southern Maine diver
Posts: 1436
Joined: 8/13/2005 From: South Berwick, Maine USA Status: offline
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Hi Rhona... I've been using the muriatic acid solution (soup as I call it) for about 5 years now and I have never had a problem with the solution freezing. I've used both a 50/50 solution and a "straight up" solution for really hard calcified growth. No freezing problems with either. I keep the "soup" outside in a five gallon bucket with a tight lid on it. One thing you must remember is the temperature differential. You use the acid outside, so the temperature of your solution becomes the same as the outside air temperature. If you take a bottle out and bring it into a warm interior and run it under room temperature water...Crack!!!!     Before I take the bottle out of the "soup" in the winter, I bring out another bucket of cold, fresh water and let it cool down to near freezing. I remove the cleaned bottle from the acid solution and immerse it into the cold, fresh water and rinse all the debris and residual acid off the bottle. Then I wrap the bottle in an old towel and bring it inside and set it in cool place (cellar or mud room) and let it warm up gradually to room temperature. Then (and only then) do I bring it inside the warm kitchen and give it another rinse or additional cleaning with bottle brushes in the sink using cold running water. I would try your acid solution and cleaning methods on some common bottles first and when you become comfortable with it, then use it on your high quality "keepers". Nice chattin with you, Rhona. Wayne
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