Joseph Meehan wrote:
George E. Cawthon wrote:

Les wrote:

Planning on buying all new kitchen appliances, since they are all
about 18 yrs old. Currently have a hood over the range that has a
fan and light as part of it. I would like to replace the hood with
a microwave oven over the range.

My condo is 18 yrs old. Can I assume that since I have electricity
with the hood, that the electrical wiring is ample for the
microwave, like the salesman says? Or how can it be tested to make
sure that the current electrical wiring is OK?


Just a touch of realism and a bit of sarcasm.
Replacing the hood with a hood/microwave can be
done but will likely be unsatisfactory (the hood
part) and will certainly cost a lot more than the
two separately. But, do it if you really want it.

Second. All house circuits are at least 15 amps.
It is unlikely that you would buy a microwave
that uses more than 13.5 amps. The hood fan and
light probably don't use more than 1-2 amps, thus
that circuit with the will support the microwave
alone and probably the microwave, hood fan, and
light all running at the same time. Just don't
put other things on it, or at least turn them on
when the microwave is running.

Just remember that thousands (err;; make that tens
of thousands, actually probably millions)) of
people just set the microwave on the counter and
plug it into wall circuit which is usually 15 amps
with no problem at all. Mine also has a toaster
in the same plug. Both do operate at the same
time, if yours won't then avoid the hassle of
resetting breakers by not operating other
appliance on that circuit when you use the
microwave.


If they both operate well at the same time, they are likely on a split
circuit so the upper and lower plugs are really two different circuits.


See SQLit's comments, he seems to have a handle on
the issue and a reasonable view.



Actually no. But it is a 20 amp circuit. Previous
microwave was 12.5 or 12A and the toaster was 8,
so the amp load was right on the edge. Never
tripped the breaker but you could hear the
microwave kind of slow down when the toaster went
on. Never figured out why the breaker never
tripped but probably because the two were probably
never both on more than 45 seconds to 1 minute at
at time.