Shouldn't all cooking equip go under the hood?

[swhatIdo]

Just looking for a little back up on a point I'm trying to make. I'm with a convenience retailer who has recently expanded their fast food program, adding 2 high speed ovens and a few pieces of refrig equip.

It's my contention that not having these ovens under the exhaust hood, combined with refrig equipment added recently and through the years, has had a negative effect on the air quality in their stores, leading to a large volume of complaints ranging from uncomfortable temperatures to super high humidity levels(and all the problems this has caused). Further, I'm of the opinion that we might now have to resized the exhaust fans and hoods which were designed to accomodate 1-2 deep fryers, and that resizing these fans will mean that we would have to have the TAB contractor rebalance the whole system.

I say that any money saved by not having done these things has been chewed up by paying for service calls to deal with comfort issues, air quality issues, punky ceiling tiles, mold, outside air infiltration, foggy windows and display doors, iced evaporators, and probably many things I don't realize yet.

Am I off base? I'm an electrician, but I have been building stores like this for 10 years until I joined this company. Its a great company, full of great people, but I think, under past leadership, we've sacrificed expertise for expedience, but that this can be fixed if we listen to the right folks.

[ACFIXR]

Here is some good reading.Hope some of it helps.

[hcong]

Your refrigeration equipment doesn't need to be under a hood, but I don't believe you meant for them to be.

You are completely right, it is recommended and required under the Uniform Mechanical Code unless the cooking equipment is UL 197 rated.

Don't forget more exhaust and make up air equals more outside air that needs to be cooled and your HVAC unit might not be big enough.