I'll be following the responses, too. Our OTR MW seems fine so far (I'd never had one before) but on GW, everyone seems to think they're awful. In our old kitchen, I didn't even have a vent at all...so I'm pleased to just have any venting! My GC said he thought it would be fine. Ours is a GE Profile convection microwave.
So--what do others think? I have heard my friends say they can't stand their hoods because it sounds like a jet's going off, even when on low speed.

Oh My,

totally misunderstood your post. I thought you meant that
the OTR MW is not so bad.

I have to laugh at my stupidity. I quickly opened the post
thinking maybe she found the holy grail of OTR MW.
An OTR MW that is not so bad that works and is functional.
A OTR that does the job. But I realize I am a fool and
you meant suck literally not like my teenage son would say.

I detest my OTR MW. I wish I had spent the money on a hood.
I will change it, I just have to do it slowly or DH will
have a fit. He is a bit stubborn about me spending money
on something he does not think we need.

The sound of the fan? I would rather have a little noise
and garlic smells, grease splatter and sticky oil spots
off my range. Sucked away to the outside rather than
a mess on my stove. Sound vs Gross. I'll take the Sound.

Thanks for your post and I am sorry you are disappointed.
I do know how you feel.
~boxerpups

.

I just went appliance shopping today. There is one Kitchen Aid model that has a couple of curves to it -- it curves out over the oven and there is a curved uptake area for the steam under the microwave itself. According to the salesperson, it makes the vent quite a bit more efficient. It was 900 dollars, so probably out of my budget, but did include a convection oven as well.

I can't seem to get a link to work, but try googling "KitchenAid TruCapture Ventilation"

Hope this helps someone!

A neighbor of mine has the KA. It's just like any other, alas (and that's an outrageous price you found-you can find it much cheaper than that).

>Do these over the counter microwave ovens work as range hoods?

No, they have lights beneath them, and sometimes a rack for hanging utensils. The lack of a fan is one of the things that distinguishes an OTC micro from an OTR.

Oh no! Yikes! And I was going to get that same Samsung. And spend mucho dinero to have the venting out the back rather than up thru the cabs, where the current vent is.

I need to rethink. I have never used our current 50 yr. old vent. It's stuffed with plastic bags to keep the cold/heat out! I rarely fry.

Does the mw oven work well? I micro a lot. Reheat coffee all day long. steam veggies(no pots)

@writersblock -- anything I get will probably vent better than my circa-1987 downdraft! I have no personal experience with the KA microwave, but the concave bottom side did look to me like it would collect steam, so I thought I'd pass the info on. Obviously, serious shoppers will have to check them out more carefully than my quick glance.

I forgot to say, I have a Bosch OTR MW.
It is better than the GE I had before but a hood would
be even better.
~boxer

westsider40, I have not used it to do much microwaving yet but it seems to work fine on the small heating chores I've selected.

I will at least look at the kitchen aid to see if it seems to be in some way different.

At this point I think I will be taking out the samsung and returning it.

I need to figure it out soon because the 30 day return policy is in effect.

When you installed this mw, did you vent out the back or out the top? Did you reset the damper for the correct orientation?

Dear Weed,

Please help me understand what difference venting out the back or the top matters. Set aside for the moment the issue of resetting the damper, but the question you asked was whether regfman vented out the back or out the top.

Samsung's website says that one has three options for venting. It does not say that the 400 cfm is affected or compromised if one chooses venting out the back, or the top, or recirculating- the three Samsung stated options. I look forward to your response to my specific question. Thanks. As I said, I was planning to get the Samsung because of what sounded like decent venting. Specific, please.

I vented out the top, which is the default, and correct for the duct that I have over it. I know it is blowing air out through the top because I can see air fluttering plants next to the outside wall vent.

As for the damper, when I first turned it on and found it wasn't pulling air up from the bottom (didn't look outside to see the plants moving) I opened up the funnel duct to take a peek at the damper thinking it must be blocked and sure enough it was stuck closed by lack of clearance to the rectangle duct. I yanked on it and being made of very thin gauge aluminum it bent, so I just yanked harder and pulled it out completely. So there is no damper in the airway.

Today I experimented with some cardboard to see if I could make a visor that would catch the steam that was not going up into the bottom of the microwave and I had some success with a design. I am contemplating having a custom sheet metal part made that I could attach to the microwave. That's one approach.

The other is to spend a couple hours removing it and returning it and then buy something else that might work better (and hopefully be much less noisey), this time paying for installation and if that new one isn't any better having the installer take it out on the same trip..... and then going back to a dedicated range hood and getting a very small microwave for the small heating jobs we use it for. The dedicated range hood is not our first choice as we've come to like the extra space on the counter that has been free'd up by using a hanging microwave.

I asked the question to get to the damper answer. That is, if the vent was to the rear, the default is to the top. And if the damper was not moved as well as the fan shroud, it would not exhaust at all. Secondly was if to the top and the damper was not free-moving, it would not exhaust.

