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While we are discussing vent hoods, one thing people doing kitchen remodels (or new houses, etc.) may want to look into is putting the vent fan inline in the duct (e.g. in the attic) instead of in the hood itself. With a silencer (cuts about 20 decibels) between the hood and the fan, kitchen ventilation hoods can be made dramatically quieter than the typical extremely noisy version. The fan noise more or less goes away and the remaining noise comes from the air flowing through the grease filter / into the duct.

Adding the make-up air system increases the cost by 50% or something (needs a similarly powerful fan and similarly sized duct for air coming in vs. going out), but any powerful vent hood should probably include one (and building codes demand them in many places, though I think this is often overlooked in practice).



Story from a previous life when I was an HVAC tech in college… got a call out to a new restaurant where the owner was complaining that the place was not cooling.

After doing the routine checks, the AC was fine. Upon further investigation, there was no make up air. The owner decided to delete the MUA out of the design to save money (didn’t listen to his MEP designer). Not only was the kitchen vent hood exhausting kitchen air but conditioned restaurant air as well. It was permitted city construction, I have no clue how the place passed inspection.




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