When you have a water ionizer you may find that you occasionally need to clean hard water calcium off of your glasses, bottles and pitchers. The reason is that ionized water has a greater concentration of calcium than whatever is in your source water.

Calcium and Your Health

Calcium is a fantastically healthy, alkaline mineral. Ionizing water makes the calcium in it even healthier for your cells. Ionization not only increases the concentration of calcium, but it also gives it a negative charge, which makes it bio-available for your cells.

Calcium and Scaling

On the down-side of calcium, it is crystalline-shaped and tends to stick to the surfaces of containers it is stored in. What this does is it leaves a whitish film on the containers you use, which is typically very hard to clean [especially if you don’t know the trick I’m about to teach you].

Here’s an example. I have a couple of pitchers that had quite a bit of scaling on them. I use these pitchers to pour ionized water into, like an intermediate vessel to pour ionized water into prior to filling up my bottles. I do this as a time-saving measure. The problem is that they get scaling on them regularly.

Trick to Clean Hard Water Calcium off of Glasses, Bottles & Pitchers

There is a simple trick that I use to clean hard water calcium. The way I do it is also very cost-effective. I use a gallon jug of vinegar that I dedicate as my “soaking vinegar”. I’ll fill glasses, bottles and/or pitchers with vinegar and in about 2 hours or so I’ll pour the vinegar back into the jug [for later re-use]. The calcium is now softened up and the glass, bottle or pitcher is ready to clean hard water calcium off of it.

Here’s a video that I made to demonstrate cleaning calcium off of my pitchers.

Why Does Vinegar Work to Clean Hard Water Calcium Scaling?

Vinegar works because it’s very, very acidic. The acidity literally breaks up and dissolves the calcium film. It’s not so acidic as to harm the container [plastic, glass, etc.] though, so all it does is loosen up the calcium so it can be easily washed off.

The gallon jug of vinegar I use cost me less than $5.00 and I will be able to use and re-use it for a long time [at least  many months] before I would need to replace it. Bacteria won’t grow in vinegar, so it’s safe for re-use, and can be usually just stored in room temperature.