When my mom had her's installed, it was out the top but the fan shroud was in the wrong position and it did nothing. She did not see the installer do the work so she did not know the answer, but removing and reinstalling fixed the problem. So I asked the question in order to get to an answer.

But OTR mw's don't do that well anyway. Capture is poor.

O.K. I'll agree that OTR Mw/fan combos do not work as well as separate MW and range hoods. However, due to space and configuration sometime that is the only choice.
8 yrs. ago I had to replace my ancient (1983) all in one GE combo range, microwave/hood. I purchased a smoothtop slide in GE Profile range and the Profile SpacemakerXL 1800 OTC MW/fan. It has 3 speeds plus a power boost.
I do much stove top grilling and oven broiling and have had no problem and the microwave works perfectly.
I think what Weed states about venting etc. is correct.
Properly installed and vented an OTCMW will give more than satisfactory service, compared to the alternative- the unvented, replaceable filter, OTC MW.

This morning I did an online chat with Kitchen Aid and learned that there are three models with the "KitchenAid TruCapture Ventilation".

This evening I went into the big box store where I bought the Samsung and told them I intend to return it and bought the least expensive of the three KitchenAids. It is 2.5x more expensive than the Samsung. Plus this time I paid an additional $160 for installation.

The installers will remove the Samsung and put it back in the box so that I can drive it back to the store. Then they will install the KitchenAid. Before they leave I will test the KitchenAid to see if it does satisfactory exhausting and if it is not much better then the Samsung I'll have them uninstall it and return it.

I'm hoping.

It is possible that air is moving because there is a gap in the ducting. However, the areal flow rate at the exhaust will naturally be larger than at the intake (hood aperture) because the latter is larger.

Also, hoods do not suck up effluent and steam from the pots below unless they are very close to the pots. Hoods function correctly (capture and containment) when they are (a) large enough to encompass the rising and expanding effluent at the height that they are mounted at, and (b) have enough air flow to keep the effluent in the hood until it is sucked into the ducting.

kas

I just paid a contractor to create a vent for our 'microwave over the stove' through the wall

which took out two much needed shelves in the bathroom storage cupboard, up through the

wall (6 inch pipe demanded) through the roof to a new vent. I was so happy to have the

exhaust going through the roof rather than back into the kitchen.

First time we put a pot to boil water (on the front stove burner) the steam went past the

Samsung microwave and straight up to the newly installed pot light and new ceiling.

This was not the plan !! I am wondering - as the microwave does suck up the steam from

boiling pots on the back burners - if we installed a 'filler' and moved the microwave

out so it was closer to overhanging the front burners - would this help?????????

As you may see by reviewing many of the hood topics on this forum, to capture the rising and expanding effluent the hood aperture must overlap it. Then the flow rate per unit area in the aperture must be high enough to keep the effluent from curling out of the aperture when it meets something it can reflect from. Neither of these requirements is typically fully met by an over-the-range microwave oven.

kas

Thankyou submitters! It looks like the consensus tells me - no matter the expense one can put into an OTR MO the science is - a close, strong sucking fan over your steaming pot is the answer and OTR MO's just aren't in the position to do this on all four burners of the range below. The corn pot and the crab pot will have to be on an outside burner and little cooking pots on the back burners of the stove. I do thank the submitters as I was willing to go to great lengths to have this darn combo work.It would have been a waste of time and money. Others have tried and some fascinating suggestions have come forth. Thanks again!

Mine vents fine. Just made a big pot of soup last night and lots of steam happened. Turned on the fan and steam disappeared fast. Microwave works just fine. Mine is KA.

We had one in a two-week summer rental and it was awful! It was noisier than my true range hood and it didn't vent anything! Steam, etc., just billowed up and and around it!

The MW was a bit small - shorter than a countertop MW but I don't think it was any shorter than our MW drawer. It was a pain in the neck when my kids were trying to use it while I was working at the range (there wasn't much workspace in the rental).

I think it was a GE, but I'm not sure.

Hi so I bought a Samsung chef collection.it was installed with venting from the back. It does not suck much air from below but more from the duct above the door in the front is this normal to be aspirating ftom both vents?

I have a Samsung range top microwave and experience all the same lack of exhausting power many others posting here are experiencing. One thing I noticed is that there is a secondary (or is it primary since most of my air seems to be entering there) air inlet on top of the microwave where the door meets. I'm not sure why there is venting above the door since it does not capture any of the steam/smoke that escapes from underneath. I will do a test by blocking off this vent area to see if I can increase air velocity underneath.. Check your microwave to see if you have an intake vent on the top front

No, I don't believe they work and our go to appliance guy told us them same thing. That said, I still bought an OTR one because the only other place for a microwave was the counter and I didn't want to lose the space or to visually have to look at it. My counters are pretty bare. If I were to do it over...... there are days I wish I would have done it the right way. I have a GE Cafe (the cheaper model of the two) and steam blows all up the front of the microwave. It's quite terrible. Our other OTR performed the same.

