Hob ketttles & limescale

[Ethel]

I am fed up of the limescale in the electric kettle, and having to replace the kettle every few years because they break.

Do ordinary hob kettles get limescale? I don't recall having this problem years ago

[buildersmate]

It could be because your Water Company has changed the main source of where your water comes from - especially in the Midlands which is on the cusp of water sources from mainly chalk soils (mainly in the South and SE).
Kettles break from this because the thickness of the scale creates a thermal insulator between the hot element and the water needing heating - meaning the element gets hotter than it should do.
I use a stainless steel kettle (Kenwood jug) with one of those stainless steel thingies in it - that looks like a pot scourer. This gives a largish extra surface area of water in contact with metal for scale to cling to - as an alternative to collecting around the base (the element is under the flat surface base on these types of kettles).
Then I put dilute brick cleaner (hydrochloric acid) in about monthly to remove what does collect. Vineger and other acids obviously work just as effectively - just not as strong and more expensive. Provided one buys a decent quality of stainless steel in the fist place, the acid doesn't seem to impact it (or the plastic). Still going after 5 years.

[Ethel]

Thanks BM - my current stainless steel kettle cost �70 two years ago, and the plastic bits inside have just shattered, they are that brittle.
My water has always been very hard.
I do use the stainless steel ball and descale regularly.

But would an old fashioned hob kettle be better?

[ChuckFickens]

an old fashioned hob kettle would still get limescale in it, but it would probably not cause it to break so quickly, what would happen though is the limescale would act as insulation and it would require more and more energy to heat the water.

I would suggest next time you replace your kettle you also buy a britta water filter and only ever fill your kettle from that, I live in a hard water area and although I don't do the above (and my kettle does get scaled up) my parents do use a water filter and there is hardly any scale in their kettle at all after a few years use.

[Ethel]

Chuck - my drinking water is filtered already! I could weep, but I won't.

I think I may resort to boiling the water in a milk pan - at least that can be properly washed

[ChuckFickens]

oh and where I work we are required to only fill the kettles using filtered water too as the company got so fed up of having to buy new kettles every 6 months or so (it's actually in the staff handbook and you can, in theory, be disciplined if caught filling a kettle straight from the tap!!)

[alavahalf]

People often call on me as they have a problem with their shower...9 times out of 10 their shower head is blocked with lime scale...If the water can't escape from the holes in the shower head, it get to hot and dribbles out.
Living in a hard water area I am often asked what can be done about it ...
All I can say is my neighbours suffer with limescale...but I don't even though we have the same water supply...
Around 20 years ago I had a problem with a constant drip in my header tank which tops up my main water tank. When I went to have a look at it I found the whole inside of my copper tank caked in limescale...
Immediately I did a bit of research and found various so called remedies, all of which I viewed with suspicion.
Apart from one, which claimed that special magnets could remove this offending problem.....a bit expensive I thought.
Having given this some thought I came to the conclusion that a manet is a magnet and why not give it a go... at the time my son was involved in racing model cars, and would need a new motor for his car every few weeks. So we had a load of spare motors sitting around.....I popped one open ,removed the magnets and fitted them round my main water supply by the stop ****... and forgot about them....
It was only a few years later that I returned to have look in the tank and was greeted by a clean copper surface...not a spot of scale below the water line.
By the way magnets are'nt just magnets....these day's you can get earth magnets or neodinium magnets.... These are scary strong and are not for playing with...BE WARNED..
These are far superior to the one which I fitted many years ago.
They are ready available from a well known auction site...not sure if I can mention it...but it's the best known.

It's not magic ...I have been told that the magnets change the polarity of the particles in the water, and this stops them from sticking to surfaces as they

[Ethel]

I've heard of that before - it's interesting.

[luxury]

Hi Ethel,

When I had my kitchen put in I had a Salamander water filter put in too. They are cheap, but definitely take the hardness down.

http://www.salamander-engineering.co.uk/produc ts/products_limescale.html

I have a hob kettle and it's been going strong for 3 yrs now and very little scale.

I bought it from Plumbase.

[Ethel]

Lots to think about :)

[Mortartube]

Get some Limelite from the supermarket and descale it yourself every 6 months or so. It is easy to do and a bottle should do it twice.

[Buenchico]

Hi Ethel.

Unless you can get rid of the calcium bicarbonate in your water supply (by using some form of 'water softening', which is not the same as 'filtering'), any kettle will suffer from limescale. However the limescale will be concentrated around the hottest points of the kettle. With an electric kettle, that means around the element (which can lead to early failure of the kettle). With a hob kettle the limescale forms mainly on the base of the kettle, which slightly impairs the heating efficiency but doesn't result in any drastic failure.

If you want to stick to using an electric kettle, the simplest and cheapest solution is to buy cheap kettles. A 'Value' cordless jug kettle, from Tesco, will cost you less than a fiver, and it will do the job just as well as a �70 stainless steel model.

Chris

[Ice.Maiden]

Ethel - get a kettle with a sealed element. I have one, and never noticed any build-up of limescale.
http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http: //s7v1.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/230416859 %3F%24product%24&imgrefurl=http://www.johnlewi s.com/clickfrom/generic/adtrack.asp%3FAD%3D225 64%26sku%3D230416859%26WS%3D2&usg=__N9dGG0vHiu sXxI07IJzWlbkL214=&h=298&w=298&sz=12&hl=en&sta rt=16&um=1&tbnid=KA8wk6P-9q1MzM:&tbnh=116&tbnw =116&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dlimescale%2Bfree%2Bket tles%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%2 6channel%3Ds%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:officia l%26sa%3DN

[Ice.Maiden]

Nope - often pop onto here, along with science, history, B & S, A & N, F & D, shopping..whatever. Lost track with cb at the moment though - been yakking on MSN! : )

[McMouse]

My 10 year old hob kettle gets limescale which I remove every couple of months or so with limescale remover. I also have a removeable wire thingy which collects the scale and is easily rinsed clean.

[ruthann58]

i boil mine up once a week wtih a good squirt of lemon juice in the water as i hate the smell of vinagar

[CSG2306]

Hi all,

My remedy is: stainless steel kettle with concealed element, John Lewis �44.

EVERY WEEK place one tea spoonfull of Citric Acid from Boots or any other chemist into the kettle and bring to NEARLY boiling point and leave for 15 minutes. If you let it boil it will spill out of the spout.

If your kettle is bad with scale then you will have to repeat the process using more Citric Acid. However once it is clean then it is so easy to keep it clean.

Be aware of other acids as they can discolour your kettle if not handled properly, Citric Acid is quite save to use.

Regards

Drew

[quicksquid]

Its just really important to clean it monthly, Stop the build up, stop the problem.

http://www.squidoo.com/descaleakettle