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Which vent hood for a 48' range

13 years ago

We are going to need a ventilation system for a 48" free standing range. This is going to be mounted into a custom cabinet for our new house. Any recommendations on which one to get? The sales guy told us that Vent-a-hood would be best. But we are new to this and just starting my research. Thanks again.

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Comments (7)

deeageaux
13 years ago
Some people like their Vent-a-hood and some people really really hate their Vent-a-hood.

Many say it is very difficult to clean and VAH insist you mount it rather low.

My recommendations 1) Prestige/Blue star. Same hoods sold by two different companies. 2) a)Modern Aire b) Independent Hoods 3)Metallo Arts.

Prestige/Blue Star would be the highest performance.

2 a/b offer equal quality with more styling options. Less capture area with less performance but still very good. I would rank Metallo Arts just behind the other three in terms of quality.

Modern Aire is teaming up with Eurostoves(a vendor that helped give birth to the Capital Culinarian)to get hoods that match the performnace of Prestige/Bluestar. And my guess is more styling options. Should be out soon. I know you said you don't need it till February.

Here is a link that might be useful: Eurostoves Hood/Culinarian Site
sayde
13 years ago
Prestige seems to have gotten good reviews. You can get a Prestige "powerpack" which has the liner, baffles, motor, lights, switches, and have a custom hood made to fit around it. The Prestige can be vented up or back, which was important for our installation. I'm having the Prestige built into a copper hood.
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Wow! A rare case where the aesthetics part of the performance-aesthetics-economy: pick-any-two limitation is not a factor in hood selection. But first, given a sealed household, I would strongly recommend obtaining a furnace kit to use outside air. This will avoid the possibility of the MUA system not working perfectly and the hood causing negative house pressure and hence backdrafting of the combustion appliance. I know that such devices exist for Beckett burners, and would guess that there are adapters for other burners. As the OP correctly notes, a 200 cfm ERV is not going to cope with a 1200 cfm vent hood. (Actually, what would happen with a sealed house is that at full power, the hood would pull the cfm the ERV would let through into the now minus a couple of inches w.c. house pressure.) So MUA is essential, and in the mid-Atlantic region would be pretty uncomfortable in winter if unheated. Depending on one's tolerance for heat and humidity, cooling in summer might be optional or not. We are starting to get into the realm where performance-economy, pick any two is applicable. MUA can be roughly characterized as passive or active. By passive is meant no fan in the circuit. Active uses a booster fan to keep the house pressure stable. No-fan only works for simple ducting with a vent hood air flow controlled damper. (A recent post here provided some sources for these.) If a filter is used at 1200 cfm (or whatever flow actually could be pulled with all the doors and windows open, then the house pressure will drop. One can see on websites selling filter packs that the pressure drop at such flow rates is too large for combustion appliance safety, which require negative pressures not be greater than 0.03 to 0.06 inches depending on appliance type. Active is needed to overcome the filter restriction. It may be needed to overcome heating heat exchanger restriction and/or air conditioning heat exchanger (expander) restriction. The difficulty with active is balancing the MUA air flow rate against the variable hood flow rate such that the house pressure is near zero. This usually requires a control system of some sort, and can be a "project." What to do? What to do? Only one free-of-processing-controllers active MUA has occurred to me. In the simplest embodiment, the hood control is connected to two parallel wired identical fans, one in the hood exhaust path and one in the MUA path. Then the two will (try to) operate at nearly the same flow rate at every control setting, and one only needs to adjust the MUA duct restriction until it matches that of the hood path. More exactly, adjust the MUA path so that house pressure falls very little as the hood is turned on. Note that this doesn't account for bathroom fans, fireplaces, or other exhaust flows not due to the hood. In such cases, PID control of the MUA fan would be needed. In my case, due to a 1500 cfm hood, 1000 cfm over-oven vent, fireplace, and three bathroom fan household, I am building an active MUA that will use an axial blower in the 2000 cfm regime. It has to overcome the pressure loss of its intake vent, its filter, and its heat exchanger (which is hot water pumped from my oil burner). Control is via a Fuji PID controller operating from a BAPF differential pressure sensor. The motor power control is not yet selected, and a lot of sheet metal action is still needed, along with further attic revisions that I seem to have trouble getting to at the needed rate. I recommend the OP and/or his HVAC person read the "Kitchen Ventilation Systems Application & Design Guide" that may be found at Greenheck's web site. It periodically moves around, URL-wise, so a Google search by name may be fastest. Greenheck or one of its competitors may be able to provide what you need for considerably less agony than a do-it-yourself HVAC project would. kas
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They make vents for ranges like this that have the motor that runs the fan outside up on the roof. Its not big - just sits in a metal roof cap thing. This pulls the air out, instead of pushing it up. When I got mine (with six burners, griddle and grill) they recommended this method due to the amount of heat all this generated. The unexpected benefit to me was that even though you still hear the significant air flow noise, the fan noise is outside so it is quieter than the alternatives. Usually I like more room on either side of the range, but with a larger range, you find there is room on top of the range to move things around, so the relatively small counter space on either side should be just fine. As for the size and the upper cabinets, I wish I had listened to them when they suggested a wider capture area in the hood. Going with a hood a little wider than the range would have been best. I'd give up the uppers to get better performance. Or perhaps another look like small open shelves that hold your oils and vinegar, etc, could work. Good luck!
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You may be better off asking this over on the Appliances forum. But you'll probably get a lot of differing opinions. This old thread is probably a good place to start, especially if noise level is a major concern for your setup. The consensus there seems to be that Vent-a-Hoods are fairly noisy, and some people say they're also hard to clean. Laura
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Not only should the hood sides overlap the range cooktop, (60 inches may do vs. 48 for the range), but similarly the front-to-back aperture distance must be sufficient to overlap the range cooktop. The VaH drawing shows 30 inches, perhaps enough, although it is unclear how much of that might be lip or controls. Assume none. With an entrance aperture of 30 x 60 or 12.5 sq. ft. under the hood, at 90 CFM per sq. ft. the actual flow should be 1100 CFM -- probably adequate even on an island -- so long as there are no significant cross drafts. However, a magic lung isn't magic. The most we can generously assume is that the hood hanging in the air can flow the rated 1100 CFM. What it can do with some length of ducting, a roof cap, and a make-up air system imperfectly attempting to make the interior air pressure to outside air pressure equal is not knowable without analysis. I would go for a higher flow rate, ca. 1700 CFM. With care and expense, maybe 1500 would scrape by, particularly at 30-inches height, where the hood may block the view of taller cooks. A side view stick figure mock-up is recommended. Also, I am unclear how effective the entire entry aperture is, without more detail about how the incoming air meets the blowers and how the blower structure interacts with it. Pro style baffle type hoods are, in their way, somewhat less complex internally if the blower is moved to the roof where it belongs.
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alexstanton
13 years ago
One thing you should keep in mind when you shopping around for a range hood to go over a 48Ã¢ÂÂ stove, is the size of the hood. Many (almost all) American-type brands are made with good quality but are pretty oversized and bulky. Even though itÃ¢ÂÂs a Ã¢ÂÂcommercialÃ¢ÂÂ look, which may complement a traditional kitchen design, it will block much of the view, which is especially important if your kitchen is shared with the living room or has a view of the outside.

