Hi - this thread is a little old now so this might be too late, but I have some related Qs even after reading all this helpful advice. I'm starting gut reno of a 120+ year old townhouse in NYC and plan to install 36" bluestar with 2, 22K BTU burners (in addition to other smaller burners of course) which we'll use primarily for stir fry. We HATE grease smell in the house and cook all the time, so want to get what we need for the stove we have. So I'm fine getting major CFM, if that's what it takes, but my concern is the ducting. It seems we have 2 options - up an existing chimney (which we're having relined and is not used for fireplaces; fireplaces were all sealed up decades ago) - but that would be 3 stories or about 50 feet needed to get to the roof and I wonder if that's too far for it to function properly...2nd option would be to bring it down into a soffit on the floor below (a rental apartment that already has a dropped ceiling) and vent out of the exterior wall, but this would require making a new hole in our masonry, and would mean the venting would be just outside our kitchen, under a french door that we're likely to want to open often while we're cooking - so the smoke could in theory end up back in the kitchen, no? I am by no means an expert so forgive me if I'm totally off base here, but any thoughts/advice would be much appreciated. Thanks!

Can't offer any advice here except to reiterate that in the end, the hood needs to work properly or there is no point in whatever convolutions you, the KD, or the GC go through to get it in. I second the vote to get an expert in to assess the options and recommend CFM/ducting/etc. options. They deal with issues like this all the time and I guarantee, they've seen stranger setups and worked around them successfully. I am far more concerned about the notion that you or your DH are not welcome to be present and observing during the work. It's one thing if they are saying "please don't stand in front of the guy with the nail gun while he's firing it" -- quite another to suggest you should not be observing the work as it progresses. I work from home, and went down -- literally -- every 5-10 minutes to watch our renovation. I often stood there, watching, for long periods, sometimes chatting, sometimes just watching. I asked questions (why is this here, what is that for, how are you going to deal with that?) ALL the time. And only because I was watching did we catch things like #12 or #14 electrical wire when the cable lighting manufacturer required #6 or #8 (required a phone call to the manufacturer, then putting the electrical sub on the line with them, to convince him of the need for that ... I had to ask the manufacturer rep "what would happen if he uses the #14 he wants to" and the response "your house will probably burn down within two weeks" -- I just asked him to please repeat that to the sub. Did the trick. We found we had to do that a lot: check and double check, research ourselves, read the installation instructions OURSELVES so we'd know if things were being done properly (we got the wrong size duct -- and hole in our roof -- at first, because he read the instructions for a 600 CFM hood, and we had a 1,200 CFM hood... his response: "Dang it! Why do they put all the instructions in one book!" (the 600 CFM instructions came FIRST in the book... he just read them, then figured he was all set and cut the hole... my husband came home that night, looked at the hole in the roof, said ummm... let's check that.... and voila, WAY too small!) (Ditto for the Miele -- how DARE those uppity Europeans put so many different languages into ONE installation manual! It's just not FAIR! :) (I even went so far as to offer to get a Miele installer out, once it was apparent my GC had never seen a Miele before ... he said "heck no, ya' seen one dishwasher, ya' seen 'em all, they're all the same...!" and proceeded to install the bottom strip backwards...) Bottom line: you need to know what they've done, how they did it, where they made changes (you might have to deal with the effects/consequences in your wall later on, either because you have a problem down the road or because you want to do something further). You have every right to watch what they are doing. It's your money, they work for you, you call the shots. A good contractor with competent subs should never object to being observed OR to being questioned about how something is being done and why, IMHO. I hate to think what we'd have ended up with (besides a house in cinders) had we not watched every move our guys made!

I'm sure you all heard of the North Shore Animal League. Well a dog was adopted from them, they live in back of me. They brought it home tied it to a tree, just like you said and left it there. Once a day water was offered but was spilled after they left. Same with her food. She did eat once a day. There are two boys and a little girl wholive there. 2, 9, 11. Perfect ages to play with a dog. Winter came and dog still outside. It was cold. No bed, no house. A few weeks later a dog house appeared. only thing is the dog could not reach it with the chain. It was a plastic house and the wind would blow it over or away. It was never but back in position. Now I wonder is the dogs water frozen? I called north shore animal league and complained. They said they went there and checked it out. I sat and watched all day to see if anyone came. No one was there to check the dog. They lied. I found out the dogs owner's father is the judge of our town. When I called and emailed a second time they said the dog was fine. I would gibe the dog water during the day. My heart broke. MY den looks out over their backyard. Why the neightbors on either side could watch this they had a view of the yard also. Well the NAAL must of told them I complained, (wich is against the rules) now all the neigbors will not speak to me. They are afraid because her father is the judge. I know why I love animals more then people. BTW summer came, they cut the tree down that gave it a little shelter. Poor thing. Finally one day I noticed he dog was gone. Was it because I threatned the NORTHSHORE ANIMAL LEAGUE to call the newspaper? I have unfriendly neighbors but maybe I made a little dog happy.

Buehl, Here in my home town there is a liquidation place called MTF where they sell all kinds of surplus and salvage- I love to frequent the stationary section- I probably have enough pens to last the rest of my lifetime! (Must be the teacher in me!) Anyhow I was lucky enough to get two different sets one for $5 and one for $8. Now these are sets of 24 colours, not just browns- but I find the smaller sets often don't have browns in them. pcjs- funnily enough I do buy DH a lot of his tools- like the water saw he pooh poohed (and he's used already for the fireplace hearth). I got him the compound mitre saw, and many others... It's just the idea of an air compressor I guess kinda scares me off and if he's not going to use it anyways... Anyhow, you have any recommendations for a nailer? :>)