building new house: Drain grooves in counter next to undermount sink

[Roger Feeley]

It seemed like a good idea to me but the counter people say they can't do it and that no one wants it.

332441

Is this a dumb idea? This is a very small house (in-law quarters) and I will be doing dishes by hand. I argued hard for no dishwasher because I never liked them. I would like someplace to drain dishes before I dry them. If I don't do this, I will probably get some sort of drain board.

[roger wiegand]

A drain board is easier to pick up and dump into the sink and to clean. I think you might come to regret having to clean those grooves. Being able to move the drainboard and have a flat counter might be nice.

We installed a fairly big double bowl sink and drain the dishes in one side in a custom fit rack, but have the sink available when we need it.

[mike holden]

Anything can be done, for a price. However, think about the drain water curling over the edge and down next the sink/countertop interface making a fine soup for growing bacteria, mold, and other creepy-crawlies. I dont like undermount sinks for that reason, and your drain would just make it worse.
What is the countertop material? I have corian because I can have sinks seamless with the top - no edge to trap grit and grime.
Just my preferences, Mike

[Jim Becker]

The folks who did our soapstone counters did this on-site quite easily. They just used a tapered template with the PC7518 router and a round-nose bit. While "dishes" get washed in the dishwasher, there are still things that get hand-washed and even if they are toweled dry, they need a place to sit just after washing and before the towel can be wielded, especially if one person is doing the deed.

[Bob Vavricka]

Roger, Check out a Blanco Silgranit Precis kitchen sink. Link here (http://www.blanco-germany.com/en_us/en_us/sinks/product_catalog/overview_all.html?pid=1269500751120)
We bought one with 1 and 3/4 bowls with an attached drain board. It came with a stainless steel drain rack, stainless steel bowl racks (which we don't use) a cutting board that fits over the drain board or anywhere along the sinks (it sits on the granite) and a colander that hangs on the lip of either sink. It has been easy to care for and we love it. They make one with a single bowl also. I had sufficient room to put a drawer under the drain board and our pull out trash bins sit under the drawer.

[Roger Feeley]

I'm the guy that washes dishes around our house and always have been. Even when we had a dishwasher, I didn't really make it work much.

-- Anything we only have one of, I wash immediately by hand. I'm a 'clean as you cook' kind of guy so there is never a sink full of dishes.
-- Our dishwasher did a lousy job of cleaning so I remove all visible stuff from the dishes before they go in. I've never seen a dishwasher that actually cleans dishes.
-- Our dishwasher did a lousy job of drying dishes so I always have a towel to hand dry them when they come out. Mostly water in the bottoms of cups and things but I see a lot of drops in pans too. Again, this is the norm in my experience.

So my general dislike for dishwashers has led me to take the final step and just not have one this time around. Add to that that this kitchen will be very small and the dishwasher would have consumed a third of our under-counter general storage. This was and easy decision for me.

[Roger Feeley]

Thanks. I found something similar in stainless and the boss didn't like it. I sent her your link and she likes it better.

[Jim Becker]

I'm also a 'clean as I cook' home "chef" and it makes sense to me to work that way. Unfortunately, other family members are, um...different... ;)

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

Will you be preparing food on that counter? The house we moved into has tile counters with deep grooves. It is a nightmare to clean up food crumbs or food juices. When you wipe a sponge or cloth across the counter the crumbs fall into the grooves. When you wipe liquids or sauces, the grooves will act as a scraper as you run the cloth across it. You then have to wipe into the grooves to get the gunk out of the grooves.

I'm not much of a cook, but I too clean as I cook. I blame it on my high school teacher during the basic cooking portion of Home Ec. We had to clean as we cooked so the class was clean for the next round of students. She really drilled it into us to clean as we went along! The LOML did not have that type of class in school and it's quite obvious we have different cooking styles!

[Brian Elfert]

If you are getting Corian or other acrylic countertop why not make yourself a drain board that can be set on the counter? This might be better as it won't be permanent. You could get the cutout for the sink and use your router to make a drain board.

I choose not to have a dishwasher for now and I just wash all my dishes by hand.

[Ken Combs]

I used to do Swanstone fab and install. Drainboard grooves were common and not really hard to do. Just fab up a taper jig to run the router. It's just straight lines that change depth along the length. With the integral sink/countertop the nasty breeding place that might happen with stone didn't exist.

But, If doing stone one could allow more overhang on the drain end cut a groove in the bottom of the countertop. That would prevent water from flowing over the end and back to the juncture of of the sink/top.

[Brian Ashton]

It seemed like a good idea to me but the counter people say they can't do it and that no one wants it.

332441

Is this a dumb idea? This is a very small house (in-law quarters) and I will be doing dishes by hand. I argued hard for no dishwasher because I never liked them. I would like someplace to drain dishes before I dry them. If I don't do this, I will probably get some sort of drain board.

If I'm seeing correctly in that picture that's a real stone top. Therefore it's not that easy to do those groves. Don't think you can just pull out a router with a round nose bit and tack a template on the top and burn them out. I suspect they would need some sort of over head router that is equiped with specialized diamond bits to do that - which most stone top shops won't have.

[Jim Becker]

Brian, you are correct if that's actually stone (the exception being soapstone like I have but that's not soapstone for sure). The material in the photo actually looks like Corian or similar to me, however. The technique would be the same regardless of the material, but for "stone-stone", the cutting tool would be specialized.

[Frank Drew]

The folks who did our soapstone counters did this on-site quite easily. They just used a tapered template with the PC7518 router and a round-nose bit. While "dishes" get washed in the dishwasher, there are still things that get hand-washed and even if they are toweled dry, they need a place to sit just after washing and before the towel can be wielded, especially if one person is doing the deed.

I agree with Jim that these are a great idea and aren't at all hard to clean (fine sanding after routing can leave the grooves all nice and slick. The taper jig that increases the depth of the grooves as they approach the sink is essential, of course.

Years ago, Fine Homebuilding had a photo article about doing this onsite; I think the countertop was Corian; I suppose the difficulty routing the grooves depends on the material, but even with stone, any skilled fabricator should be able to do this fairly easily -- look at all the other decorative work they do with stone.

[Frank Drew]

The grooves are most usefully wide-ish, like 1/2" - 3/4". Narrow ones could be a p.i.a.

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

I took a better look at the photo above. I thought they were 1/4" grooves at first. I agree with Frank. 1/2" - 3/4" grooves would be very useful. Look at the old farmhouse kitchen sinks that had drainboards along the sides. Those made clean-up very easy.

[Jim Becker]

The tapered grooves in our soapstone counter drainboard area were done with a 1/2" round nose bit. Very easy to wipe out.

[Curt Harms]

Any acrylic type counter material would be pretty easy to put slots into. My only thought was that if the 'deep' end of the slot was very deep there wouldn't be a lot of material left as the sheets are typically 1/2" thick. You could put a 'doubler' under where the slots are but you'd need to account for that in the support structure. It's a shame that one of the manufacturers of solid surface materials won't sell retail with no warranty. The stuff is pretty easy to work with and IMO is a great kitchen/bath material, sanitary and easy to keep clean.

[Roger Feeley]

Thanks to all for the good information. I think we may go with an undermound sink with a drainer like what Bob suggested. The boss hated the stainless one I found but thought the soapstone or granite versions were better. I gave her three options:
1. grooves in counter
2. Undermount sink with drain shelf
3. some sort of drainer on the counter.