Extractor hoods: Better to live under a hood than to breathe whatever you can

There’s a little smoke curling in the crowded stove…

Although the first kitchen air purifier appeared only in the middle of the last century, the air in the room where food is cooked has always been purified.

Smoke blowing from chimneys over rooftops carried away together with products of incomplete combustion of fuel drops of fat, moisture and all sorts of odors that invariably accompany cooking process.

Not without reason, so valued the ability to well stove: thanks to the strong draft and fire is well maintained, and the air in the house remained fresh and clean, no matter how long the hostess was engaged in cooking.

In modern apartment buildings instead of a pipe – a ventilation shaft connected by air ducts with a closed grille opening into the kitchen of each apartment. Light, warm air rises and flows upward through the grille to the outside, where it is sucked in by the cool, fresh outside air that enters through the gaps in the hood.

Naturally, the greater the temperature difference between the air inside and outside the apartment, the more efficient is the air exchange.

Therefore, in the summer, when it is cooler in the house than outdoors, the ventilation system stops working altogether, and sometimes there is a so-called “rollover” ventilation: warmer air comes in through the shaft, forcing the cooler air through the cracks.

However, the efficiency of natural ventilation even in winter does not exceed 90 cfm. m per hour, which is not enough to protect not only our noses from fragrances that are often unappetizing, but also our lungs from becoming laden with carcinogenic soot particles and aerosols that are harmful to the respiratory system.

But this value is only achieved if the ventilation system is regularly cleaned of poplar fluff, bird droppings and other litter that clog it. Where do you see a chimney sweep these days??

The hood is a forcing in of clean air

Since natural ventilation can not provide sufficient air exchange in the kitchen, it was necessary to resort to forced ventilation, that is, to remove polluted air with a fan.

The second factor making it possible to increase the efficiency of ventilation is the position and size of the suction surface: Being the same size as the stove hob, it covers it like a hood from above. So the fumes, grease and smells rising from boiling pots and pans splashing with oil are almost completely sucked into a device called a kitchen hood.

As a result, the amount of air that can be blown in an hour that is, the suction capacity is 3 to 8 times greater than with natural ventilation, and in some models even greater than 10 times greater!

That way even the intense fumes and smells of long, hard frying are extracted from the kitchen so quickly that they don’t have time to seep into the rooms.

Hang up high or keep your head down?

Performance – the main parameter, in accordance with which the hood is chosen for a particular room.

According to sanitary regulations, the entire volume of air in the kitchen must be replaced 10-12 times in an hour, so if the kitchen of 6 square meters is suitable extraction capacity of 180 m3 h, for 25 square meters kitchen room integrated into the living room, which has recently become a fairly common occurrence, will need an extractor hood with a capacity of about 700 m3 h.

The distance between the cooker hob and the hood must be 65 cm to 85 cm if you wish to install the hood higher for any reason, you must use a hood with a greater capacity.

Of course, the closer the hood is to the stove, the more vapors and odors will be collected, but lowering it too low for gas stoves is not safe: grease particles deposited on it can ignite with an open flame,

The hood casing can suffer from overheating.

A hanging hood that hangs too low can also interfere with your cooking skills and can be a very sensitive reminder if you forget to duck your head when chasing after some escaping milk.

By the way, those who are so lucky in life that the other members of the family do not disdain to cook should choose a model that has the ability to adjust the distance from the hob, in order to adjust it to the height of each “cook”.

The second parameter, whose value is also rigidly predetermined, has already been mentioned: in order to reduce the leakage of contaminated air, the area of the suction surface must correspond to that of the hob.

That’s why our most popular range hoods are those that fit standard 60 or 90 cm wide cooktops.

That’s basically all you need to consider when installing a hood so that even the most modest of hoods will be able to successfully filter dirt and odors out of the kitchen air.

To go down the chimney, you have to go through the filter

Most hoods can be operated in two modes: extraction and recirculation.

The most effective extraction mode is the basic one: it has the highest performance this is the value given in the technical specifications and ensures 100% air purification because all the dirt collected by the hood is simply ducted to a ventilation shaft or directly to the outside.

