I have had a few people asking how I built this range hood so I thought I would do a small post about it. I would like to say, that these instructions are pretty lame and broad. It's hard to go back and remember how I did stuff when I wasn't really documenting, for instructions, I was just winging it. But some smart person may be able to decipher what I did and build their own, even better hood.
The widest part of the hood is almost 37 inches. That is the trim at the
bottom of the upper curve. Our ceilings are 8 feet which made the length of the hood from the ceiling, not
including the descending curves 29 1.2 inches. It is 31 inches to the
stove, but the fan inside has more distance. All of these measurements
were important to me in making sure the hood didn't look out of
proportion.
When I designed the hood, I designed it all in the
design program Illustrator. I am a graphic designer so it was easy to
use the tools available to me to make the curves I like etc. Then I
printed it all out full scale and hung it on my walls. This was the side
profile I had printed out. Then I had my tall husband stand around it
so I could get the height of the hood right and adjusted where needed. This could also be done just by sketching your shape on newsprint and hanging it on your wall.
My
husband built a 2x4 frame and securely mounted it to the wall, and we mounted the fan to the frame. Then I
cut all the exterior shapes out of 1 inch thick MDF and screwed it to
the frame. The sides went on first then the curved front. I used 1/4 inch MDF so it would be flexible and bend to the curve. My
husband and I had to push very hard on the MDF to join it with the
curve and we used staples to secure it. The straps were also from the 1/4 inch MDF. Then I trimmed out the front and top in MDF as well and gave it a good sanding to make it nice and smooth.
Underneath there painted plywood, cut the dimensions of the box with a hole cut out of the center for the fan. The bottom of the fan that has the switches and light covers then attaches over the plywood to the fan up in the hood. One day I'll cover this in stainless steel.
The scallops were from a scrapbooking store and were 4 inch die-cut this
paper circles I cut in half and glued under my trim. I had bought a
hole saw bit to make the circles, but that was a bit of a comical
disaster. These paper ones worked like a charm and when painted are as
solid as the MDF.
I
wish I had taken picture of each step, because I can't remember what the
frame looked like underneath, but I know I was able to staple some of
that curved front to it. I think there was a cross bar or something. The
next range hood I build will not have the curved front. While I love
the look, it was hard to pull off with my limited skills. Luckily we
were successful and it looks kind of okay!
2 comments:
looks amazing. not just ok.
I have seen some standards which call for 2/3 or 3/4 of the airflow of the kitchen fan to be supplied as make up air. This of course relies upon the cracks of the house to make up the rest. Under most circumstances, this may be correct, but as homes get tighter and tighter I can’t see this ratio working for long.
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