Mid-Atlantic Commercial Hood Installers | DC, MD, VA & PA | (800) 200-2134
Commercial kitchen hood installation contractors serving Washington DC, Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania - Type I and Type II hoods, all-welded grease duct, rooftop fan, make-up air, fire suppression coordination, and permit management. Call (800) 200-2134.
Express Kitchen Hoods is the Mid-Atlantic’s specialized commercial kitchen hood installation contractor — Washington DC, Maryland, Virginia, and southeastern Pennsylvania. Type I and Type II hood systems, all-welded grease duct, rooftop fan, make-up air, fire suppression coordination, and permit management. Call (800) 200-2134.
Why Specialized Installation Matters
Commercial kitchen hood installation is a specialized mechanical trade that differs fundamentally from general HVAC or sheet metal work. NFPA 96 imposes strict requirements on grease duct construction (all-welded, 16-gauge minimum, continuous liquid-tight seams), clearance to combustibles (18 inches to unprotected combustibles), access panel placement, fire suppression integration, and system commissioning that are unique to grease-laden exhaust systems. A contractor without specific grease exhaust experience routinely produces installations with code deficiencies that surface during the restaurant’s first fire inspection — after the kitchen is operational and correction is expensive.
Express Kitchen Hoods focuses exclusively on commercial kitchen exhaust systems. We do not perform general mechanical contracting or residential HVAC work. Every installation we complete is designed, permitted, and executed to NFPA 96 and the applicable local mechanical code, with access panels placed correctly for future cleaning compliance. This specialization means our estimators, project managers, and installation crews encounter the same code requirements and installation challenges on every job — there is no learning curve on unfamiliar code sections or first-time-on-a-restaurant-project guesswork.
The practical result is that Express Kitchen Hoods installations consistently pass fire inspection on the first review, certificate of occupancy sign-offs proceed without mechanical correction notices, and restaurant operators who use us for installation often continue as long-term NFPA 96 cleaning customers because the cleaning crews already know every access panel location, duct routing, and fan specification on the system they installed.
Complete Installation Scope
New Restaurant Build-Outs
Complete hood system installation for new restaurant construction and first-generation build-outs throughout the Mid-Atlantic. Scope includes site survey, cooking equipment schedule review, exhaust volume calculation, hood selection or custom fabrication, all-welded grease duct, rooftop fan installation with flashed curb penetration, make-up air coordination, fire suppression contractor coordination, and permit management. We work alongside general contractors on commercial tenant improvements and serve restaurant operators who are managing direct kitchen construction.
Hood Replacement
Replacement of end-of-life, non-compliant, or undersized hood systems in operating restaurants. Hood replacement projects require careful scheduling to minimize kitchen operational disruption — we plan replacement sequences to complete installation in the shortest feasible time and coordinate with restaurant management on timing. Common replacement triggers include: undersized hood that fails to capture cooking exhaust, non-welded duct identified as a fire code deficiency, grease duct in disrepair, or cooking equipment upgrades that require a larger hood to cover the expanded equipment line.
Kitchen Reconfiguration
When a restaurant reconfigures its cooking line — adding a charbroiler or wok range, replacing a gas range with a solid-fuel grill, or expanding the cooking equipment footprint — the existing hood and exhaust system may need to be extended, repositioned, or supplemented. We assess the existing system’s ability to serve the reconfigured equipment list and design modifications or additions to bring the system into NFPA 96 compliance. Kitchen reconfiguration hood work includes permit amendment for the added scope.
Ghost Kitchen & Cloud Kitchen
The growth of ghost kitchen and cloud kitchen concepts throughout the DC, MD, and VA metro area has created demand for efficient multi-brand kitchen installations where multiple operators share a building. We design and install multi-operator ghost kitchen hood systems that provide individual NFPA 96 compliance documentation for each operator, correctly separated exhaust systems, and access panel placement that allows each operator’s duct to be cleaned independently. Permit coordination for multi-tenant kitchen building configurations included.
Mid-Atlantic Regulatory Landscape
| Jurisdiction | Governing Code | Permitting Authority |
|---|---|---|
| Washington, DC | DC Construction Codes + NFPA 96 | DCRA (Dept. of Buildings) |
| Montgomery County, MD | COMAR 29.06.01 + NFPA 96 | MCDPS Building |
| Prince George’s County, MD | COMAR 29.06.01 + NFPA 96 | PG County D-PW&T |
| Fairfax County, VA | Virginia SFPC + NFPA 96 | Fairfax County Land Dev. |
| City of Alexandria, VA | Virginia SFPC + NFPA 96 | Alexandria DCRA |
| Arlington County, VA | Virginia SFPC + NFPA 96 | Arlington CPHD |
Coverage Map
Washington DC
Montgomery County, MD
Prince George’s County, MD
Baltimore City & County
Fairfax County, VA
Arlington & Alexandria, VA
Loudoun & Prince William, VA
Chester & York Counties, PA
Frequently Asked Questions — Hood Installation
How long does a commercial hood installation take in the DC/MD/VA area?
For a straightforward single-hood installation in a new restaurant build-out — one hood, a relatively direct duct run to the rooftop, and a single fan — the physical installation scope is typically 2–5 days of crew time from hood set through fan and make-up air rough-in. Permit timeline is the main variable: DC DCRA mechanical permits can take 4–8 weeks depending on application backlog; Montgomery County and Fairfax County typically run 3–6 weeks for standard restaurant mechanical permits. We file permits as early in the project timeline as possible and use the permit review period to complete prefabrication so installation can proceed promptly when permit approval arrives.
Do you provide both the hood equipment and the installation labor?
Yes — we supply equipment (from CaptiveAire or other manufacturers, or custom-fabricated for non-standard applications) and provide all installation labor under one contract. This means one point of accountability for the complete hood system installation and avoids the coordination risk of separating equipment supply from installation. The alternative — where a restaurant operator supplies a hood and contracts separately for installation — creates gaps in accountability when installation scope requires equipment-specific coordination details that the installer didn’t have advance notice of. Call (800) 200-2134 to discuss your equipment needs.
What is all-welded grease duct and why does it matter?
NFPA 96 Chapter 5 requires that grease duct be constructed of 16-gauge (minimum) black steel with all seams continuously welded liquid-tight. Welded duct construction eliminates the seam gaps that would be present in mechanically fastened or slip-fit duct joints — gaps through which liquefied grease can escape during a grease duct fire and potentially ignite adjacent combustible structure. Many violations discovered on older restaurant installations involve duct that was installed with mechanical fasteners (screws) rather than continuous welds. Our duct is fully welded on all seams, tested by our installation crew for liquid-tightness, and inspected before covering or enclosure as part of our quality process.
Mid-Atlantic Hood Installation
DC, Maryland, Virginia & Pennsylvania — NFPA 96 compliant, permit managed, fire suppression coordinated.