Rangehoods in Aparments

Bandita

Bandita

Hi all,

We'll be renovating a unit (top floor) that currently is just oven/cooktop - no rangehood. What are the options - how do they work in apartments?

We had a kitchen person there today who offered 3 options:
1) buy a rangehood that filters and air and blows it back out into the kitchen;
2) cut a hole into the ceiling - smoke goes up there (I don't quite understand this one - doesn't seem right??)
3) Cut a whole into the ceiling and outside wall so it goes outside.

The unit is solid brick. Would there be BC ramifications of cutting hole into outside wall? Seems quite $$$. Not sure about into ceiling either - or just sending smoke straight up there, seems unsafe? Or maybe that's just normal - everywhere we'd lived has always had a rangehood in place, so never had to think about it :D

Thanks for the help!

Cheers,
Jen
 
We had a unit with the air filter style rangehood over the stove. I think it must have been reasonably effective because it was really greasy/filthy when I had to clean it after the tenants moved out after their six month lease finished.
 
Thanks Tizzy,

What was the cost of the air filter style rangehood? I'm guessing it's much $$ than a "normal" one?

Cheers,
Jen
 
Hi Jen,

Usually the overhead triangular type of rangehoods give you the option of fitting filterpads and recirculating the air back into the kitchen through vents on the side of the "chimney" or to direct out/up with ducting.

The flat slide out types I looked at saved space but only gave the recirc. option.

Ducting into the ceiling/roof space is generally not a great idea, you find that unless you have really good ventilation in your roof, (like a 40 knot breeze) everything around the outlet becomes layered in a greasy film and the moisture from steam may promote dampness.

Recirculated thru filter pads is good but the pads have to be cleaned regularly. Some models I looked at required the filters to be changed as they were a paper type material, unlikely to be done by tennants. Venting up into the ceiling then out to an external wall or down and out the eaves (If closed in) is the best idea if it is possible.

I bought a stainless steel hood with "chimney" for a tad less than $200 at a warehouse car park clearance (usually about $3-400), I am reallly happy with it, it has a fairly noisy 2 speed fan, and 2 halogen downlights which I really like, no shadows cast over the cooking area. You can pay heaps $$$ more for a really good quality one with trendy curved glass hood section etc.

The biggest problem I found was mounting it to a plasterboard wall, there was nothing solid to attach to. I could/should have added in a timber noggin to attach to, which would have required cutting out plasterboard fitting a timber between two studs at the required level and then replacing the plasterboard.

Instead I used those expanding butterfly type bolts and clips. The only drawback to this is hoping that people don't hang/lean onto it with too much weight. If there was a wall stud/noggin behind or if it was a brick wall it would have been real easy to fit.

I also had to have a power socket added to the wall next to the hood to plug into to. Some models are hard wired in by a sparky.

Only drawback I find is, being over 6ft, I'm always banging my head on the corners when leaning over the stove. Ouch, doing it less as time passes and my brain registers the big new shiny obstacle. To prevent this I would have had to mount it too high to be really effective.

Hope this helps.
 
your best option in this case is to buy a recirculating rangehood of better quality and either vent it through the top cupboards to any space between the top cabinets and the ceiling or if there is no space then vent it back into the kitchen from the front ,several rangehoods of better quality have this feature ,
 
Hi Jen

We have used both the recirculation and exhaust to the outside.

The exhaust to the outside was achieved by boring a hole through both brick walls that make up a full brick construction. Then sleeving it with a fire proof layer and installing a pipe and grill on the outside. In the end was a lot of work and has only been marginally effective.

The reason the result has been marginal is to do with he tenants we have. Mainly they are asia and just love to cook using a lot of oil that just seems to end up caking the whole rangehood. The oil cakes the range hood whether it is vented to the outside or recirculating.

We have found that with the recirculating you still get residual deposits of oil on the ceiling and top of the kitchen cupboard, whereas with the vented ones there is none of this.

I say marginal because in both situations we need to replace the rangehood on a change in tenant as I have found that cleaing and replacing the grills is just not practical in time an cost (for replacement grills). The problem with the vented hoods is that the plumbing through the cupboard is specific to the rangehood and are having problems finding cheap rangehoods that will allign.

The replacement rangehoods I buy for $99 so not a big cost compared to the cost of the grills that run to $30 -40 and then you still have to clean the internalls with a lot of sharp edges.

So the bottom lne is if you think the tenatns are going to gunk up the work install a cheap one that you can easily replace.

Cheers
 
Thanks for all the advice, fantastic!!

Are the recirculating rangehoods only available in the large triangle style rangehoods with the "chimney" - or can you get them in the smaller, pull out styles?

Thanks,
Jen
 
Hi Jen. I've got no idea what happened to the reply I wrote last night. :confused: I mustn't have submitted it properly. Anyway, all I said was I didn't purchase the flat style recirculating hood, it was already there when we bought the place. I agree with Beef_hooked's comment though, they are a pain for catching your forehead on while cooking. Ours was installed under and into a cupboard. Cleaning it was definately a yukky job when it was let go.
 
JenD said:
2) cut a hole into the ceiling - smoke goes up there (I don't quite understand this one - doesn't seem right??)


Cheers,
Jen
Click to expand...

I think you'll find many residential installations just dump to the ceiling space.

I've had oil smoke vented from the kitchen come back down in the bathroom....

Cheers,

The Y-man
 
many years ago (1980,s),here in ipswich we had virtually an entire estate of servicemen in the raaf ,over time it was noticed that there were runs of a sticky substance running down the walls from behind the cornice ,after examination the substance was deemed to be cooking oils deposited directly into the ceiling cavity from the kitchen rangehood ,this brought immediate action as now the houses were not only a health risk because of the oils but were also a fire risk , i hope that this lesson will nudge some of you to do ducting of hoods correctly
 
Hi all again

find photo of one installed attached

Celeste
 

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I'd really like one of these myself.. i hate the recirculating one I have.

the difficulty and expense involved in ducting it up into the ceiling, and into the existing 200mm duct in the bathroom makes it not worth doing.
 
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