If it's at all helpful, ours if vented out the back.

Mine does, but not in a good way.

I found that the cheapest hood vents better than the supposedly most powerful OTR MW.

Found this link trying to figure out why my new $1000 ge advantium unit doesnt even have enough bottom suction to hold a piece of paper up against the bottom intake vents, yet the air blowing on top that connects into the attic vent is very strong.

I figured out that 90% of the siction is coming from the top front instead of the bottom qhere you want it.

The grill holes on the top front are the ones that would be used for output (not suction input) of you set it uo to recirculate because you didn't have an upper exhaust ventilation pipe.

But i DO have an upper exhaust, so why the heck is it sucking must of the air from the recirculation out out area instead of the bottom ?

I read the installation instructions many times to see if there was a "configuration" atrpni missed, but nodda.

Anyone else notice this same observance ?

Block those recirc outputs.

We just had the advantium installed - oh joy was I happy!! So excited to have such a snazzy new toy and the sales guy said it would be amazing venting if vented to the outside - so we hired his guy to do that. He taped off the recirc outputs and turned it on. The smoke of a blown out candle set on the stovetop doesn't even get sucked upwards toward the vents. They are so weak! This thing just doesn't work! Had a GE guy out to look at it per salesman's recommendations, and he said "On high, if it holds a a papertowel for even a second or two, that's all you should expect." Uuugh - why did we just pay all this money to have a hole cut in our house, and it doesn't work?? Buyers Remorse!!!

As I've noted previously [in the Appliance forum], even large hoods with powerful blowers do not depend on sucking stuff off of the stove top; instead their flow rate aids removal of the rising cooking plumes when the plumes get to the hood -- largely using flow through the baffles or filter meshes to keep the rising effluent from reflecting off of the hood sheet metal and baffle surfaces due to conservation of momentum. With real cooking the rising effluent will have a significant upward velocity so the candle experiment is not representative.

Also, the nature of the fan curve for most hood blowers is such that when paper is used to block a vent as some sort of test of suction, the flow is zero and the pressure holding the paper will be whatever value the blower's fan curve intercepts on the pressure (Y) axis of the graph. For an OTR microwave oven vent, this may be only a few tenths of an inch of water column (a tiny fraction of an atmosphere), and thus the size of the piece of paper it can hold up may be modest. If this modest size is not big enough to cover the entire entry area of the hood, then flow will bypass the paper, the pressure difference will be even lower, and the paper will fall.

kas

My new LG OTR microwave has good airflow to the external vent, but at least half of the air is entering above the microwave door instead of above the stovetop.

The vent above the microwave door is used to blow air back into the room when the microwave is installed using the recirculating configuration. I was surprised to realize that when the microwave is externally vented, that vent draws air in. A lot of air.

Mine seems to work fine. Sucks steam right up. Sometimes with an abundance of cooking or steam, the fan turns on by itself, and it's loud, but it's doing so to prevent steam from building up in the kitchen so I don't mind. It was not my first choice, aesthetically I would have preferred a hood, but I also knew my young children would ruin any microwave that was within reach in a drawer or built in at counter level. In a few years when my kids are older I'll probably replace with a hood.

I have a KitchenAid.

Rebeccamomof123 - MWs these days come with child locks. I'd have gone for the hood!

Add me to the list of frustrated OTR microwave owners. I had to laugh/wince when I read the above comment by a fellow GE owner that theirs "doesnt even have enough bottom suction to hold a piece of paper up against the bottom intake vents," because that's exactly the experiment I've done. Mine is set to vent to the outside too (in a condo) rather than recirculate, which is ultimately just a giant waste of the cabinet above my microwave. Mine's a GE Profile PVM9195SFSS with a 400 CFM blower and a "Boost" mode.

Boiling a pot of water results in nearly all of the steam going straight up, with some of it condensing on the front of the microwave and the rest going toward the ceiling. A friend of mine with a GE had her front control panel go out, and the technician said that's a common problem due to...yep, you guessed it. Condensation.

For a truly miserable experience, anything seasoned with a little oil on a skillet spreads noxious fumes throughout my condo. The whole place stays hazy for half an hour or more.

One trick I've learned that helps just a little bit is to open the microwave door when venting. More steam gets sucked INTO the microwave and then up and out than ever gets sucked up from the underside.

I have an extended warranty, and I've thought about calling a repair technician, but based on what you all have said, that sounds like a waste. When I had a small dishwasher issue, the technician ended up doing more damage the first time than he fixed, so I'm wary.

Well, this was super helpful! My microwave was installed incorrectly. I took it down, rotated the fan, and put it back up. Only thing needed was a screwdriver. Thank you!