Recommended Ceiling Fan Brands???

I need to purchase 4 ceiling fans of various designs and sizes.... which manufacturers would you recommend...
I'm next to a Home Depot which carries both Hunter and Hamptom Bay... there has been some discussion about the level of customer service at Hunter and I suspect Hamptom Bay is a HD "house brand " ... (my experience is that HD house brands are largely garbage)...
Any good online sources ???
thanks for your advice and suggestions !!!
Peter

I just installed a Litex brand "Vortex Hugger" 36 inch model last week in my bedroom. It's a cheapie....around $19.99 but I've been pleasantly surprised. Relatively quiet operation, very little wobble, cools a small room fine on low or medium. The light kit is disappointing, though. Only rated for a single 60 watt bulb. I'm running it without the globe, and with a 100 watt bulb.

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When we needed to have a fan installed in our new kitchen recently our electrician said to purchase anything BUT Hunter - they just aren't as reliable as they once were and he didn't think they were worth the money. We wanted a brushed chrome finish fan, under 45 inches, and as we were already beyond budget, price was definitely a consideration. After shopping at the big box stores and local electric stores we finally found exactly what we wanted - at K-Mart for about $40! Of all five fans in our house, this new one is our hands-on favorite...works great, quiet, and no shimmy. Of course, YMMV!
Liz

I bought SEARS "cheapies" many years ago.
They run continuously... summer and winter.
Completely trouble-free.
Around year 10, I did oil the fan bearings...
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<rj>

The Hampton Bay brand is made by several manufacturers and some of them are excellent and reasonably priced. MILO Hunter is garbage, however Casablanca intellitouch fans are probably the best fan you can buy (also owned by Hunter)
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I'll second the vote for Casablanca. The 10 year old unit in my previous home is still absolutely silent when running, except for the sound of the blades moving through the air when it's turned on high. The Hunter which came with my current house is a noisy piece of crap - some sort of weird ticking noise as it revolves. And, not very well balanced. The thing wobbles.

Doug Kanter wrote:
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Yeah, I'd heard N.Y. was installing ceiling fans for the homeless in dumpsters now.

On Tue 02 Aug 2005 03:48:05a, RBM wrote in alt.home.repair:
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Well, cheap is cheap, and some manufacturer's make nothing but cheap fans that are nothing but garbage. OTOH, Hunter was one of the first ceiling fan manufacturers, dating back to the late 1800s when many fans were even water powered. Hunter finally addressed the mass market and does build some very inexpensive fans of what I consider dubious quality. However, the Hunter Original Classic fan is one of the best fans built today, bar none.
http://tinyurl.com/a6why
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Peter, 8/1/2005, 10:22:55 PM, wrote:
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I installed a Hampton Bay and a Hunter three years ago. They run constantly 9 months out of the year. The Hunter is still quiet, the Hampton Bay is making motor noises even though it has no rod extension and doesn't wobble whatsoever. I have a Hunter in the great room that has been running nearly constantly for fifteen years and has begun to make some slight ticking noises recently.

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Our three current ceiling fans are all Hunter, one is ~10 years old, another ~ 7 years old, the other ~4 years old. The newest fan developed a hum about a year after purchase. Hunter responded promptly to e-mail, determined the fan was defective, and immediately sent a replacement, a better fan than the original. I've had several other Hunter fans in previous houses with no problems.
Home Depot owns Hampton Bay I believe (someone will correct me if I'm wrong <g>). Before buying the newest Hunter (from Lowes) we bought a Hampton Bay, not a bottom of the line. Air output was lousy and it seemed cheaply made, so we returned it.
Whatever brand you buy stay away from the bottom of the line. And bear in mind fan light fixtures often give very little light and are the source of many fan noises. I prefer fans without lights, if possible.
Just my experience :-).
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Other than the major manufacturers/retailers web sites, no, sorry.
You may want to check Consumer Reports to see if they've reviewed ceiling fans recently.

Over the past ten years I have replaced all the wobbling, humming, shaking, fans in my house with Hunters. In my opinion easiest to install and best quality for the money. None of my six Hunters ages ten years to six weeks, shakes rattles or hums.
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I just installed 2 Hunter fans in bedrooms last week. No balancing was required and they are very quiet. Used Hamptom Bay remotes on both. Warren

I'd buy from a store nearby so that you can easily return the noisy, defective ones. Quality control in ceiling fans seems to be something unknown to the manufacturers.
Peter wrote:
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Positive I hope? At least that's been my experience contacting hunter customer support.
-- Todd H. http://www.toddh.net /

On 8/3/2005 1:52 PM or thereabouts, Todd H. appears, somewhat unbelievably, to have opined:
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Not entirely for me. Although my question about finding a light bulb to fit the fan I had just installed turned out to be a rather stupid question. I feel that they should have been able to answer the question rather than to just tell me, "we don't make light bulbs."
The correct answer (which probably should have been obvious to me) was to purchase a fan bulb or an appliance bulb which are smaller than the average Type A bulb. Why couldn't Hunter customer service have told me that rather than some helpful folks here?