Extracting sideways...cooker hood

[princesschick]

So, we decided to increase the size of the opening to our kitchen fireplace to be able to fit a lovely range cooker into it. We now have the headache of installing an extractor unit. We hadn't realised that we wouldn't be able to extract up the chimney despite many of the Rangemaster cookers being in fireplaces in their brochure, basically we were suckered by their marketing, although their technical team assure me this is common sigh. Falcon / Rangemaster confirmed that you can only extract vertically by 3m - our chimney is 10m. We asked if we could "get away with it" which was met with a very frosty technical bod telling me that lots of people do but then phone back 2 months later to say that their extraction unit is useless and doesn't work. Basically trying to extract vertically this far would cause condensation to run back down the chimney, into the unit, causing the motor to fail and the whole thing to pack up. Buggar.

They have suggested extracting horizontally through an outside wall. Second problem... that the fireplace is on the side of the kitchen that doesn't have an exterior wall. We think that we will be able to run the ducting through the kitchen wall into the loft space above the bathroom extension and out. The extension is single story and backs on to the kitchen. So, there will only be a run of about 3m max from the side of the chimney to the outside wall through the bathroom loft space. (Sorry if I've lost everyone at this point).

I'm waiting for the installation guide for the Falcon Built-in Hood to turn up this afternoon. However, I have my reservations that this is the right product for us, it's also right at the top end of our budget. We're coming to the end of a massive renovation of a tiny house, which has cleaned us out and although we've got money left to do the kitchen, I'd love to save money where possible and I don't need a flashy cooker extraction unit, just something efficient to get rid of steam and smells...sideways.

Has anyone put a range cooker like a Rangemaster (not an AGA or Esse with its own flu - sadly we're not that rich yet!!) into a fireplace? How did you extract? Does anyone have any product suggestions that we can do what we want to do? Does anyone know of anything designed for this purpose? So many people seem to have cookers in fireplaces we really didn't consider that it would be a problem.

I'll finish by saying that we can't install our shower until we've decided what to do and until we've installed the shower, I'm stuck in a very stressy small house with the in laws with full compliment of pregnancy hormones (and have been here for 4 months and itching to get the hell out). Needless to say I'm looking to crack on ASAP!!!

Sorry for the essay! Thanks in advance!

if you have wall units, you can run the duct from a cooker hood horizontally on top of, or inside, the wall units until it reaches an external wall. An apaptor to rectangular duct means it lies flat. I would have thought that would be easier than your loft route.

If it was important to you to extract up the chimney, you could get a fireproof steel duct with a grease filter and a condensation trap, these are quite common in commercial kitchens and chip shops but not common in a domestic kitchen. You would be able to get a pretty powerful suction though.

Thanks pigletjohn we don't have wall units all the way 'round unfortunately and because of the way the extension has been built it takes up quite a bit of the 'external' wall. Really hard to explain, if i could do a cack handed drawing and post it I would have done! Your other suggestion is very interesting though. I'll mention this to DH when he gets back from a hard day grafting with our plumber!

won't be cheap.

Hmm...suspected as much. We don't have loadsa cash at the moment, so perhaps drilling holes in 2 single brick walls and sending ducting through side of fireplace and through floor space / loft space above bathroom will be our best bet after all. Damn those brochures!! Thanks anyway though, it's all food for thought.

condensation in ducting is common in unheated loft spaces, but can be prevented or reduced by flopping loft insulation over the duct. Use 4-inch soil pipe or plastic duct rather than convoluted hose, and apart from the rise directly above the extractor, give it a slight fall towards the outside grille or cowl so any water will drip outside.

Can't you get one that recycles the air so it doesn't need ducting?

recirculating extractor?

a recirculating hood is quite effective as a kitchen ornament, but totally useless at extracting steam, and almost totally ineffective at removing cooking smells.

Fair enough. I know nothing! I really only clicked on the thread because I thought it sounded a bit rude.

Hi all, so we had another chat about the extractor issue last night. And argued over a non toxic sofa solution. Fun times in our house. Also, did anyone watch Restoration Man last night? Were they actually flicking limewash around at each other? Have they ever had lime in the eye?! Mentallists!

Peppermint and Sausage we're not going to go down the recirculating route as they get crap reviews and they don't work. Plus you end up replacing filters all the time. Plus we don't have a lot of ventilation in the kitchen because the double glazing installed doesn't have any trickle vents and I believe that you have to be quite careful with recirculating extractors and having air flow to the room. It would mean opening the window a lot. I may have misunderstood. Anyway, it's a moot point because we're going to have proper extraction to the kitchen anyway.

I found a Wickes good ideas brochure on ventilation last night and having talked to the husband he reckons he can easily get a hole in the side of the fireplace (1 brick thick, not structural, this has been checked) and then in the ceiling to run the ducting, cover this with some sort of steel thing to make it look less ugly and then run the ducting through the floor void and through the bathroom loft and then to the outside wall. He made it sound like it would be quite easy. We'll see, eh?

Good idea to insulate and angle the ducting piglet wouldn't have thought of that.

Only other thing we discussed is having an extractor powered by a separate unit elsewhere. Although DH doesn't know if these actually exist. Just a musing he had in his headhole. So that's my task du jour. The idea has come from the system we had in our old flat whereby there were 3 air flow vents in the ceiling powered by a separate motor unit in a ceiling void in a cupboard. However, these were for air flow not for extraction.

On a completely separate note, how is the title of the thread rude. just wondering?!

Yup... the external motor version does exist. Sadly we don't have £2k to spend on one of these though...!!

or less

You would need good filters to prevent the duct and fan dripping with grease.

Whether or not you can run in throughthe floor void depend on which way the joists run. You can run alongside them in parallel, but not through them.

We had the same problem and will be boxing in the venting sideways to the external wall. We have no wall cupboards so the builders will fit a sort of ceiling plinth box which will run along the whole wall which will contain the extraction duct and also house the spotlights which will act as task lighting for the worksurface. Hopefully it will just look like a sort of dropped ceiling and actually you won't notice it much as you will be so busy looking at all the other lovely things

It's not fitted yet, so can't post pictures, but they seem to think this will work fine.

Hi Better thanks for your thoughts :) We won't have a problem with the joists because they run the way that the ducting needs to run. It was our electrician who pointed this solution out because he noticed the joists running this way when he had the boards up to re-wire the house. I hope that your project looks great, good idea to put some lights into the boxing :)

Thanks pigletjohn for your suggestion about the fan too :)