If you have the option to go with an inline blower (installed in the ducting) or an external blower (installed outside, often on a roof or wall) that's the way to go. A 1200 CFM fan is going to be loud if it's right above your head. When I researched these liners the Proline ones (now owned by BlueStar) were among the best available options. Everyone who has one loves it. High quality, easy to clean and from what I understand they are quieter than many competitors (though again I can't speak to that as I have an external blower)

pauls234 - the difference in price is ~$850. The Bluestar hood does not include the blower. Thank you for the info on the Zephyr hood. Do you find using the controls on the hood to be difficult?

Difficult in what sense? The hood is mounted fairly high and I am not overly tall so I do find myself stretching to reach them sometimes, but using the remote solves that. I've never thought of the controls as difficult.

I have a custom hood by BlueStar with a roof mounted blower. It is very quiet. That is the best thing I can say about it. If you have specific questions about the hood, please feel free to DM me. I cannot imagine a scenario where I would purchase another one. I wouldn't even have a free one.

pauls234 - Difficult in the sense of hard to reach and/or hard to get the right setting. Hard to tell from pictures online but is it just up and down buttons? Or does it have a separate button for each of the six levels?

No problem getting to the right settings, but it is just up and down buttons on the actual hood, so you do have to cycle through settings 1-3 to get to 4 for example, i.e. there is no "level 4" button. On the remote, I believe it is just one button that automatically goes up (not down) so if you were on level 4 and wanted to get to 1 you would have to go through 5 and 6 first, but there is no delay, it passes through them as quickly as you press the button - very easy to use and get to the desired settings. I believe there is also a timer function, though I have not yet used it now that I think about it.

The lights on it are really nice as well.

I don't have any experience with the Bluestar insert, but we did have a Zephyr. Below is the text of my post from another thread describing our experience. In a nutshell, we got rid of it and put in a remote blower. If there's ANY way for you to get the fan out of the kitchen, do it.

I can't comment on those specific models, but we had a Zephyr Monsoon II model AK9346AS installed about a year ago and it we found it to be impossibly loud. Their literature says the sone level on low is 3.5, which, based on this chart, is about 45 decibels. I downloaded a decibel meter to my phone and with the phone sitting on the stove 35 inches below, the noise registered 80-82 db. That's MUCH louder than advertised, and we found it very uncomfortable and annoying--couldn't hear the Sonos speaker 12 feet away or anyone talking in a normal voice, and there was a sigh of relief whenever we turned the fan off.

We eventually decided to switch it out and install a Wolf liner (with variable speed knob), an inline silencer, and 1400 cfm Abbaka roof mounted blower. It's quieter on high than the Zephyr was on low. The three pieces are a more expensive proposition (even if we hadn't made the Zephyr mistake), but the result is so vastly more pleasant that I still smile when I turn on the fan.

In a nutshell, if there's any way you can listen to the Zephyr and Best, preferably in a similar setting, do it. Don't trust the literature.

Can you describe how loud a roof mounted blower would be. We live in an HOA where a lot of people seem to have nothing to do but complain.

Thanks

Inga

Hi Inga. Our blower is on a relatively low roof that slopes up from a deck and, while you can hear it when it's running, I don't think it's obtrusive or roaring even on high. I just turned the fan on now and went outside to listen at 10 p.m. and there were lots of other noises in the neighborhood that were louder. The brochure for the brand we have describes it as akin to a window air conditioner.

I agree with AvatarWalt. I turned mine on high and went outside and I can barely hear it over pool equipment and other noises in our setting. We currently have trees on both sides of our home, so perhaps that buffers the sound. Additionally, our blower is on the roof of the second floor; not sure how much louder it would seem if we had a one story. I will say, though, even on high You can barely hear the fan blowing inside the house. My last house had a blower so loud that you couldn't carry on conversation....it felt like I was cooking under a helicopter! Bottom line: even in a first floor roof installation I can't imagine the noise would be noticeable by neighbors.

Does anyone have any additional recommendations for a 36" BS platinum range? We would use 2-3 eyes at the same time at max, or 1 doing wok cooking. It was suggested we used the Zephyr AK9240AS. Do you all think this will be sufficient?

We have a 36” BS Platinum range and we put in the 42” Nepx 27 ventahood. 42” wide and 27” deep. It hangs 3” over all sides which does a great job capturing any smoke, smells etc. We were strongly advised to go with a larger hood to adequately cover the range and because of the high BTU output of these ranges. It’s been 1 1/2 years and we love our BS and hood so much that we’re now planning to put the 30” RNB with a similar hood but 36”for the 30” range in a new cabin build. It has great lighting and not noisy. Highly recommend this!