Ventilation

There has been over the years, a discussion of whether a down draft is as good as a hood.  We believe that the power of a vent should be measured on a personal and performance scale.  A vent is measured in CFMs (cubic feet of air moved in a minute).  The bigger the number the stronger the vent.  What determines how much power one needs is the type of cooking one does and how much heat is given off by the burners on a cooking surface.  The optimum vent would be an overhead hood which covers the cooking surface and is high enough and hollow inside to trap smoke and odors which do not immediately leave through the exhaust system and do not let them into the kitchen. I am going to take you through a couple of scenarios which are commonplace in our business and show you how choices are made in vents.

A customer comes in to the store and is planning an island installation for their cooking surface.  Island hoods are quite large and sometimes unsightly but sometimes elegant and become the center point of the kitchen, and cost between $1500 and $3000+ dollars.  The cooktop this customer is looking for is a standard gas top with two 12,000 BTU and two 9,000 BTU burners.  The cooktop’s performance would rate a 400 cfm or larger blower.  The customer does not like the price of island hoods and asks about a down draft.  Most down drafts today are mounted behind the cooktop and raise when needed.  They vary from 500-1000cfm.  Since they draw so close to the cooktop they do not need to be as powerful as an overhead hood but tend to be so.  In a nutshell, THEY WORK!  If the down draft systems we sell are installed correctly they should be able to handle any standard gas or electric cooktop even for those who stir-fry.  Where they are suspect is when one wants to use them behind a Commercial cooktop with 15,000 btu burners, BBQs, and Griddles.  There is not enough draw to allow them to perform properly, people still do install them anyway if their personal cooking habits do not warrant higher cfms.

When installing a cooking surface against wall customers have the option of a reasonably priced hood.  Again, performance and personal needs are evaluated.  With a professional stovetop most would opt for an over head hood.  These hoods should be the same depth as the cooktop (usually 24”) and anywhere from 9” to 30” tall or taller if needed.  They should be at least as wide as the cooking surface or the next size wider minimum.  Professional cooktops have 15,000 btu burners and need a minimum of 600 cfm but with more burners (6,8, BBQ, Griddle) bigger motors may be needed to meet the cooktop’s performance.  If the consumer only were going to use the professional cooktop to boil water less of a hood would be needed.  Only Viking supports a down draft system in the professional equipment.

A customer is trying to decide between a hood and a down draft and is concerned about the noise level.  High performance vents usually have a higher sound level, even when the motor is located remotely (on a roof, external mounted blower).  The sound level one hears in a vent system is the air moving through the filters, by removing the filters and the fan blade, the motor is virtually silent.  A blower system will be quieter than a fan blade (propeller) system.  A vent with infinite control as opposed to a one, two, or three-speed control, should be quieter because they have the ability to go to much lower speeds (cfm).  Our opinion is that no vent is quiet on high speed.  There is a difference of sounds when lower speeds are selected. 

In the market place today there are hundreds of vents to offer, from wall mount to under cabinet, from microwave hood to island hood, from pull out to custom wood or plaster liners, white to copper colors, the list goes on and on in all shapes, sixes, and colors with many different cfms.  We display a large array of these items as well as the down draft systems and many are operational so one can hear the sound levels.