Hi Chaps and Chapesses, The window fitters jumped onto the kitchen worktop and dented the stainless steel draining board quite badly. They came today to change the sink as it was not possible to panel beat it from the underneath to get the large dent out. As the old sink lifted off there was a horrible cracking sound and I can see that about 3cms from the edge, the gloss laminate surface of the worktop has cracked, not visibly as such, but if you run your finger over it you can feel it has gone through as the two sides of the crack are uneven and water will ingress and swell the chipboard now. Is there anything to smudge over it to waterproof it although that will probably look awful? Or is it possible to apply heat to melt the crack together? If so, what with? I have a jeweller's soldering iron but that may destroy it. Any ideas gratefully received. Thanks and kind regards, Rosie
Get them to fix their destruction. I guess others will be along in a minute or so to say "If they don't fix it, tell them that if it does not get fixed soon, you will get someone else to fix it, and recover your costs via an action in the county court" (i.e. what is called a "small claim" or fast track action). Take photographs now to retain and send to the responsible firm.
The laminate surface is made up of several layers of coloured craft paper bonded together with various types of resin to form a heat resistant surface. Trying to weld a crack in a laminate surface back together, with heat, is simply not possible. If the crack you describe is not visible on the top surface, there isn’t much you can do to cosmetically repair it, as there is no gap for a repair filler or compound to fill. That said, you could try a product called Unika Colorfill which is available in many colours to match most worktops, and apply that to the damaged area in case there are hairline cracks you can’t see.
If the laminate has lifted and cracked enough that you can feel it, there is no repair that can be done to a laminated worktop and even more so a high gloss polyester worktop. If left as it is and being so near to the sink, it's only a matter of time before it "blows" (weeks maybe, but certainly within a month or two). The only option really is to replace the worktop. Had the sink been removed by a competent kitchen fitter, it may well not have damaged the worktop at all. Obviously your window fitting company didn't want to pay a kitchen fitter to do the job.
Thanks for the advice. It is annoying as all the rest is fine, just one small section, but in a very inconvenient place. I cannot bear the disruption for the worktop to be replaced as it has three sides and the kitchen was only just finished a few months ago. So will have a crack (ho ho) with a bit of black colourfill to see if it can be unobtrusively smoothed over somehow and failing that, get some kind of silicon mat to cover it to prolong the life for now. With thanks.
Thanks. I will not creme brulee torch it then!!! I thought it might be possible to T cut it somehow, but will have a go with the Colourfill. Many thanks for responding.
Not really properly fixable it seems. Every trade that has come through the door has bust something that a previous trade has done. It is very annoying. But wholesale replacement is not an option for me, it is too disruptive for now, the refurb took 9 months because of Covid and other delays and I can't live with any more building work now. With thanks.
Colourfill won't work i'm afraid. It isn't even waterproof when you have a very clear joint point and you have none in your case. Although you don't wont the disruption now, when it does "blow" (in weeks or a month or so) you will have to put up with the disruption at that point. The difference is, at that point the double glazing company won't pay for it to be done, because you would have accepted it now. One way or another, it will have to be replaced. Get them to pay for it to be replaced now, or accept that you will have to pay for it to be replaced latter on.
Replacing the sink with another one 3cm bigger front to back just is not an option. The vast majority of sink cutouts are about 480mm to 500mm front to back at most and in fact most are about 480mm. Even if one 30mm deeper was available, it would almost certainly need the top rail of the base unit removed and may well even stop the base doors from closing.
Hi Mate the op didn't state where the 30cm was cracked from, just said it was edge which without pictures could be front back or side edge, they didn't state if the sink was standard size or small, having fitted 100's of sinks over 30 years as a fitter I've fitted some small ones in utility areas, screw fix do a small one at 430 deep so they are not all 480-500 deep, if the crack was on the side edge it might be possible to get a bigger sink and absorb the the crack in the cutout, hence the reason i said maybe