Welcome to the Hood

Have you ever busted a hole in your wall all the way to your neighbor's house?

I have. Welcome to the vent hood.

Installing this house's first vent hood was a big job; having it vent to the outside was even bigger.

Father brought his arsenal of power tools, The Squirrel (brother-in-law) brought his energy, and I brought enough worry about possible disasters for all three of us.

We started by making shims with a saw and a hunk of wood I found in the shed.

Turned out to be cedar! The shims leveled the bottom of the cabinet so we had something flat to mount the vent hood to.

We marked the new duct hole on the wall, found the center, and drilled a hole straight through EVERYTHING. The drill bit emerged perfectly in a mortar joint on the other side.

Using that hole as a guide we drew the duct pattern on the outside of the brick and used a grinder to cut the edges deep.

Then, we perforated the edge with a hammer drill...

...and chiseled the brick out.

After cutting the inside wall and dropping power from the attic we were ready to dry fit the duct piece.

Wow, there really is a hole in my wall!

The rest of the installation took a little while, but went well.

The outside is really nice! A good and clean job, and well caulked too!

I'll show pictures of the finished product a little later.
Right now, I have some plumbing to take care of...