I have a 36" Bertazzoni gas cooktop and a Bosch 500 series electric oven beneath it. You can do it with a drop-in cooktop, but not a rangetop-type, where the knobs are at the front. Assuming you are looking at a drop-in cooktop, check online for the manufacturer's installation manuals and check the clearances they call for - they should list all the various dimensions, including the depth of the cooktop, and the clearance gap required by the oven. In my case, we opted to raise the countertops by one inch to increase the clearance. Alternatively, we could have dropped the oven by an inch, but that would have meant the door opened very low indeed. To raise the counters, my GC added a layer of thick plywood, then faced it to match my cabinets exactly - it looks a part of the trim and you would never know. Hope this helps.

I just joined this forum so I could learn more about this cook top. I have tried to contact some of you directly, but I may not have succeeded. Apologies, if for some this is repetitious. Based on the web-based information, including your collective enthusiasm, this cook top seems to fit our needs. We plan to buy a house whose kitchen we wish to change. The existing stove is an electric glass top with a convection oven. That top is not my first choice, but it is new and I like the idea of a convection oven. We think the adjoining kitchen counter is big enough to accommodate a second cook top, perhaps a 36 incher, but 30" is better. I want a high powered center burner. Centrality is good because the location would diminish spills and splatters from getting on the kitchen counter itself. The Caldera 30" seems uniquely to suit our needs. The major design problem is that a large wok, for instance, might block other burners. And we do not have the space or money for a dedicated wok burner. I do know that our current four burner electric stove in the house from which we are moving would not accommodate a 15" wok in the center without impinging on all the other burners. True if the burners were to be placed closer to the external corners, the problem would diminish, but it would not disappear. Since we do plan to keep the current glass 4 burner that is not a serious drawback, but I am curious to learn about your own experiences. The more serious problem is that Caldera has gone missing. I have tried all their web-based contacts, phone numbers and email address. The email address elicited no reply. The phone numbers have been shut. Their most recent address in Stowe, Vermont, is now the location of an electric lighting company. I did locate a dealer on eBay who is apparently now carrying the top I want for about $840. The salesman who answered the phone did not specialize in Caldera and his colleague who knows more was out for the day. However he thought they had been taken over and moved to NY state, but the confirmation of this must await the return of the specialist colleague. He did think that the warranties were still valid. One of the appeals of the company was that Stowe is only a few hours drive from where I live in western Massachusetts so the manufacturer would be near-by, but now I do not know where they are and if they still exist. By the way I even tried to track down Al Shute - - I believe the customer service Al at Caldera - - and his home phone is also disconnected. So they seem to have done a complete disappearing act. The absence of any updated and corrected information on their website is not reassuring, but websites in general do get notoriously out of date, even for flourishing and growing concerns. So, addressing my questions specifically to trailrunner, tomalyse, mommycooks, raynag, the Caldera owners on this thread, do you know what has become of Caldera? Have the new owners maintained the standards of the old? Do they still in any way exist? And if so, what is their service?

Yes, some of us have no other options b/c of the design of out kitchen. I had an old Jenn-Air electric rrange w/ a downdraft in my "original" kitchen and was perfectly happy with it. I did lots and lots of research, attempted to change design to avoid downdraft and just could not seem to work around it and accomodate other priorities in the room. So.....we have a 6 burner Dacor gas (propane) cooktop. (36"). Installed a 36" Thermador downdraft. Chose this model b/c it rose higher than others and wanted one that would be taller than my tallest pot. The sales guy convinced me that a 600 cfm remote blower would be more than enough. I had plenty of conversations with him and the HVAC guys, talking about what I wanted, what I had learned, etc. The 600 cfm doesn't really seem like enough, we cook in our kitchen daily, often several times a day. I don't remember smells lingering like they do now, steam can hang around, and heaven forbid that we burn something, that fills the room for sure. Anyway, the bottom line is that if I had to go back and do it all again -- ideally, the design would not call for a downdraft. Can't undo that one - so, I might consider a different cooktop -- electric or induction. Finally, I would make sure that I have a blower powerful enough to handle what I am doing -- I think we should have gotten a stronger blower, and we still might. But for the time being I am learning to live with this and adjust our cooking accordingly. The Thermador has done its job to the best of its ability. I do like the additional height of 14" as opposed to most others which I believe are 8-10". I also wish that we had gone with the 1000 cfm inline blower rather than the 600. Here is a link that might be useful: Thermador downdraft

I did buy it! I like it a pretty good but. It is super powerful but has really good low temps too. That was my complaint with an older Miele I had, it would always burn things bc it was so hot on low. I’m having some issues with burners clicking. That’s my only complaint and I haven’t had it checked out yet bc it’s an annoyance as of now.