I've had some "absolute black" granite worktops installed in the kitchen - the glossy type. I've noticed that sometimes where I've left wet things on the surface slight white water marks have appeared. They're only visible in certain lights but they're annoying. Does this mean that the stone hasn't been properly sealed? I'm planning on giving the installers a call, but I just wanted to check here first for advice.
As far as I know, the granite is just polished and not sealed. First thing I did with ours was apply a coat of Lithofin Stainstop
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you really need to follow the instructions to the letter and NEVER leave it on longer than it says because if it "goes off" you're stuffed!
At the same time of ordering the "stain stop" I also purchased a pot of Lithofin "easy clean" which cleans the stuff up superbly and can be used daily if required, and.... for special guests... I get out my tub of "Lithofin MN Polish Cream" It gets done every few months because it's bloody hard work by hand (one day I'll get one of those electric car polisher things) but is well worth the effort knowing it's adding to the impregnable layer to protect our granite investment.
p.s. it ain't cheap stuff, but so far the above have lasted over 12 months, and it's far cheaper than new granite worktops.
Thanks, looks like good stuff, I think I shall be ordering a pot. Looking around on the lithofin website there doesn't seem to be a product to remove any existing watermarks. Is it just a matter of learning to live with them, or does anyone know of a way to get them out before the sealing.
I don't know personally, I'd expect one of the many on-line granite suppliers would be able to give you an answer if your own installer can't (though i'd have thought he would have the answer)
Fit a water softener. When hard water evaporates, it leaves behind any calcium, which forms white deposits. The white deposits can be scrubbed off, or will dissolve in acid, although you probably don't want any acids near your expensive worktops!
It still has many cracks and "crystaline" type features. I know of one person that has a permanent red wine stain in her granite top that won't polish off/out.
True for real granite but a lot of natural stones are sold as granite but they are not. It's quite usual also for black stones to be doctored with some kind of shoeshine to make them blacker, this will fail in time.
The mere existence of water marks points to a fake "granite".
Many of the fake "granite" have calcite in them, if this is the case then the descaler will dissolve holes on it.
Test first in a non visible area, any bubbling or loss of shine is sign of the presence of calcite.
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