Range Hood Letting Cold Air In????

12 years ago

Just wondering how much air you can feel coming into your kitchen from your range hood?

In my new home, I have a hood that vents to the outside and they is alot of air (right now) cold air coming in from the bottom grates of the hood. Is this normal, or is this just another sh***y job that my builder passed on to me???

When it's windy, you can almost feel a breeze, and you can hear the flap outside opening and closing.

If this isn't normal, what should the builder have done, to keep the cold and I guess in the summer the warm air from coming in the vent and down the hood?

Featured Answer

brickeyee

12 years ago

"you can hear the flap outside opening and closing. "

Sounds like they used a simple 'dryer vent' type outside hood.

You may be able to add a ;little extra weight to eh flapper to keep it closed.
Adding some coins to the outside of the existing flap is often all that is needed.

One of the problems with less powerful fans in hoods is that they cannot develop enough sir pressure to open a damper against even a small spring.
More powerful hoods often have a split circular damper with a spring and some felt on the edges of the opening to try and seal better.

You might be able to put a second damper inside near the hood outlet to try and block air flow.

It would be possible to make a power operated damper (they are used in many higher efficiency gas flues) but you also need safety switches to make sure the damper opens, and that adds cost.

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Comments (7)

dakota01
Original Author
12 years ago
Thanks for the suggestions! Actually the fan system that I purchsed is good quality, powerful and was over 1K. Possibly, the installer just didn't do his job right. I you are right that they just used a dryer type vent. With all the other stuff that's poor quality on my house, I wouldn't doubt it. Builder was all about saving "his money".
I will try the coins and hopefully that will help. I would guess they "forgot" to insulate this area as well...

Thanks Again
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bmorepanic
12 years ago
There is supposed to be a back draft stopper installed behind the vent exit to prevent air blowing back in. Occasionally, its included with the insert (mine was), but usually, who ever bought the duct buys the damper.
macybaby
12 years ago
Mine will only allow air to go OUT. I do hear it flapping on really windy days as the wind over the vent on the roof creates a draw and sucks air out of the house, causing the flap to open up just as it would when the blower is on. The wind has to be just right for it to do that. Same thing happens for the bathroom vents - but none of them let blowing cold air into the house.

Good thing as it's about 10F out today.
brickeyee
12 years ago
"was over 1K"

I think the last external blower I put in was about $800 per blower, and the hood used two.
mamadadapaige
12 years ago
I had this too in my last house. The contractors installed the hood and duct work but didn't use a back draft damper. They had to come back once winter came as tons of cold air was coming in. They had to remove my hood (which sort of messed up the paint on my ceiling), put it in and then reinstall hood. Sort of a PITA but it did solve the problem. Wish I would have known upfront to be watching for them to know to do this but I didn't. Live and learn.
chitown_remodel
12 years ago
This just happened to us. Our hood vents up and out through the roof. The damper is in the roof vent so the damper that came with the hood did not need to be installed.

However, for some reason my installer did not put a continuous pipe up to the vent in the roof (please don't ask why I only write the checks) so cold air was pouring in from the attic.

We had blue tape all over it covering it up on our 20 degree days.

He finally came out to fix it by closing the gap between the hood vent and the vent in the roof. Took him 1/2 hour.