Sorry, just took a look at this thread again and noticed your question...by the time I got to Miele, I had decided on induction, so I didn't give the Miele an actual test drive. I did give it a pretty thorough inspection at the Miele place, though, and thought it was a very sexy range -- and the performance seemed very similar to the Wolf dual fuel. I say that b/c the Miele also has the stacked burners, which I really liked, but the BTUs are higher than Wolf (which top out at around 16k, I believe -- Miele was closer to 20k or so -- I can't quite remember). The Miele ovens on the 48" range were very nice -- the smaller one is a speed oven, and the bigger one is a regular convection. The speed oven wasn't a big plus for me personally, since I really wanted a steam oven as a second oven, but there are people on this forum who love their speed ovens. One thing I really liked about the Miele oven, which Wolf doesn't have, is the burst of steam option, which is great for baking (you can program up to 3 bursts of steam for up to 6 min. each during cooking). I didn't care that much about the MasterChef options on Miele, but again, others love these. At any rate, the Miele seemed very similar to the Wolf, I liked the steam option on the oven better and liked the Miele burners better (also, if you're interested in a grill, theirs was excellent and seemed very similar to the Wolf, which I think is the best in the business). If I had stuck with a range, I would have been very tempted by the Miele.

Our steam oven In the 48 inch model was leaking then stopped working. We finally had it replaced. New model came. And it leaks too! If you get that Thermador with the steam I don’t think that steam oven will last. They could never figure out how to stop the leak to replaced it. Needless to say we aren’t pleased the new model leaks too. Very frustrating with what seems to be faulty engineering.

It is worth pointing out, I think, that the pressure differential across the blower, called pressure loss, is essentially the same whether the blower is in the hood, at the end of the duct outside, or in a door blowing into an otherwise sealed house. The pressure loss is the sum of all the losses due to friction and turbulence in the duct, duct cap where present, hood transitions, baffles, make-up air system restrictions, etc. Any slight differences in pressure loss with blower position will be due to local transitions where the blower is mounted versus the blower's air flow uniformity at the blower exit. The resulting flow rate will be that which applies to that pressure loss on the fan curve plot. Front of hood deposited grease is due to insufficient overlap and/or insufficient air velocity at the hood aperture. Hoods are generally poor at drawing air from the vicinity of the burners. Most plume capture depends on the plume's upward velocity, mainly driven by the buoyancy of hot grease and water vapor and air. The plume naturally expands as it rises, hence hood aperture overlap is desirable.

I am always curious why people feel so strongly about dual fuel. It just feels like something that is more prone to failure. The appeal of the traditional Bluestar is its very straight-forward and rugged design. It's a true workhorse, and personally I wouldn't pick any other brand; but everybody has different preferences. As for fuel source, it doesn't make a big difference in practice. Every oven needs some adjustments to your cooking technique anyway. And it's a much bigger deal adjusting to an oven that doesn't heat evenly (just to give a common example), than adjusting to a different fuel source. We have a Bluestar gas range, and two electric Miele wall ovens (SpeedOven and CSO). And you know what, fuel source never even is a consideration when I have to pick one or the other. Each one of these three ovens has its own strengths, and I love this particular combination, though. If you have the money and space, I can't recommend it highly enough. Technically, an electrically heated oven has the advantage of higher moisture, which can help with things like baking bread. But that's so easy to compensate for; it's why people love making bread in a Dutch oven. What else do you make where you prefer electric over gas? In full fairness, the Bluestar gas range does have a known downside. It takes a long time to preheat. The upside is that it heats very evenly, is very predictable, and has the most amazingly powerful broiler, second only to commercial salamanders.