The recirculation mode makes the hood similar to a normal room air cleaner, only more powerful: the extracted air is purified as it passes through the filters placed in the hood body and is recovered.

Hoods that run in exhaust mode also have a filter. It would seem that why clean before removing?

The way the air passes through the hood and down the chimney means that drops of fat inside the hood and fan blades and the walls of the chimney can be very hard to clean.

So installing a grease filter will make your life much easier and help you maintain high extraction performance.

These filters can be either organic made of fleece or synthetic fibers or metallic aluminum, less often steel .

The filters are generally laminated to increase the cleaning efficiency and prolong the life of the hood.

Metal filters are reusable: wash them in warm water and detergent or leave it to the dishwasher and put them back in the hood.

True, in order not to reduce the performance of the hood due to dirt deposited on the filter, this operation should be performed at least once a month.

If the grease filter is included in the mandatory equipment of the appliance, the charcoal filter, which is used in the recirculation mode to absorb odors, is purchased additionally. Which is quite justified, since this mode is considered auxiliary.

Approximately once every six months or a year depending on how intensively you cook the charcoal filter has to be replaced.

Although the recirculation performance is 30-40% lower, there are times when it is best, such as when you don’t want to lose heat by exhausting it and then getting cold outside air that rushes in through the cracks.

True, the cold can also come in through the ventilation shaft, but if the hood is equipped with an anti-return valve, it will not let not only the cold air into the kitchen, but also smoke, extraneous odors and sounds.

But sometimes – due to the constructional features of the building – recirculation becomes the only feasible mode. The air outlet requires a ductwork connection, the installation of which can be quite complicated and sometimes even impossible.

By the way, if there are fancy double-glazed windows that don’t let in air from the street at all, the exhaust unit in the mode of air exhaust simply won’t work and the situation can be saved only by additional air intake units.

Design: Rampant fantasy with fresh air extraction

As we have seen, in principle, the hood is a fairly simple appliance. However, the price range is huge: from 3 000 to 100 000 Dollars.

Because it has all sorts of extra features for more comfort and reliability, and not least because of the difference in design.

No other kitchen appliance in the house can match the cooker hood in terms of the number of design concepts that it incorporates into the kitchen interior.

The kitchen is a very special place: loaded with all sorts of equipment, it remains a family club and therefore should be comfortable and elegant. The hood, bearing the main accent, organizes the working space of the kitchen and allows you to combine everything into a single ensemble.

However, if you are happy with your existing decor you can keep the hood unobtrusive and make it disappear completely into the cabinet above the stove.

And for the wall-mounted hood, which is in full view, the fireplace type is suitable, which is offered in such a variety of decorative designs that you can easily find a variant that corresponds to the design of your kitchen.

For example, the combination of stainless steel and glass in a high-tech hood combines beautifully with modern cooktops. Brushed aluminum surface combines beautifully with glass, and in cheaper models, where the material for the body is plastic and painted metal, stainless steel trim gives a smart appearance.

For lovers of the “country” style, the frame of the hood is made of natural wood. For example, ELIKOR offers many models with natural oak framing, traditionally popular in America.

Ceiling-mounted island hoods for those lucky ones who have a large kitchen with a cooking suite at the center.

If it is possible to install a cooktop with an extra module, a very convenient option is a tabletop hood Gaggenau, Electrolux built into this module, which is retracted back into the table after cooking. Due to the proximity to the cooking surface, the air purification in this case is the most complete.

The same result is achieved with a sloping suction surface: The overlapping horizontal suction elements in one of the AEG models allow evaporation to be removed from a distance of 30 cm above the cooking surface.

Some seemingly purely decorative elements are also functional. Thus, the tempered glass visor protects the control panel from dirt.

Sometimes a small overhang turns into a screen, such as in one of Miele’s award-winning models, while the curved overhang, which is so attractive, makes it easy to access the hob.

You can also add glass shelves and finely designed grids to the hoods, so that you can use the “dead zone” above your cooking utensils.

Light at the end of the meal

We can’t talk about light. Not to mention the convenience of letting the light shine directly onto the food being cooked, the lighting provided by the hood will make your kitchen environment even more welcoming.

