Range Hood Redo

I've felt so strange recently being away from my blog (and twitter)! With my new hours at work, school, home projects and life in general I have found it hard to fit in time for the blog - not to mention all of the computer problems I have been having recently. However, computer problems have been solved after I went out the other day and replaced my old crappy HP with a brand new MacBook... I am in LOVE!


Anywho - on to what you came to read about... projects! We've completed a lot recently, and I was happy to jump back into my kitchen refresh project two weekends ago. What exactly did I get up to in the kitchen? Well, if you've been reading then you know I've already painted our backsplash, started painting the wood cupboards, and I've also painted the walls... which I have yet to fully share. So what else could I do?

Well, honestly, our vent fan was pretty gross. Despite the little sticker on the inside of the fan that clearly states "Clean Grease Covered Areas Regularly" - I don't think that thing had been cleaned in many, many years. Also, it was an almondy, yellowish colour that just wasn't fitting in with the rest of our appliances (which are currently a mixture of white and stainless). We are slowly moving over to stainless appliances as necessary, but we see no point in buying a new range hood until the kitchen gets a complete overhaul in the future, so I took on the task of giving it some new life!

Here's our sad and sorry looking range hood before I gave it some TLC:

The first step was for B to turn off the power to the hood. You don't want to be messing with any sort of electrical currents when you're disconnecting things - so just do it the right way, please! Once it was disconnected, I took the greasy mess out back and got busy with my good friend "Krud Kutter" (who you may remember helped me out with my tile painting project). I knew it was pretty bad so I just went with the straight "Krud Kutter" - no water added and it did the trick beautifully! Of course, I could see a bit of film on top of it after I had wiped the whole thing down, so I used a fresh rag with some water and gave it another wipe down and let it dry.

Thankfully, our range hood wasn't too rusty, and was definitely not glossy - so I didn't have to worry about sanding (though I am sure it wouldn't have hurt, I'm just lazy). Once I was sure the fan was dry, I taped off anything I didn't want painted, like electrical wires and the buttons, and pulled out the silver appliance epoxy we had purchased that morning while at Home Depot (it was a total spur of the moment project).

I worked as the can instructed, giving two light coats at first about a minute or two apart and then let it dry for half an hour between each following coat. Be sure you don't use this for anything that has direct heat on it like stove tops, ovens or microwaves. Once we had let it sit for hours drying in the sun B gave it a light spray with some clear coat (though not necessary) to make sure it was all sealed, and then it was installed.

The silver is a little darker than the stainless on the dishwasher and microwave, but this is definitely a huge improvement over the hold yellowish hue it once bore. I know it will look particularly fantastic once I get around to finishing ALL those cupboards! (I will soon, I swear!)

So, there you have my latest addition to my list of kitchen refresh projects! What do you think? Have you ever tackled painting an appliance? How did the project turn out for you?