I've had a DCS 30" range for 5 years now and I'm very pleased. I would also consider Capital if I were buying now. Wolf has traditionally been a good brand but lately they seem to have some unresolved problems with their all gas models.

I think 600 CFM will be more than enough - particularly since you don't have a grill. There have been articles about how range/hood manufacturers tend to oversell you on hoods. I would get a deep hood however, at least 24" and preferably 27" to cover the front burners.

Hi Wikachick,

I wonder why your salesperson suggested that 600 CFM is sufficient for a 6-burner? I recall there is a CFM:BTU ratio formula that should be used when calculating hood size. I'm sorry but I don't remember if it was 1:100 or 1:1,000; please do look into this because I'm wondering if 600 CFM may be too small.

After researching appliances we have ordered a 36" Capital Precision with a Viking hood of 1200 CFM.

Yes, there is a "formula", more like a guideline, of 1 CFM to 100 BTU, but that assumes that you have all your burners on maximum most of the time - that's what I meant when I said that they tend to oversell hood power. When you get a hood of over 600 CFMs then you have to start worrying about make-up air which can get expensive. In fact in some states, I think MN is one of them, they require makeup air for any hood over 300 CFMs.

Our custom hood is 1500 cfm, but we have a grill. Everyone who comes to my house comments on the looks (nice perk - though meaningless to me as I actually cook and was worried more about performance). I did ask Capital come out to calibrate the ovens and lower my simmer on the burners, but the service was lightning fast. Oh - sometimes I do large events which require a caterer. My caterer was in love with my Capital and she has cooked on everything out there.

The only downside (as stated on other threads) is that the grill is small (for my purposes) and it is a bear to keep clean. I have yet to find a product that works well.

Where in L.A. are you?

I'm in Sherman Oaks.

Rosa - you will have no problem with service then. Capital comes direct to you - no middleman. How great is that?

Great to know that the service is prompt, and it's nice to know that the caterer loved the stove. I'm thinking of splitting the difference and getting a Best hood with 1000 CFM. I haven't seen a full picture of the Capital hood so I don't know if I'd like the look, but I'm thinking that 1200 is overkill for the 6 burner. Has anyone used an inline blower (mounted in the attic), and is the noise reduction worth it?

Hi clax66,

I'm also looking at the Viking hood, which was highly recommended by yet another sales guy. Does yours have an exterior or interior blower?

Julie,

The Wolf oven is 16 1/2" high and the Capital is 14" Do you ever have a problem with the height being too low? The biggest problem with the Wolf is that it is 4" shallower than the Capital, so it won't take full size sheet pans, but the Wolf is wider by 3", so my flat cookie sheets will fit side by side. I thought that the shallowness of the Wolf would look better in the cabinets, but I see that the difference jutting out from the cabinet with the Capital would only be an extra inch. Any thoughts?

Thanks!

Hi - I also have a Capital 48" with a griddle. I have a 900 cfm VAH. Works well for us. As for the height being too low, I don't have any issues/problems with that. I've never given it a second thought. I can fit multiple pans in there. The range doesn't look like it's "jutting out" from the cabinets IMO. I think it looks right.

Thanks everyone for all the great advice. I am pulling my hair out about the vent, though. I was all set to order the Broan K4236SS 1000 CFM hood, but the tech at Broan told me I'd have to go to 1200 to cover the 6 19,000 BTU burners on the Capital. I argued that it was overkill, as many people have commented, but she said that the building inspector would look at the BTU total of the stove and kick back anything under the HVI limit (in this case, 1140 CFM). Has anyone heard of such a thing? Arrrgh!!! Thanks

Most locales don't even require a vent hood, let alone mandating the number of CFMs. I'd check with your building inspector to make sure, but I don't think you'll have an issue. On the other hand, have you looked into the make-up air issue? With a 1000 CFM hood, you may have a real issue - lack of make-up air can be dangerous and cause your furnace to backdraft, although you can always crack a window for make-up air. As I said before, since you don't have a grill, unless you're planning to have all burners going at full blast most of the time, 600 CFMs should be sufficient. I have a 5 burner range with a total of 81.5K BTUs and I rarely turn my 600 CFM hood to the maximum setting.

