My kitchen stove hood fan needs a new carbon filter as the current one lookes pretty caked with grease from the previous owners of the place. It turns out the manufacturers filters cost €150 which I find a bit excessive. Filters seem to be the printer ink of the kitchen.
So I’m thinking either if it is possible to clean out the current one, or reuse the casing and refill it with some bulk carbon filter material, if there is such to be found.
I have no idea, I’ve never done anything of this sort before.
Experiences, ideas, suggestions much appreciated.
Edit: There is a metal mesh under that is washable, but also an internal filter, as the hood is recirculating the air back into the kitchen. My apartment building does not allow kitchen fan exhaust into the ventilation system.
@CadeJohnson In my case it is recirculating the air so it does need to trap both grease and odors.
If you think about it though, coming into a kitchen and saying “it smells good!” is OK; if the odor is bad, maybe lack of carbon filter is not the problem! lolz I have a recirculating fan, but I don’t think it does much odor trapping. Odor molecules come in all sorts of forms - some adsorb to carbon and some don’t. Although activated carbon has a large capacity considering the size of the particles of carbon, it can’t do miracles. Furthermore, I suspect the carbon is encased in trapped oil long before its odor-absorbing capacity is exhausted (though I guess that depends on one’s cooking style).