The hard water consists of minerals that can leave stains. These minerals come in the form of lime, calcium, chalk, and magnesium. The water acquires them during its journey from the ground right into your water systems. Let’s see how we can clean them.
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Know the causes behind water stains on your shower doors
A new glass shower door does not remain shiny and appear new for a long time. This is irrespective of how frequently you use various bathroom cleaning products or wipe them down.
One of the major causes of the hard water stain is soap scum. This is essentially a mixture of oils and hard water.
Even in your shower setting, the presence of magnesium, calcium, water mix of fatty acids in your shampoos and soaps gives rise to such stains. For instance, when all these dry, it results in a crusty layer of film.
Oftentimes, your glass shower doors experience the reaction of the home’s water with your soap. Most bar soaps have paraffin wax. This, in turn, reacts to water inviting unwarranted stains. The scum you get to see on your bathroom’s surface is because of the soap. Once you complete your shower, the wax easily settles on the glass. It creates a layer of scum requiring immediate cleaning.
Fortunately, there are several methods to clean your glass shower doors
As you shower daily, you ought to care for your shower door every day. You can create and maintain a shine as well. This is possible with two simple steps:
- Deep clean once a week, and
- Treat the shower glass daily.
Let’s discuss each of these in more detail so that you can a sparkly and clean shower every time.
Preventive measures can do wonders for you: daily tasks
You can keep your glass shower doors grime-free and clean by taking the necessary initiatives. Cleaning the doors at frequent intervals is one such step.
Apart from this, you can always adopt certain preventive measures. For instance, ensure to squeegee the door after every use. Remind every family member to do so each time they shower. The basic squeegee is not very expensive. Standing water creates stains. If you dry the door after you have used it, there is a lower chance of getting dirty white stains. Make sure to wipe down your shower doors preferably every night. This ought to be done after the last member of your family has taken the bath.
It is possible to dry the door further by using a sponge or towel.
This way you will be successful in avoiding any additional toxic chemicals or cleaning products. You can even cross multiple chores off by cleaning walls, floors, and shower doors.
It is a prudent move to leave the door open once you have taken a shower. It will give sufficient scope to it to dry out.
If you wish to further prevent any hard water spot, take these steps:
- Keep shower doors clean.
- Spray the doors with any water repellent spray, and
- Let the bathroom fan run a while or open a window. This removes the moist air.
A deeper clean: weekly task
You can ensure your cleaning task ends up trouble-free. For this, you will need to make suitable arrangements for certain items. For instance, you will need:
- Small bowl.
- Rubber gloves.
- Squeegee.
- Microfiber cloths.
- Eye protection.
- Old towel.
- Soft-bristled brush.
- Lemon juice.
- Baking soda.
- Distilled white vinegar.
You can follow these steps to clean the shower:
- Take a spray bottle and fill it up with white vinegar.
- Apply it for saturating the glass thoroughly.
- Allow 10 minutes to elapse so that the vinegar can soak in completely.
- If there is any significant buildup, allow it to soak for a little longer.
- Finally, dip one scrub sponge in the baking soda and keep scrubbing the glass.
Vinegar is equally effective in cleaning water stains and soap scum
Vinegar is very helpful for cleaning both water stains and soap scum. For guaranteed and fruitful outcomes, you can count on diluted white vinegar with baking soda. It gives this combination wonderful scrubbing abilities.
Even the motion in which you scrub is important. For instance, don’t scrub the surface of the said glass in circular motions. You should follow an S-pattern so that you don’t go over the dirty parts after you have been over the clean parts. It aids you in cutting through stubborn deposits.
If there is chalk on the showerhead, you can consider removing it and letting it rest in vinegar for a night. This can remove the white spots on your showerhead. It will also increase the water flow.
You can also use a toothbrush to clean the grouts between the tiles. This can get dirty over time and keeping this clean is essential. A lot of people forget about this and their sower doesn’t look very clean. It is not a fun job but it needs to happen from time to time.
We have discussed how to clean shower door tracks here.
Consider a water softener
The problem with hard water is that the chalk clogs up your showerhead and pipes. It also creates dirty stains on your shower door. You might consider investing in a water softener to get rid of this. This removes the chalk from your water. This costs a few thousand dollars to install. It also requires maintenance as you need to refill the salt every month. It can be a great investment as it makes your house cleaner and can make your water heater last longer. For this reason, a lot of people opt for a water heater in areas with a lot of hard water.
It is not allowed to install in some areas as the salt in the wastewater can be difficult to process. You can then use a water conditioner instead. This often uses magnets or electricity to reduce the chalk. It is not as effective as a water softener but can help somewhat.
To conclude, we can state that showers get dirty if they are not maintained well. You need to clean up after every shower and also every week. Some people don’t want to do this but it can result in a stained and dirty shower. Some discipline is required to have a nice shower.
Removing the shower grab bar can allow you to clean behind this as well.
A shower can get dirty quite fast. Luckily, it is quite easy to remove stains and other dirt with some cleaning. In less than 30 minutes, your shower can look brand new again!