On the other hand, European-type range hoods, even though they usually have the same suction power, are typically much more slim and Ã¢ÂÂlighterÃ¢ÂÂ, and would complement a modern or contemporary kitchen very well.

I think your decision has to be based not on somebody elseÃ¢ÂÂs advice, but on your own considerations of your kitchen design and personal taste. Some people like great big bulky commercial-style hoods, some people like slim and futuristic. In your case, the overall look doesnÃ¢ÂÂt make any difference, since itÃ¢ÂÂs going to be hidden inside the cabinet (whatever the reason is) - as long as the quality of the product is good.
amcook
13 years ago
What you are looking for is an insert and a blower. Prestige makes a high capacity insert that would provide a large capture volume and baffle area. From a performance standpoint, those are the two key aspects of the hood. You can purchase the blower of your choice. I'd suggest looking at the Prestige RB1600 or IL1600 (remote and inline respectively) providing 1600CFM of extraction (limited by ducting and room pressure of course). The alternative is FanTech or other third party blower but you'll have to be careful and match duct sizes.

Good luck.
deeageaux
13 years ago
On the other hand, European-type range hoods, even though they usually have the same suction power, are typically much more slim and Ã¢ÂÂlighterÃ¢ÂÂ, and would complement a modern or contemporary kitchen very well.

Typically, European-type hoods have less capture and no mechanical capture. And are not availble with the suction power that should be used for the Culinarian. Witch the OP is looking at. These type of hoods are sufficient for induction and low btu cooktops.
deeageaux
13 years ago
What you are looking for is an insert and a blower.

Marlinman, you should look at ajmadison.com and look at inserts and canopy hoods. Find out which one you need.

When I first read your post it seemed like you were looking for a canopy type hood. Upon further review you may be looking for an insert.
amcook
13 years ago
BTW, I fall in the "owned a Vent-A-Hood and didn't like it" category. I thought it was difficult to clean and reassemble. Having to remove and replace the box around the spinning squirrel cage is a design flaw IMHO. Alignment had to be perfect to avoid scraping and very loud operation. I think any routine task shouldn't require working within millimeters of the blower since blower alignment and balance can easily be disturbed. In my install, it was loud but some have reported quieter operation so it varies by install situation.

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