So I’ve had this piece for several months… I can never get it 100% clean anymore. Not exactly sure when the stains appeared, I use to be able to get it perfect with Everclear and salt, fuck I didn’t even need salt. It was just a residue colored haze, but after an incident in which way too fine of charcoal was introduced (cosmetics grade fine. Just dust lol) into the water and it stained those spots black, making them look worse!
I’ve tried water, oil, ethanol all hot and cold with and without salt (finally ran out).
Don’t know if the pictures do it justice, would help if I dried it probably. But that bong is never dry; dig? This is fresh off a hot water rinse, followed by Everclear heated up by the latent heat, and then cold water run through before filling.
Yeah, the pics didn’t come out great… fucking hate photographing glass. You see it most in the ash catcher, which get a bit of black ash and crap normally but that all comes out in the water rinse, if not then definitely alcohol. It doesn’t effect the taste and the glass is NEARLY spotless otherwise, just kind of pisses me off. I love a nice clean bong, full of ice, glistening from every angle… sorry. I like my lab glass.
this days ago I used the glass part of my arizer air solo for a use as a pipe and I couldn’t clean it with the pure ethanol that I use to make RSO but with the isopropyl alcohol it cleaned easily.
put some 91% alcohol inside of the piece, then put it inside of a microwave, let the alcohol boil then stop the microwave, then repeat as needed. Boiling it like that with just plain water works well too. Also ZEP Purple degreaser works great. Good old fashioned vegetable oil is good at getting sludge off as well
yeah that’s big - maybe get a rubber stopper that fits the top part, fill with alcohol and lay it on it’s side and then microwave? Zep purple degreaser is amazing stuff and as long as you rinse it well it’s ok to use on glass.
We don’t microwave so we have a pretty small one; but I’ve had luck giving hot water baths. Gets plenty hot with tap water, but I can always try and heat it on my electric burner. I have yet to invest in the proper supplies to really clean: brushes, caps, maybe even a bigger microwave lol.
Yeah, I went through a microwave transformer phase. No survivors, lol.
Also, shit: just realized my piece has some metallic coating enameled on with the decals. So no microwave, but maybe a big metal bucket in the bathtub for a how water bath. Not gonna boil maybe but still.
Oh, but if I induced ultrasonic air bubbles at the location. I can fill it with water easily, hard part is imparting the vibration onto the piece without hammering it.
Well the cleaner buzzes at like 40k hertz. I know they do make ultrasonic probes, but you’d have to be pretty careful about not breaking the glass. Also you still have to use a solvent like isopropyl or everclear.
In retrospect, I’d basically just have to build a DIY custom size ultrasonic cleaner. This Old Tony (YouTube) did a related thing to a prob but I wouldn’t trust power that aggressive with anything other than liquid.
Warm ISO and rock salt will set you straight. I like to heat my ISO in an old coffee mug on a coffee mug warmer. You might need to cover the mug with a saucer so the alcohol doesn’t evaporate while warming up.
