Clean Your Glass An Iso/Salt Picture Tutorial

Discussion in 'Smoking Accessories Q&A' started by Calmes, Dec 9, 2014.

  1. http://imgur.com/a/HEHl4
     
    Teaching you how to clean your glassware! This procedure will take 3-20 minutes depending on the amount of glass, how long it's last been since you cleaned, and knowing what you're doing.

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    To clean you need to gather a few cheap supplies: A source of water, isopropyl alcohol (higher %=much easier cleaning,) an abrasive (in order of effectiveness, epsom salt, table salt, and rice work) and a poke (paperclip, small flathead, etc.) (Supplies 1/2)
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    Optional supplies: funnel will make filling your glass with salt/iso easier, latex gloves will make sure your hands don't smell like bong bowls for the next week, plastic bag you empty iso into so your sink doesn't smell like bong bowls for the next week. (Supplies 2/2)
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    Start with your largest glass. Fill up percs halfway the normal water level with enough salt to reasonably coat the entire surface. Shake for 1-4 minutes, you're done when you don't see any resin stuck to glass. (Pipes 1/2)
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    Recycle the half-used iso/salt by pouring everything you can into your next largest glass piece. Wash out all iso/salt until your glass is sparkling, making sure to give the outside of the glass a rinse too! (Pipes 2/2)
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    You will notice a startling change in the color as the iso absorbs more resin as you get down the chain of glass piece sizes, until the mix looks almost black, it can still clean more. If it does start to look too disgusting, pour out the mix and refill with new iso/salt.
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    Bowls need special tricks to clean; they contain the most unfiltered resin! This is the poke (paperclip) comes in handy. Place your thumb over one side of the bowl and fill it halfway with iso/salt. Cover both ends with your fingers and shake it for half a minute, then empty. This soaks the bowl so you can use the pick. (Bowl 1/2)
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    Use the pick to physically loosen the remaining resin. Don't push hard enough to scratch your glass (unless youdgaf!) Wash out the loosened resin with iso/salt. Look for remaining resin, use the pick, wash it out with iso/salt. When it's clean, wash it inside and out with water! (Bowl 2/2)
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    Grinders sometimes get really gunked up with compressed plant matter (the squeak they can get is annoying.) You can throw the parts you want cleaned into that iso/salt mix in a baggie and use the pick to loosen the plant matter once it's soaked. It's harder to loosen than bowl resin. Wash it out thoroughly with water.
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    So why clean your piece? It costs money, it takes time, and it involves effort. However, you're paying a decent amount for bud, and this is about enhancing the glass experience you paid for and you took time and effort to get to, it takes some more of all three to enhance it. (Discussion 1/3)
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    When you smoke out of a clean piece, the smoke is transformed. A good comparison is how food would taste if you ate off of dirty dishes. The smoke tastes/feels like it's supposed to, not intertwined with the resin of bowls past and day-old bong water. (Discussion 2/3)
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    Cleaning glass also makes it more presentable for social smoking. Smoking with even veteran smokers, clean glass elicits a positive reaction. (Discussion 3/3) This tutorial is to empower people to be able to do something when their piece gets dirtier than they want, how dirty is up to you!
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  2. Nice guide man. Can't wait to see people breeze over this and start a new thread asking how
     
  3. Wicked guide!
     
  4. Its a pretty good guide.
     
    Ive often wondered lately though...
     
    do you think maybe the salt could potentially leave small scratches on the glass surface from all the violent shaking?
    possible?
     
    that could also depend on the type of glass i guess too. 
    but just a thought.
    i try not to use salt anymore though. it does the same thing without it. i just let my pieces soak for a day or two before i rinse them out.
    idk
     
  5. Yes. If youre worried about scratching glass dont use this method on high end pieces.

    Simple green works better, is endlessly reusable and cheaper than all the above combined. Ive been using the same bottle to clean my glass a few times a week for many years, after abandoning this method above.

    Good guide though!

    Epsom salt is good for organics (magnesium) :)
     
  6. Salt won't scratch glass, especially high end pieces. 
     
    Cheers!
     
    Nice guide, been cleaning my glass this way forever, except I use sea salt not epsom salt.
     
  7. I've never had salt scratch my glass, personally, but I've only been toking since 2009 or 2010.. I just use basic table salt and 91% ISO alcohol. Warm up the pipe and alcohol and try it to loosen up harder to remove chunks of residue. 
     
  8. eh.
     
    better safe than sorry.
    im gonna get some of that simple green shit. sounds like its economically good too. i get tired of buying iso. especialy since i use 2 bongs, a bubbler and 2 spoons. shit gets expensive.
     
    ive also heard pure acetone works well too. of course ive never tried it. i hate that shit haha
     
  9. Absolutely no. Acetone leaves residue. I've tried it before and ended up trashing the glass piece I used it on. Ugh. Never tasted the same again when I hit out of it.
     
  10. #10 phunk doc, Dec 9, 2014
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 9, 2014
    excellent guide!
    although i primarily use the simple green soak method mainly because its easy for me to throw a piece to soak at night, wake up, rinse and i have a clean piece, i still use the iso/salt when i need to clean somethin on the spot then and there. just gotta be careful, broken way too much glass with shake and bake method.
     
  11. Acetone works, but simple green works best.


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  12. Good guide, but as others have said higher end pieces can get scratched up by the salt( experience sadly). Simple green is reusable almost eternally, an a good soak and the piece is like new.


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  13. I went from salt/iso to acetone to simple green fwiw.

    Acetone is terribly toxic, erodes plastic (so dont put it down your drain) and highly flammable even 15-20 feet away, if you do use it, use it outdoor on concrete in the open, away from a flame, in a glass bowl (remember, it eats plastic)

    Wear gloves, it will eat your hands up and dry them out. It also evaporates fairly quckly, which is the only upside to it imo.
     
  14. simply green is better imo because you dont have to shake, just soak it over night and wash it out and your good to go
     
  15. I use orange chronic, my gf bought it for me with my bong :)
     
    Works better than ISO + salt, I've been reusing it as well. It's more grey than orange now but it still works :confused_2:
     
  16. Salt will etch the glass. It may be more of an over time issue though(ex: Erosion). I personally only use salt as an agitator when iso isn't up to the task on it's own. If you keep your pieces clean, you don't really need salt all that often. 
     
  17. Sticky


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  18. Warm up your ISO and skip the salt

    Rinse with distilled water only


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  19. i have a few additional suggestions :) 
    i tried this one day when i was out of epsom and needed to clean my pieces and it actually worked, so if your worried about salt etching (which i have experienced with past pieces) then try cream of wheat.... I know sounds so weird but i swear it got all of the resin off faster then salt would. Also i use qtips and iso to clean bowl pieces because i have broken way to many, lol :p what i do with dry pieces is take a ceramic baking dish and arrange all in there and pour alcohol over everthing, (cover it with plastc or something, ugh ew)  then clean the bongs and after that just a swipe with a qtip and a rinse with water and they look good as new. one more thing is you can reuse iso as many times as you want, yeah it looks gross but your pieces get just as clean i promise. 
     
  20. Sticky for sure so we don't get this question every week.


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