Ceiling fan: brands?

[Kalmia]

I have 5 Hunters in the house. Smooth quiet operation.

[Nate Nagel]

Key "reputable company."

Your original post said "just about any manufacturer" I bet I can walk into the Orange Colored Store and find a ceiling fan that sells for $200 but is a festering POS.

this isn't limited to ceiling fans, either, pretty much all consumer goods are poor quality crap.

nate

[RBM]

Not a traditional fan . I don't think they even sell a traditional HB in that price range. Hunter is probably the only thing they'd have in a traditional style at that price, and personally, I'm no fan of Hunter, but it would arguably be " a quality fan"

[Nate Nagel]

just curious, why not a fan (pun intended?) I've installed at least two Hunters in my recent memory and while I knew that they weren't "top of the line" I've had no problems with them. One was installed in my kitchen xmas '07 and has seen a LOT of use since then (as in, it will be turned on to keep the kitchen cool while cooking and then left on continuously until someone notices that it's running) other was in a rental house (long story) so I don't know how that one held up.

nate

[Kyle]

A tangential complaint I have is why so many of the fan manufacturers are down-sizing the light kits on their fans? I can't find a light kit with the bowl cover (not the individual sconces) that uses a standard base - they're all going to candelabra with 60W max. which doesn't put out enough light to use as the primary light source in, say, my bedroom.

Grrr.

[RBM]

Two problems I have with Hunter, Many of them are very heavy and require special bracing above the wiring box, and many of them use the most ass backward hardware and mounting methods. IMO, whoever invented the ball hanger, was a genius. The way I see it, the second the patent expired on that design, every fan manufacturer should have adopted it, and most did, but not Hunter, they continued to use the most archaic methods available. One of their fans is a flush mount. The steel mounting plate has rubber standoffs that keep the plate a specific distance from the ceiling. If you overtighten the plate, the rubber mounts pop through the sheetrock, leaving no way to tighten the screws without drawing the plate too close to the ceiling for the motor housing screws to line up. I would expect stupid designs on cheap fans, not Hunter, yet some of the most clever designs are on fans like those from HD.

[JoeSpareBedroom]

Is there a plain vanilla Casablanca fan for $200?

[JoeSpareBedroom]

A tangential complaint I have is why so many of the fan manufacturers are down-sizing the light kits on their fans? I can't find a light kit with the bowl cover (not the individual sconces) that uses a standard base - they're all going to candelabra with 60W max. which doesn't put out enough light to use as the primary light source in, say, my bedroom.

Grrr. ===================

Maybe they're finding that customers aren't buying the ones with individual fixtures. Take a look at Casablanca. When I bought mine many years ago, some of their models could be fitted with a number of different lighting options.

[RBM]

Yes, and no. Here is a link to a site that sells traditional casablanca fans. The fans that are less expensive are not "true casablanca" fans, but imports that casablanca sticks their logo on. These are still pretty good fans, as even in the less expensive market, casablanca still has a reputation to uphold. The most traditional and probably the best selling fan they make, the Panama, seems to go on sale every summer for something in the $200 range. Of the hundreds of fans I've installed over the years, I've installed more Panamas than any other model of fan, and barring a rare defective unit, every single one of them runs balanced and silent.

[Wayne Boatwright]

On Thu 25 Jun 2009 07:23:23p, RBM told us...

Emerson fans feature 3 grades/types of motors in various styles, which reflect a wide price range as well. Their top grade motor has a lifetime full replacement warranty, requires absolutely no maintenance other than surface cleaning, and is perfectly silent in operation.

Apart from the Hunter Original (which weighs in at ~50 pounds, I wouldn't buy any other fan than Emerson. I've owned 5 of them for many years, have moved them from house to house several times, and they still perform like they were new out of the box.

[Lee B]

Late response, but...

I had two ceiling fans installed last year - one Hunter, one HD. (All I could really afford at the time, with the new house). These went into a bedroom and a den, ie spare bedroom in a 50's house that had no overhead lights. For the den, I just had the fan installed with a wall switch to control the power, and use the attached chains for the light and fan controls. For the bedroom, I got the remote control and also a wireless wall switch, that both controlled the receiver in the fan. This has worked well for me - I can control the fan and/or light from the door, and then use the remote to turn the light off. And better yet, if it gets too cool at night, I can turn the fan down without having to get up and stumble to the door or worse try to find the elusive chains in the dark.

[Chris Nelson]

I've thought it would be a nice design if there was a wall unit that listened to a remote but a wall unit and a remote that both controlled a box near the fan is OK, too. Where did you get such a setup?