Loads of our glasses are quite badly clouded from the dishwasher. As I understand it, the clouding is basically limescale deposits (possibly from when it was run for ages with no salt in it, ahem).
So, my thought is to stick them in a bowl of water into which I've poured a box of citric acid granules:
http://www.dri-pak.co.uk/cleaning-products/citric-acid/
and let them soak overnight, to make them all sparkly again. Am I a scientific genius, or an chemical idiot?
you can also buy stuff that you put in yer dishwasher to do that. Also cleans the dishwasher pipes at the same time if you use enough
down here in The Chilterns it’s almost essential - as is a Brita filter so yer coffee machine doesn’t block up
miggle class woes abide
Have you ran out of rinse aid?
Sounds like it should work to me but then again I'm not a chemist!
Altrnatively for a faster acting method you could buy some Kilrock descaler from Wickes and other stores https://www.kilrock.co.uk. This is concentrated formic acid and in my experience a 30 sec exposure should be enough to remove some pretty big scale deposits. Don't think it will hurt the glass but might want to do a test on one glass first.
Have you ran out of rinse aid?
It probably ran without enough rinse aid at some point, and definitely ran for a while with no salt in. The problem now is not stopping it happening, 'cos it's now all fully rinse aid and salted up, but getting rid of the clouding that's already happened.
Oh, good call OP.
I reckon you are onto something.
I have similar problems down on the South Coast, all our water gets filtered through the South Downs chalk and its righto’l limescaley..
Might do what you’ve done..
Let us know if your glasses survive eh.
On another similar note..
Is there any need for rinse aid? Don’t them there new fangled all-in-one tablets do all that kinda fing??
If use "all in one" tablets then you don't need salt or rinse aid?
If use “all in one” tablets then you don’t need salt or rinse aid?
Yeah, but how do you stop your dishwasher warning lights telling you salt and rinse aid have run out?!
If you have really hard water you still need salt, even using all-in-one tablets, as they're often not salty enough
Yeah, but how do you stop your dishwasher warning lights telling you salt and rinse aid have run out?!
Black insulation tape 🙂
wow, I'm interesting
I think you are - just for being in the middle of the Venn Diagram of STW threads and [url= https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/housekeeping/587637-any-way-to-stop-glasses-going-cloudy-in-the-dishwasher ]Mumsnet[/url] threads 😀
Is there any need for rinse aid? Don’t them there new fangled all-in-one tablets do all that kinda fing??
They not as great but work to a certain extent.
On some dishwashers you can disable the salt and rinse aid warning lights for this very reason. Check your manual.
Vinegar works fine too. Buy a bottle of the cheapest white vinegar you can, add some of that to the water and soak the glasses in it.
We use the Fairy Platinum ones (usually available in Wilko's for less than standard Fairy tablets elsewhere - including Amazon). We have not had any issues with glasses clouding since swapping to them.
I’d be interested in how you get on...
The milkyness is usually caused by alkaline attack on the glass surface, and can only be removed by polishing. Your particular (ab)use of the dishwasher may be an exception - any of the acids suggested will remove limescale, but keeping the salt topped up would have stopped it in the first place.
So, my thought is to stick them in a bowl of water into which I’ve poured a box of citric acid granules:
I just use Viakal on any limescale marks on glasses.
If you have really hard water you still need salt, even using all-in-one tablets, as they’re often not salty enough
Yeah, we live in a really hard water area & we have to use salt in the dishwasher as well as the all-in-one tablets.
As for citric acid, I recently bought a load off ebay for descaling the Nespresso machine (duck & cover). It works really well.
Regarding the milky glass effect - without wanting to be disparaging to the OP, I thought that primarily happened with cheap glasses when put in the dishwasher & was more of an attack on the surface, rather than a build-up.
Worth a try with citric acid though - it's not exactly expensive. I use a dessert spoon of powder in about a litre of water.
My dishwasher doesn't have any warning lights. I'd also always assumed the white misting on some glasses was just abrasion wearing the surface away. I have a few pub style pint glasses, one from Tescos which is very cloudy but the rest are fine. The undamaged ones are real pub glasses.
Hope you've been using goggles and gloves in a well ventilated area? fwiw I use citric acid when making dishwasher powder and still have a pulse.
Yep white vinegar can be used as rinse aid, you can buy it from Ebay 20 litres for around £16. Citric acid in bulk also cheaper from there too.
Using a scourer on glasses can help.
As two others have written above, the milkiness is alkaline attack by the detergent so acid won't remove it.
Have you ever washed a polished alloy bike component in the dishwasher? It will come out eroded by the alkalinity.
Yes I seem to remember it's something like hydrogen fluoride in the tablets that dissolves glass (a dim memory from my chemistry degree)
Finish do a glass safe version.
As for cheap glasses - they are the only ones I'd put in a dishwasher. I have a scar on my neck from an exploding crystal champagne glass that I was trying after someone had mistakenly put it in the dishwasher
The salt that you pour into the hatch goes into the water softening labyrinth that treats the water before it gets sprayed into the machine. If you use tablets "with salt" they aren't going to help with that process and if you live in a hard water area your machine is going to get gummed up and die if you stop using the other salt.
So, the outcome. I dissolved a boxful of the citric acid powder in a bucket of hot water and let the glasses soak in it overnight. I washed the glasses this morning (by hand). The glasses are a mix of 'normal' Ikea-or-wherever glasses and 'pub-standard' pint pots from beer festivals.
As predicted by some, it made no difference at all 🙁
Watching with interest. If our water was any harder, it'd set. My beer sometimes goes flat as soon as it's poured into a glass. I was wondering if it could be limescale related.
Our water is so hard it comes out of the tap carrying a flick knife.
Not really.. but it's a good line.
I am in Leeds and the water is so hard we nicknamed it Ronnie Pickering!
I am in Leeds and the water is so hard we nicknamed it Ronnie Pickering!
Erm. Who?