4 out of 5 leaves
Vinegar is a popular low cost all purpose cleaner. It’s better for the environment and safer for your family. But can it handle limescale deposits from hard water?
The Good
- Better for the Earth — natural vinegar vs synthetic cleaning compounds
- Better for you — natural vinegar in the house vs scary chemicals
- Very Low cost — One gallon of vinegar is only a couple dollars
The Bad
- Didn’t completely remove limescale (almost – but not completely).
My Experience
We have hard water here in Los Angeles. Look at how gross my dish rack pan gets after about a month of draining dishes.
Icky Limescale!
I decided to tackle it with old faithful – white vinegar!
I gave it a good spritz, waited a minute and wiped it down with a damp cloth. A lot of the scale came off, but as the pan dried, I could see there was still a bit more to be removed. I soaked the remaining spots with vinegar and gave it five minutes to work. After giving it a final wipe-down and rinse, I let it fully dry and assessed the results.
Just a tiny bit left
As you can see there’s just a little shadow left of the scale. For me this is good enough — especially since I know the scale will begin to build up again after the dinner dishes are done. I rate it 4 out of 5 leaves only because it was not perfect, and I don’t want to spend more than 5 minutes on this. As an added bonus, my kitchen smelled like Jones Salt and Vinegar chips for a short while. Mmmmmmm!
Have you tried using vinegar for cleaning hard water scale? How could I do it better? Please share your thoughts and ideas below!
Shared at Sunday School, Monday Mania, Homestead Barn Hop, Simple Lives Thursday, Rural Thursday, Your Green Resource, Frugal Friday
I actually have no idea if we have hard water. I live in NJ. I used to live in the LA area though, so I understand. But I love the idea of using something more natural to clean.
Natural AND so inexpensive!
I love white vinegar. I use it on our cloth diapers when we start getting build up. Wonderful stuff!
Yes, I’m quickly falling in love. Stay tuned for many more vinegar idea reviews!
I haven’t tried using vinegar yet, but I will soon. I live on the central coast of California, and we definitely have hard water, here, too. I found your blog post via the Your Green Resource link-up today
Love and hugs from the ocean shores of California, Heather 
Thanks for your visit, Heather!
We have very hard water here in eastern Nebraska (well water) and I use vinegar to spray down the shower stall after every use. It helps to keep the scale from forming. Great post!
I hadn’t thought about a daily spray down. I’ll have to try it!
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I’ve only used white vinegar hot to remove lime stains. I boil it in my water kettle when there is too much build up. And then I let it sit for a while. Works great. I grew up with doing it that way.
I keep a 12 oz bottle of water with two tbs. of cider vinegar for minor heart burn in the refrigerator. Vinegar being acidic, you would think it would irritate the problem, but it works.