Browny/yellow stains on grout

[Katade]

I have recently had a new white bathroom suite fitted. After about 6 months, a nasty light brown stain has appeared between the grout in the shower cubical and the sink and also in the shower tray. It will clean off using very harsh cleaners, but it keeps coming back.

Does anybody know what is causing it and how to stop it happening?

I live in a hard water area, but I have spent the last 2 hours searching the web regarding this problem and none of the sites state its a hard water problem.

 

[TexMex]

I believe this is caused by a combination of soap and limescale. We used to get it but since I retiled the bathroom, we have been using a spray, which prevents it happening.

I can't remember the name of it, and I'm not at home at the moment so I can't look at the bottle. You'll find it down the cleaning products isle in the supermarket.

It seems to work and only costs about 37p a bottle (in ASDA).

It could, of course be, that our new tiles (been up a couple of years now) are not subject to this, and we've been wasting our money. Just havn't wanted to temp fate to find out.

 

[AdamW]

I noticed my mum keeps a spray with a solution of water and vinegar in my parents' shower room. Perhaps this does the same trick as the limescale preventer.

Either that or she had just been cleaning the glass!!!

 

[2scoops0406]

I had a great "designer" solution to this problem, never grout with white grout!! Our family bathroom is tiled on the floor with white tiles and dark grey grout, seems to work asetically, and doesn't discolour. BTW the spell checker on this site suggested discolor instead of discolour

 

[2scoops0406]

On a more practical note, you can just use bleach brushed in with a toothbrush. I'd recommend an old toothbrush though !!

 

[ljdottir]

I don't know if that 'How Clean Is Your House' programme has a website but they had several remedies for bathroom cleaners using simple household items - they recommend white vinegar for almost everything! I think it was white vinegar and bicarbonate of soda mixed to a paste for whitening grout...

Tieing a small plastic bag full of white vinegar to taps, or leaving it in your shower tray gets limescale off...

There are lots of books and resources online recommending natural cleaning alternatives. I'm going to find some as I'm prone to eczema and I hate using harsh cleaners or bleaches.