How Automatic Glasswashers and Automatic Dishmachines Affect Glassware

Automatic glasswashers and automatic dishwashers have a distinctly different impact on glasses than a three-sink system. While issues of food flavor contamination can still occur with an improperly used three-sink system, soft water, hard water and scale can all occur to glasses washed in an automatic glasswasher or dishmachine.

Effects of Soft Water, Hard Water and Scale on Glass

Soft and hard water can both affect your glasses. Soft water etches glasses. Etching is a permanent chemical alteration of the glass surface. Etched glasses appear cloudy or hazy. Glassware is comprised of what is known as "soda-lime" glass. The major ingredients are sand, soda ash and lime. When etching occurs, the metal ions are removed from the glass surface, leaving the silica exposed. Natural or artificially softened water promotes the etching process. Soft water tends to dissolve more of the metal ions faster than hard water. Because of this, the exposed silica will appear sooner.

Once etched, there is no practical method of restoring the glassware to its original condition. There are, however, ways to avoid, or at least greatly slow the process of etching. Proper wash temperatures are important. Wash temperatures above 150° F. will accelerate etching. At 160° F., substantial damage can occur. Very little surface damage should be noted at temperatures up to 140° F. Detergent concentration should be kept within the manufacturers' recommended range. Too low a concentration can result in incomplete removal of food soil from the glass surface. In those instances where small amounts of soil are left on the surface, a physical phenomena known as occlusion can take place. Occlusion means that chemicals used in the washing process may be held by the soil and, therefore, remain in contact with the glass for long periods of time. That can be a factor in etching problems.

Hard water presents different problems, these being hard water stains and scale. Hard water can cause filming on glassware, due to the presence of calcium or magnesium ions. These types of film, however, are readily removed through acid treatment of the glassware. This website offers three different kinds of hard water removers, "Dry It H.D.", "Dry It Plus" and "Power Detergent" . Scale is a similar problem. Scale is a hard mineral coating that forms on the inside surface of boilers, kettles, and other containers in which water is repeatedly heated. Scale is relatively simple to remove, in comparison to hard and soft water stains.

Automatic Glasswashers and Dishmachines

All of these chemical products must be used with an automatic glasswasher or an automatic dishwasher . The glasswashers sold through this website are undercounter models, and better suited for lower-volume food service operations, and especially for behind bars; these glasswashers are like a conveyer dishwasher specifically designed for glassware. Automatic dishwashers come in three varieties: conveyer, single-rack and undercounter. conveyer dishwashers are the largest, and function by moving racks of dishware in either a left to right or right to left manner, through three or four cleaning cycles. This kind of dishmachine can typically handle well over 200 racks of dishware an hour, and use less than 1 gallon of water on each wash cycle. The single-rack dishmachines wash dishware one rack at a time on a 1-minute wash cycle, and only use 3/4 of a gallon of water per wash. There are also adaptors that convert straight, single-rack dishmachines into corner models, in the event that a corner location is the only/best place available for your dishmachine. Undercounter dishmachines are an out-of-the-way solution to sanitizing your dishware, always less than three feet tall, and can clean up to 30 racks of dishware an hour. These dishmachines use 1.2 gallons of water per wash cycle.

A few other problems you may encounter when washing glassware have been addressed in this article. You can also find out about how a three-sink system of glass washing could be right for you in this article.

The factual material in this article was taken from this resource: http://www.chefsfirst.com/Content/Articles/Tabletop/Why_glasses_sometime.asp