Thanks, weissman--a lot of people agree with you! Our HVAC guy told us that supplying make up air would cost us beaucoup bucks, so that's not an option. I'll check into the building code, and go from there. It's just another boulder on the treacherous road to remodel hell. Poor hubby is starting to look like a zombie. ;=#

I have to say I still love my 48" Capital range. Everyone who comes in and sees it is very impressed. Just recently put in a VAH 950 cfm hood. Don't have it completely hooked up to outside yet but expect it will be plenty. I do have the grill and to use it I do definitely need a hood. I did use the stove top and oven quite a bit without it though.

I'm presently cooking on a BlueStar 6 Burner AG (Looked at the Capital and the finish just wasn't as good - your mileage may vary) and using the Dacor hood that was in place. It's a 900CFM and it's not enough when cooking high heat or when the oven is on.

I find that opening the window next to the stove prevents the smoke alarm going off, but only if I remember to do it. Otherwise I'm poking the alarm with my sharpening steel. Simple answer to the "make up air" question, as someone else pointed out, is to open a window. No need for an expensive HVAC system. There are better ways to spend your money.

Thanks all for the info. I called the building inspector today and he said that there is no CFM requirement for residential ranges. In fact, there's no requirement to have a hood at all. He said "Any hood is fine as long as it doesn't suck you into the vent--that would be a health hazard." LOL!!!

I use my hood and am happy with the 1500 - do not like food smells in the house, but that's just me. As for the Capital jutting out, we had ours recessed into the wall to end up being flush with the cabinets. The main reason we recessed is because we had a DW door that was hitting the oven handles (in other words, design error).

As for the oven being short, no issues there and frankly, the thought never crossed my mind. You'll be fine.

Hi all,

First, thanks for all the great information on this post and others.

We're building a new home in So. NH. I think I have the choices narrowed down to between a Capital Precision (30" w/ center burner) or Blue Star 30" RNB.

I like the general beefiness, simplicity and pedigree of the Blue Star, but the Capital seems to offer all of the BTUs, good simmer control (from what I've read) and a bit more domestic refinement (not to mention the rotisserie feature).

Because of the location of the build, we're going to be on LP. Any thoughts as to which of these perform best with LP?

Any and all feedback appreciated.

Hi wikachick, we are going with the exterior blower. Good luck with your decision:)

Thanks--I'm going to go with a hood that is less than 1200 CFM. One potential problem, though: my contractor has already cut a 10" duct opening. If I decide on a hood that requires only an 8" hole, is that going to be an issue?

I'm new to this thread and about to finalize my appliance choices for a full remodel.

I've been looking at the Capital 48" 6 burner plus griddle (LP) and would love to know how that's working for anyone who has it, esp the LP part.

Am also planning to go with a 900cfm Ventahood with easy-off parts that you throw in the dishwasher to clean. Any takers?

As of last week, I can post to this thread!!!! Except I just ordered a rangetop (36" w/grill)... am getting too old to BEND DOWN for the oven on a range. I was convinced that Capital was the way to go by the excellent feedback from you all. Even though we live in the South, I like to grill (and am basically too lazy to go outside) and thought that one would be great for every evening cooking, expecially veggies. Thanks to all of you who post here for the great advice. It has made my selections easier......Now for the Venthood debate!!!!!!!!!! Vent a hood, Presitge or KOBE. Needs to be an insert, since I will have custom made around it. I read something about a Capital Vent????? Anyone know anything about it????

wikachick - I'm not completely sure, but I believe that you can use a larger duct with a hood - so if you have a 10" duct, you can use a transition to a hood that requires an 8" duct. You can't go the other way, however, without losing efficiency.

Thanks, weissman. You rock, as usual! I wanted to get an opinion before I approached my contractor and watched the meltdown. ;) Dixie, Capital makes vent hoods, too, in 600 and 1200 CFM. I wanted a chimney style, so they didn't work for me, but if you're going to put them under a cabinet or soffit they should be fine.

Here is a link that might be useful: Capital Vent Hood

I decided to go with the Capital 36" self-clean AG (which, I realized, is what I wanted all along), and the Best K4236 1000 CFM vent hood. Thanks to all who helped me make the decision! I'll post again when my kitchen's done.

