Thanks for the advice. I thought to call the place where we got the appliances. The guy who we dealt with there told me that 90% of the range installations they do are prior to granite templating and backsplash, but that it's pretty easy to pull the range out since it's on wheels. He did say it could be an advantage to do backsplash first, since less chance of damaging the new range. But now I am nervous because no one mentioned needing to have a free standing range in place before templating. Hope that is not going to be an issue!

Just wanted to make sure you have also seen the Vent-a-hood "Excalibur" model, which is a almost the same as the Rangecraft Canterbury that you like. The Excalibur comes two ways: in an undercabinet style, but that one is only 9" high (#XRH9), and a wall-mount style that is 18" high (#XRH18). Unfortunately, the pics on the VAH website for the Excalibur are TERRIBLE. But note that you can change the black bands that come standard on the Excalibur for bands with rivets like the Canterbury's. The bands can be in a number of different finishes too. Of course, the bands with rivets are an upcharge, so I am not sure if that makes the Excalibur go out of your price range. You can also use the Excalibur with a duct cover (like your second pic) or as an undercabinet style. There's also a pic on the VAH website that's a little better. Under the "Range Hood Styles" tab, click on "Design Ideas", and look at the bottom row of pics for the Excalibur. It's still not the greatest photo, but you may be able to see how similar to the Rangecraft Canterbury it is. Here is a link that might be useful: VAH Excalibur Hood

In principle, any hood with an internal blower could be gutted of the blower and operated with an in-line or roof mounted blower. (GreenDesigns may have meant that using it while leaving the blower inside would be a poor plan.) I can imagine construction details that might cause non-optimal internal hood flow patterns, but I have no detailed knowledge of the internal construction of myriad hoods to know whether such are prevalent. There may be nanny jurisdictions that would claim that code approval of the hood was violated when it had its blower removed. Any hood available for order without a blower likely is fully compatible with an external blower. This, of course, can be confirmed with the manufacturer. The most important adaptation requirement is that the blower be continuously controllable, and that the hood control be a continuous motor control. A hood with just a few motor speed positions on a switch might require a compatibly-wired motor. While a multi-position hood control could in principle be replaced by a continuous control, par. 2 may apply. When I was doing my kitchen reno, I chose a compatible hood/roof blower combination (supplied by Wolf) because the entire scope of the project (gutting and reconstructing part of a house) made playing with the details of the blower circuit a side project of tertiary importance that I couldn't afford the time to deal with. As it happens, inside my Wolf (Independent) hood is a diac/triac motor control circuit, about the simplest design available that goes back to the '70s. The compatible Wolf (Broan) roof blower uses a typical induction motor that is easily controlled by this type of circuit. The cost versus time value trade-off needs to be considered when dealing with issues like this. kas

I finally decided to install glass subway tiles in my kitchen for backsplash. However my question is, should I install the range hood and floating shelves first before my glass tiles? Is it easy to drill holes on glass tiles after it's installed? Thank you.