In a commercial food service environment, the hood and duct system are more than just ventilating heat and smoke; it provides essential services by preventing fires, enhancing air quality, and complying with fire safety codes.
However, it can sometimes fly under the radar until an inspection by the fire marshal or a grease fire occurs and it suddenly becomes a pressing issue. This is important for detecting potential issues early which helps to prevent costly interruptions and maintains an environment that is safe and code compliant.
Cleaning a commercial kitchen is an essential step to keeping your kitchen safe and efficient, especially since the process of cleaning ducts in particular are intricate and can require professional certification along with the danger involved with allowing too much grease to build up.
Such professional services have a set procedure of work, methods and tools they use (depending on how mantel or kitchen rigs are built), as well as the reasons why certified hood cleaners should be trusted with proper care to keep you safe and legal in long-term. Let us get into greater detail about this matter in this post.
Inspection and Installation
The first thing you should do is a thorough check of the exhaust system in your kitchen. Hood, filters, ductwork and exhaust fan are accessed by men who are licensed. This will assure the appropriate tools, safety measures, and cleaning approach is performed given the way your individual kitchen is laid out.
During this stage, technicians will:
Clean Hood and Ducts Professionally
Look over the entire exhaust system from hood to fan, including all ductwork, filters and access panels.
Pinpoint parts of heavy grease buildup, which perhaps need a more constant clean or unique degreasers to fully annihilate the residue.
Verify any potential access points for cleaning, such as these high-level areas and rooftop fan units, to ensure that your service is not partial, leaving some vulnerable sections unprotected.
Cover appliances, counters and back-splashes with plastic to ensure no contamination of food prep areas and protect equipment from chemicals over spray or water runoff.
Preparation is key to making your kitchen usable again and safe for everyone to use. When certified professionals have a proper setting to work in, it will make their job more efficient, keep them from having as much cleanup afterward and guarantee that there is no part of your exhaust system that has not been serviced.
Clean Surfaces and Filters
After preparing the system, key pieces are removed and cleaned by technicians. This usually comprises the filters, grease trays and accessible duct panels which tend to accumulate fats, oils and greases more so than most other areas of the ducting.
They use industrial-strength degreasers to cut through duties you, dear reader, have yet been able to surmount with your normal kitchen cleaners.
The degreasing process involves:
- Deep cleaning: taking out baffle or mesh filters for manual cleaning, soaking and degreasing narrow channels and crevices.
- Applying chemical degreasers to all the interior hood surfaces, even on the underneath of canopy where greases can layer up.
- Scrubbing with non-abrasive implements to break up caked on grease—ideal brushes, scrapers or rotary pads that are geared for bare metal or painted surfaces.
- Trash removal and proper disposal of all grease waste into the appropriate receptacle following EPA guidelines to prevent incorrect release into drains or a grease trap.
This is an important step toward achieving a clean and fire safe system. Grease is not only a major fire hazard, but it also attracts insects, block your ventilation system and allows to make you whole kitchen disgusting.
Regular surface and filter cleaning will keep critical components operating correctly and improve airflow, lower fire danger, and create a friendlier kitchen environment.
Ductwork and Exhaust Fan Cleaning
Ductwork is an unseen and at the same time hard to reach part in a kitchen ventilation system and one of the most dangerous ones.
You could have a visible residue that you can see at the hood canopy location which means inside this ductwork some even heavier layers of fuel might be built up over many years. Within these tight quarters, high cooking temps and inadequate ventilation can transform forgotten about buildup right into a substantial fire hazard if left behind untreated.
To mitigate these risks, trained technicians will utilize special tools and methodologies such as:
Professional Hood and Duct Cleaning Service
- Rotary brush systems and duct scrubbing equipment capable of negotiating extended lengths of ductwork and mechanically removing carbonized grease from the interior surface in metal.
- High-pressure hot water systems that discharge superheated water onto the duct interior, twinned with degreasers to dislodge stubborn buildup and cleanse the interiors
- Wet vacuums and portable grease containment units trap the wastewater and grease slurry, allowing for compliance with environmental guidelines whilst keeping your kitchen sanitary at all times.
- Rooftop cleaning: exhaust fans holistically with a thorough hands-on check to make sure the fan blades aren’t clean along with the housing, grease drip trays must be emptied, and then inspect the belt wear, vibration, motor operation for proper balance so it is assured to maintain airflow properly.
If the exhaust fan breaks — or worse, is covered in grease blocking airflow and increasing static pressure — it cripples the ventilation system.
Not only does gas have the proven risk of fire, but it also lowers the efficiency of ventilation during service. Fan and duct cleaning is an important part of any professional hood cleaning, guarding your kitchen against immediate hazards as well as protecting vital mechanical components for the long term.
The Last Thing to Check
After all cleaning is done, a final walkthrough demonstrates a complete servicing of the entire exhaust system and that it is functioning properly. This quality control check ensures no key points were overlooked in the system, and that all regulatory standards are met. A before-and-after photo by the technician during his work, shows records and transparency.
Final steps typically include:
- Detailed visual inspection of the hood, ducts, fan, and any access panels to confirm thorough cleaning
- Reinstallation of All Cleaned Filters and System Components (Ensuring Everything is Operating and Securely in Place)
- Owner/customer and kitchen manager review of service findings and cleaning report for accountability and future maintenance planning
- Provide a cleaning certificate or sticker showing the completion of all cleaning requirements and make sure it is located on the range hood in plain sight for inspection.
This documentation is crucial in satisfying fire code requirements and often requested during health department inspections, fire marshal visits, or insurance audits. This gives you a valuable piece of mind knowing that your kitchen is not only clean, but also compliant and inspection ready.
Cleaning That Protects More Than Just Equipment
Hood and duct cleaning is a necessary part of preventative maintenance, but it also ensures that your restaurant maintains optimal levels of safety, efficiency and customer loyalty. Grease fires are involved in greater than 30% of structure fires at food facilities, so cleaning the exhaust system is not optional.
All of Braza Fire technicians are certified to complete your hood and duct cleaning, following a thorough process which meets all national and local fire safety codes in the Albuquerque area of New Mexico. Our team meticulously cleans each component from the initial assessment to the final inspection, so your kitchen is kept in compliance and runs efficiently while safeguarding your assets.
Ready to schedule your service?
Reach out to Brazas Fire-Inc for Albuquerque hood cleaning consultation today and ensure your kitchen is always up-to-code, and ready for inspection at any time.