Hi, everyone. We got a 30" Capital range with the central wok burner. We can't say enough good things about it. We've had ours for three months. We paired it with a Kobe hood and we're pleased with the way they look and work together. We live in NJ, where Capital may not be as well known. The dealer, H&H Appliances was great and installation was professional. I love having high BTU burners that work so well - I can brown, sear and even simmer a large soup without having to constantly adjust the heat. Capital adds alot of value to their product and overall they seem to have a smart sense of design. By the way, we love the rotisserie. Its fun and the results are great. I roast and my better half bakes, so having a self cleaning gas oven is the best of all worlds. Enjoy your new kitchen - I hope this helps.

Thanks for the info, Russ--I'm happy I picked the Capital.

Has anyone bought a Capital online?
How did it go?
Have you had any trouble getting service?
Is the grill adjustable on the Capital?
Help! Need to make the range decision very soon.
I'm in the Northwest. Anyone in the Portland or Salem area have a Capital you'd be willing to show me? (I'll bring brownies!)

hey folks,

I'm looking for some cooking help and advice. I bought a 36" Capital Precision largely on the basis of recommendations from this board. I love the look and the burners.

However, I'm having some trouble with the oven. It seems to take a long time to get hot and doesn't seem to get as hot as I'd like. I had the service guy in to test the temperature -- and he found it was slight over 500 degrees. in other words, fine.

And yet, it still doesn't seem right to me. I tried to make a thin-crust pizza on a pizza stone in the oven and it took ages to cook and never charred up. A smallish roast chicken came out spectacularly (maybe the best i've ever cooked) but took much longer than normal. normally a chicken of this size would take around 50 min to an hour, but this took a solid 1:20 to 1:30 or so.

I haven't tried the convection yet.

Any advice? Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks for your help!

-Jesse

We bought a Capital 30" range last evening. The following ranges were rejected for various reasons Wolf, Viking, Thermador. We bought Capital for the following reasons, looks, quality of build, valjue added by the 5th burner (wok), and the rotisserie as well as the roll out racks. I was not able to find any negative comments on Capital, although that is not surprisinbg given the fact that it is a relatively new companyie 2001. We have a GE profile microwave hood over the current range. My wife loves it. GE says that the rating of the unit is 450 CFM. If the microwave fails we are looking at a Viking microwave hood as a possible replacement. All stainless steel and a fan that is rated at 600 CFM. My question: Is there anything negative I should know about the Capital range ? Can I live with a 450 CFM fan and an open window ?

It's well liked on this forum. Depending on what you're cooking, I don't see why you can't use your 450CFM fan and an open window... depends on what you're cooking...(think wok). I think we had a Capital employee at one time posting here without being completely up front about it, and that caused a stir for a few moments.

Building a new home in Las Vegas...is capital ranges better than American Range...I read that Wolf has had some issues and my wife is leaning to wolf...any thoughts

After owning a capital Precision 60" gas self cleaning range since 2008, I would say, AVOID CAPITAL. I was the biggest capital fan because I thought they had the best and most innovative product. Upon delivery and installation, we were burning everything we put inside one of the ovens. We went back and forth with Capital for months, they sent out repair people who swore there was nothing wrong with the oven. We were even blamed for not letting the oven warm up for enough time before we put our food in. We had to threaten them with legal action before they finally had a proper technician fix our range.

As the years progressed, our issues continued. The rotiserrie went out. They sent the parts and I fixed the motor myself. Our grill always heats only the left side. I had a gas leak inside the range and Capital did not respond to my requests for help. I had to get Trevor from Eurostoves involved and then they responded. The absolute worst is they offered to fix my grill and wok burner (useless) for free as long as I paid for shipping both ways. A few days later, they sent an email and said, they were wrong when they told me they would fix it for free and would charge me for the repairs. I AM DONE WITH CAPITAL.

We are having a similar initial experience to Ash, although we are just at the "burning everything" stage. When we first got the range (48") we did the sugar melt test and saw that the oven had hot spots in the back corners. I figured that it wasn't too off but after baking a bunch since we've had I know that the uneven heating is a significant factor and has to be dealt with otherwise the stuff in the back of the oven will burn horribly while the rest of the batch remains an unappetizing ghostly white. A chunk of soapstone in the bottom of the oven evened things out, but it took forever to preheat.

I have yet to experience the mechanical issues.

Here is a link that might be useful: sugar test