get to sell their all-in-one products. They don't push inserts. Inline describes a blower located at some point in the Duct. Inline is not at the duct beginning (front end), and not at the Duct termination. Remote describes a blower located in a place far away from the kitchen. It can be at the end of the Duct, pulling (sucking) air instead of pushing it down the Duct. The industry likes to sell more than just a blower. A whole kit. An all-in-one solution. Something that parts fools from money. Consumers who know enough can separate all the variables. The industry does not promote inline blowers. Having an inline blower allows the consumer to buy the other parts as separate items. The industry does not promote remote blowers. Some are promoted as part of a whole kit. They can be bought separately. Blowers that are not positioned at the front end of the duct are not in your face. Noise is caused by several factors. The blower being in your face is one factor. Review: The industry mixes terms up. They will call anything a Hood. Exhaust is the big general term. "Will this Exhaust my kitchen air?" hth

Whether a 10-inch MUA duct will help will depend on the restrictions getting the air into the rooms of the house. For example, what sizes are the furnace to room ducts? Is there a furnace filter in place? Is the MUA flow going against the flow that the furnace and/or air conditioning move the air in the relevant ducts. Perhaps you could have a 10-inch duct to a Broan or other MUA powered damper that dumps into the house in some way before the duct continues toward connecting to the furnace. The damper opens when the flow in the hood duct is high enough. Generally, not liking cooking odors in high concentration or grease on the walls, I will always vote for more hood ventilation flow rate, within the bounds of good enough. Good enough for full containment (very approximately and very condensed) is a blower zero static pressure rated flow rate equal to the hood aperture area (sq. ft.) x 90 ft/min* x (3/2) for pressure losses. This assumes not too much restriction on the necessary MUA flow. Full capture requires the hood significantly overlap the hot surfaces from which grease and smoke effluent is being generated. Lower flow rates may be fine if only frying eggs and not bacon. Time searching this forum on MUA will provide more information and insight. kas ------ * 90 ft/s comes from the rising effluent velocity of 3 ft/s for hot cooking surfaces per references in my My Clippings, 60 seconds per minute, and an advantage of 2 for the flow dynamics of baffle hoods of nominal configuration (somewhere between a guess and an observation).

I was in a similar situation. Old home from the 60's. Installed a new woodstove, fixed chimney etc to keep my baseboard heating costs low. Whats the most efficient depends on the times. Natural gas if available, Propane, and oil prices fluctuate. It's a roll of the dice. Wood is always the cheapest but labor intensive. Coal if its easily available. Pellet is an option too, but you need to store enough, wood, coal, or pellets somewhere easily accessible. You need to either hire, or clean your chimney and stove yourself. Here's a tip. You ain't getting' any younger. Choose your battles wisely. What if you throw your back out? Then what... Mini splits. Here's what I found. Efficient? To a degree. -20? Nonsense. More like 36. Real world numbers here. You have to run an electric heating element to the coils so when they freeze, you can melt the ice. $$ Then if you're smart, you make sure you build or have built, a shield of sorts to keep the elements off it. If there's a snow drift, you better get out there and clear it by hand. Some will bolt it to the walls to keep it off the floor, but you can't go that high and awnings only do so much. Think about it. The machines need to be serviced. Lets talk a 10 year ROI here. Warranties, such as offered by Mitsubishi, require a licensed professional to come out and service it once a year. $$. If you don't pay, you lose the warranty. How nice. You could gamble and risk it all...There goes my savings over a 10 year period. You either need to buy, or clean the filters. Anywhere form 1 to 3 of em annually depending on model. Replaced eventually if you clean them yourself. Cost of installation? Ridiculous. Run electric, upgrade your panel, run ugly line sets and condensate pipes all over the place? Bah. THE ONLY WAY you could save money is if you knew someone in the biz to cut you an install deal. Other than that you'll pay 10K on average. I got quoted $5k for a single 18K unit. $10K on a split system running off a 36K unit. Run the numbers and you'll see its just not worth it. How much money can you save over a 10 year period will yield an ROI that just about equals out. Clearly a waste of time and effort. That's whats its about. Peace of mind. Baseboards = zero maintenance other than a vacuum cleaner or a coat of paint. Heck. My wife can do that. Companies/Businesses/People can and will say ANYTHING to convince you to empty your pockets. Its unethical yes, against the law, no. Leave the baseboard and have some peace of mind. You'll pay inflated costs over time or drop thousands at once and HOPE that you found a contractor worth his spit. Mini Splits. BAH. You can't escape paying. No one can. One way or the other they're gonna get you. The smartest guys in the world have run the numbers. The system has been set up. Its the working class that pays. Not the poor, Not the rich. Remember that. Choose the path of least resistance and don't' let these jerks fool you. Everybody hates math. You just have to do it. When was the last time you heard someone say they love math...That's how they get you. "Coil size, amperage, etc will fall on sadly deaf ears - with math involved I won't follow it. If possible, please, descriptions are better such as 'the coils are now bigger' or 'they use a different metal so it does x'."

I am the resident expert only because real HVAC systems engineers don't frequent this forum, as far as I know. Noise introduced into the kitchen will be significantly reduced if an external blower with silencer can be fitted. A lot of the high frequency blade tip turbulence caused noise will be removed. This is also true of an in-line (duct mounted) blower. The issue of the neighbor is difficult to assess. What is the configuration of his or her windows relative to your potential external blower (1500 CFM I assume you meant). Your own window sound transmission is also an unknown. Generally, the external noise could be abated by (a) using a silencer on each side of a duct mounted in-line blower, or (b), using a deliberately under-driven* "up-blast" commercial blower (mounted as a side blast). (I think opaone is using an under-driven blower for his new system.) It is also possible to use a chase to move the blower up to roof level. I have a 1500 CFM nominal Wolf (Broan) blower on my roof. Its sound level is detectable but not obtrusive from the ground, but it might be if in a wall location where the sound is "trapped" between two houses. Possibly a more expensive but similar in design Abbaka downslope unit would be marginally quieter. ------ * commercial blowers of this type can use a pulley system between motor and fan that allows for different ratios. By choosing a ratio that operates the fan blades below their rated speed when the motor is receiving maximum voltage, significant turbulence noise can be avoided. The physical cost is a larger unit than would otherwise be required for the desired flow rate. Residential blower fans are directly coupled to their motors.