Hi all,
Recently discovered a little bugger of a mouse had gotten into the attic eaves and, for whatever reason, decided to chew the aluminium flexible ducting used for the cooker hood. I'm presuming it could smell food and tried to make its way to the kitchen. Either way, it has chewed a good few holes in that thing. Rather than just replacing it like-for-like, I'm wondering about converting it to a rigid setup.
The duct itself basically begins in the kitchen ceiling, where it does a 90 degree bend into the eaves via the room above's floorboards, and then terminates into another couple of 90 degree bends and out the wall. Total length is around 2m or so (if even that), so I believe the 90 degree bends aren't too harmful to the performance.
I was thinking of swapping it out for rigid PVC ducting, slapping around foam pipe insulation, and then foil taping it all up (foil tape is much thicker and sharper when cut compared to that flexible tubing crap, so I hope that deters any further rodents from trying their luck).
This will be my first time having a go at rigid ducting, so any advice for connections/cementing the PVC (good idea, bad?) and things to keep in mind if maintenance or disassembly is required in future. Cheers. Will likely give this a go on the shower ducting as well, which as a similar setup and distance.
Attached a crude drawing showing how the ducting generally looks like.
Recently discovered a little bugger of a mouse had gotten into the attic eaves and, for whatever reason, decided to chew the aluminium flexible ducting used for the cooker hood. I'm presuming it could smell food and tried to make its way to the kitchen. Either way, it has chewed a good few holes in that thing. Rather than just replacing it like-for-like, I'm wondering about converting it to a rigid setup.
The duct itself basically begins in the kitchen ceiling, where it does a 90 degree bend into the eaves via the room above's floorboards, and then terminates into another couple of 90 degree bends and out the wall. Total length is around 2m or so (if even that), so I believe the 90 degree bends aren't too harmful to the performance.
I was thinking of swapping it out for rigid PVC ducting, slapping around foam pipe insulation, and then foil taping it all up (foil tape is much thicker and sharper when cut compared to that flexible tubing crap, so I hope that deters any further rodents from trying their luck).
This will be my first time having a go at rigid ducting, so any advice for connections/cementing the PVC (good idea, bad?) and things to keep in mind if maintenance or disassembly is required in future. Cheers. Will likely give this a go on the shower ducting as well, which as a similar setup and distance.
Attached a crude drawing showing how the ducting generally looks like.