Dottie wrote:
I should have put water softeners and counter tops. My water
softener was bought in 2006. By the time I had problems with it -
there was a power outage and the timer got messed up - and I just
unplugged it and never started it again. That was about a year ago.
My area is big on power outages so its an on-going problem. Anyway,
another reason I did not bother to hook it up was that I was already
having problems with calcium/lime deposits. I have dark colored
Wilsonart standard laminate counter tops and the calcium/lime
deposits showed up on them. I have now scrubbed the color off the
counter tops behind the faucets. I even bought a large sheet of the
laminate and had someone from Handy Man come out and replace a part
of it. That's still o.k. but the other side is bad looking. I have
been looking for new counter top material and got new estimates on
replacing the entire kitchen counter top area. I do not want to
spend money on Silastone or Granite for my cabinets. They are o.k. -
got them replaced in 2003...but not that great. I am probably going
for the Wilsonart Premium laminate. But I am afraid that after I get
new ones I will still have the same problem with the hard water. (My
county changed their recipe for water about two years ago - didn't
used to be this bad). A new water softener is expensive -- it would
add over a thousand to the total. My current one isn't that old --
but I will need help disconnecting it so I can clean it very well
before actually using it again. And the bottom line is - it didn't
help that much with the problem. One of my neighbors does not have a
water softener and isn't having any problems. The other neighbor
does have one -- he also has Silastone counter tops - and no problem
with hard water. So -- it's hard to know what to do.
Any advice on how to handle this would be appreciated.

I don't know much about hard water , but Nevamar brand plastic laminate
has what they call "ARP" surface . It's apparently infused with some kind of
metal/oxide , and the surface is very durable - fabricators hate it (I did!)
because it's hard on tooling , dulls files quickly . It sounds like you
don't have postform tops , a good installer/fabricator can replace the
laminate in situ if that's the case .

--
Snag