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I got a question from a consumer from http://www.CountertopReview.com . He asked if Caesarstone stains and my first response was no. It is a non-porous material so how can it stain.
Boy was I wrong. I took a Caesarstone sample and used a Sharpie on it. Then tried to clean with Acetone with no luck. Got about 90% of it off but you can easily see it.
So how does a non-porous material stain? And more importantly, how would you go about removing it with regular household cleaners?
Acetone will not remove all the pigment you will also need soap and water to remove the water base pigment in the sharpie, and you may need a little lacquer thinner also.
The other thing, and this makes little sense to me but I have personal experience that it works…
1) You must dab away the “cleaner” while still very wet and the “stain” is disolved and suspended. Do not wipe or let dry before dabbing.
2) You should use a terry cloth rag, not something smooth like an old tee shirt. The loops on the terry cloth will make a difference, trust me. I know it makes little sense, but it works better.Looks to me like you thinned out the ink so much it worked its way around the quartz and poly joins. You’ll get it cleaner, but I don’t think you’ll get 100%.
If you do the same thing on plastic laminate, and we know it is non-porous, it will do the same thing. I think it was about 5 or 6 years ago the EPA changed what they could use for pigments in markers. The new pigments many metal based scratch and etch the plastic, this leaves pigment in the plastic after it is cleaned. When this changed happen a lot of laminate had numbers and names that could be seen after cleaned, which had to be replaced. Now the laminate suppliers only use stickers with names or grease pencil, no more markers. Because of the different pigments used now, you will need to used several different types of cleaners, like I said before and sometimes bleach to remove all the color. But because of the scratching and etching effect you may still see where the marker was in certain light angles.
Not sure how to get the stain out but I tried it with SS and the results where great. Solid Surface the only true non-porous surface. it just keeps getting betterI tried Ajax with bleach and a scrub brush for about 30 seconds. I also tried soap and water.
For your typical homeowner, this is getting too complicated. You would think it would at least clean up with a bleach cleaner but it doesn’t.
Preach it Brother Olson, Had a situation Monday with a similar color by another manuf. had some pencil ines around a cook top cut out that would not come off, thank goodness that the flange covered the extra line. Home owner was watching the installer trying to scrub the stain off and says “I thought this would not stain?” So did I. Oops. Now the installer knows why I tape the surface before making marks.
I thought I was pretty well versed in the uncommon knowledge department.
Then Dani comes along and learns me some new s**t.
I am smarter today than I was yesterday.
Jon, I have seen the old blue grocery receipts “stain” solid surface that the only way to get it out was to sand it out. KaBoom works well on Quartz for removing a whole bunch of things that look like “stains”. Non porous just means nothing will soak into the surface, not that nothing can “stain” the surface.
I’ve heard a product called Kenny’s Cleaner works well on engineered stone but have no source. Some guys swear by rubbing slurry sludge from fabrication removes stains also.
Joe
I would assume that would work Joe, because it has some grit in it… but, wouldn’t you also risk changing the sheen in that area?
The “slurry sludge” works, just change “rubbing” to gently wiping. The sludge acts like a poltice to wick up the staining agent. If you rub too hard, you are corrent Wags, you could scratch the surface.
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