The light bulbs integrated in the hood can be incandescent or fluorescent energy-saving bulbs or halogen bulbs that look like small suns.

On some cooker hoods, you can adjust the intensity of the lighting Soft Light function , turning it to maximum intensity when cooking and turning it down when dining out to create a more intimate atmosphere. And by varying the focus of the light, you can change the size of the illuminated area the “Dimm” function .

Comfort – everything under the hood, everything under control?

Noise. Noise level is just as important as extraction performance. The noise in the cooker hood, which should be working throughout the cooking time, is so loud that it drowns out everything in the world and gives you a headache, so you quickly stop using it.

As a result, manufacturers pay a great deal of attention to “quietness”, creating structures that eliminate vibration and equipping hoods with special acoustic packs.

The use of high-powered fans also has a big effect because the noise emitted by these low-speed fans is much lower than that produced by low-powered fans operating at high speeds.

The noise level of some models is as low as 52-58 dB at maximum output, so even small conversations can be conducted in comfort.

Hood operation is extremely easy: simply press the button for the selected power level. As a rule, for precise selection of a suitable mode, there are several stages of power control although there is also a stepless step change , and sometimes an intensive mode is added, which allows you to hide from the household the fact of even strong burning.

However, no matter how easy to press the button, manufacturers are trying to facilitate this operation: the company Miele offers a joystick located at eye level, KRONAsteel – bright button illumination, Kaizer and Faber – remote control sorry, have not figured out how to cook without leaving your favorite chair! , and the company AEG – a unique feature control “Sensor Control – No Touch”, which turns on the hood with a wave of the hand.

But sometimes absent-mindedly we don’t remember to turn on the cooker hood until the smells spreading all over the apartment remind us of it. The salvation from “sclerosis” in this case – automatic switching on the hood after turning on the burner.

Even more interesting when the optimum operating mode is set automatically when switching on, as is the case with the Siemens cooker hoods, where the choice is made according to the degree of air pollution, determined by an ultrasonic density sensor. The sensor keeps monitoring the situation during the whole cooking time, giving a signal to change the mode when needed.

The end of extraction does not coincide with the end of cooking: it still takes some time to remove the dirt

The exhaust hood is a great place to introduce odours and impurities that didn’t make it to the fume cupboard in the first place.

The cooker hoods are equipped with a fan speed function that allows them to work for an extra 10-20 minutes when they are switched off so that you don’t waste time waiting for the air to clear.

Another option is the automatic switch-off timer, which can be activated either by pressing a separate button or by holding down one of the speed selection buttons.

The KRONAsteel extraction hoods are equipped with such timers, and while the timers of the simple models switch off the cooker hood after a fixed time 15 minutes , the more elite models offer a choice of times 5, 10 and 15 minutes .

For those rooms that are ventilated only through the hood, it comes in handy to have a model with interval start system: automatically starting the fan every hour will provide fresh air into the apartment.

After three years the filters are gone for good

The need to replace or clean them will be promptly indicated by LED indicators, programmed for a specific period of operation. Some companies make it possible to individually define, according to the user’s habits, how long the grease filter should be used.

But while this time means you have to replace the organic filter for a new one, the metal filter only needs to be cleaned and will last as long as the hood itself. No problem at all with filter removal thanks to a sophisticated filter cassette fixing system.

As for the activated charcoal filter, while it usually lasts around one year, the exclusive “LongLife” activated charcoal filter by AEG extends its life to three years.

The filter can be cleaned and regenerated: it can be cleaned in the dishwasher at 65°C and regenerated by drying in the oven for 10 minutes with static heat at 100°C.

Hood reliability is determined by the longevity of the motor. Double suction motors are used for a smooth running.

Sensors that make sure that the hood does not “overdo it” also contribute: If the hood has been running continuously for the maximum permitted time, the sensors will signal to shut down.

KRONAsteel overheating is monitored by a thermal fuse, which switches the hood off at a temperature above the permitted safety level.

Such improvements have turned a simple appliance into a real wonder of technology. This, as well as an amazingly successful and diverse design finds, makes the hood a must-have piece of kitchen equipment. That fully meets the importance of its role in creating a healthy living environment.