Newbie here :) what do you suggest to clean my bottles?

I find my treasure under water, usually filled with muck! One time it was filled with a crayfish! Haha. I am wondering what's the best ways to clean them? My mom and I have found about 200 or so. I usually use a bottle brush and then eventually run it through the dishwasher but I'm wondering is there a secret to making them look new again?
Thanks! Amy

Hi Amy, welcome to the forums. Your cleaning method is about standard except I caution you about putting them in the dishwasher. That could damage them. There is adequate information in these forums archives but I don't have the expertise to bring them forward. Perhaps others will. Basically I suggest water rinse, soak for 24 hours or more in an Oxalic Acid solution (properly mixed) and then a clear water & brush rinse. Make sure temperatures of everything is close. I also carefully use various size wire and green scrubber pads. Jim

Although (at least here) Lime Away has risen in price, it and bleach (not mixed) do an alright job of cleaning bottles once you get the muck out (I've never tried it on the outside of an ACL.) I use plastic-bristle scrub-brushes to scrub on Non-ACL bottles (see pic of ACL bottles) and an old, soft-bristle toothbrush on ACL bottles after letting the ACL (if found outside) dry for 2 months. You have the brushes to do the interior. For a better job of cleaning inside, I use stiff wires wrapped in paper-towel (don't let metal contact glass) that I can bend to shape for cleaning even the upper shoulders of a bottle and any corners. I myself started out finding bottles in the lake. Show pics, but some bottles are worth "tumbling." The thing I don't like about that is that it can lead to broken bottles or faint embossing, and it removes the surface-layers of glass-- so what the people touched decades ago is not what you're touching.On the upside of tumbling, see the second photo to see what wonders it can do to a bottle that just won't come clean due to the white hazy "sickness." Jim mentions temperature because you want the water temperature to match that of the temperature of the air they had just been in-- I've never experienced it in that form, but others have had their bottles crack because of sudden temperature-differences from air-to-water and indoor-to-outdoor moves. I also tried the dishwasher, but it does nothing for me. Acids, as I'm sure you know, can be a severe danger-- I didn't know enough on them when I first got to experimenting with acids and bottles, and I had a few experimental bottles full of acid/water explode before me. ACL (Applied Colored Label, also called Painted-Label/pyroglazed. These were baked on See the Squirt bottle? Do you see how the upper neck is clear-green, but beneath it it's all creamy-green? That's sick and stained on the inside. I've used acids without luck. I've scraped without luck. I've Lime Awayed it without luck. It's gonna stay that way like the left bottle in the blue word above (click blue words on here.) The problem with ACLs is that you cannot really tumble them. LOL. A bottle that had been stained white with sickness and what I call "mineralization" due to being in the ground/lake-- it's now "tumbled" professionally and really shines: We're looking forward to seeing your finds, and we wish you great luck! Have fun here and in the lake-- today would be a great one to be in the water here. Also: Welcome to the forum!

Wow, thanks for all the help! I think in the last 2 days I found about a hundred in the lake. I automatically put all twist caps in recycling. I've got some milk bottles, mainly soda (lots of older coca cola and Pepsi), today a Piccadilly club London gin (neat crackled bottle, Hines (root beer) lots of mineral waters and an old porcelain baby doll with no head! LOL. Never know what kind of treasures I'll find. I'd post pics but the camera on my phone is not working for some reason. Here's a pic from last year after some time hunting. Didn't sort or throw out any yet so nothing spectacular. Sure is fun though
P.s. Found a lilac glass bottle yesterday. Beautiful!

Not all screw-caps are worthless. We'll be awaiting your discoveries. If you can get onto a computer...1. Upload your photos using a USB cord2. Go to Microsoft Paint3. Go to File, click Open, select a photo4. Go to Image, click Resize/Skew...5. Change Horizontal and Vertical from 100 to 206. Save photo7. Click on here and, in the upper left of your text-box, click (Open Full Version)8. Upper right shows a picture-icon with grass, sky, sun, tree. Click it and9. Click From Gallery Upload10. Select a photo OR 1. Upload an image onto something that will give you a URL2. Click the Photo Icon3. Click Image URL4. Paste URL in and hit Insert ^ Two ways we usually upload photos. ^

Thank you for your help. Uploadings not the problem though. I actually fell in the lake with my new iPhone ????. Everything works except the camera so I can't take pictures at the moment. Honestly we have so many and I wish I knew a way to sort what to throw out.

My cousin actually found a soda bottle with a round bottom like a light bulb! Finding these treasures are great. Storing and cleaning them on the other hand is pretty time consuming...

Hello Amy, and welcome to the forums. A really good way to get the insides of bottles clean is to use aquarium sand and bartenders friend, available n hardware stores, sand in pet shops put a little friend powder into a bottle tspn and fill the bottle a quarter of the way up with sand and shaka shaka shaka for awhile, you will be surpriaed at what this will remove.......Andy

I know a girl who put her phone in the washing machine.I don't own a phone. (Hard to use when you have paws. []) If it is unembossed like the bottle at left here and is a crown-top, it's likely worthless except as art. This is a blob-top (click blue words.)If they look like this, you might have a $10+ bottle as long as it has the druggist name. Bottles like these.... Well, that colored one is a $150 bottle. Each of these is a $5 bottle.A bottle that is just shoulder-embossed like this isn't worth much either-- usually nothing unless it has a picture on it. Flasks that aren't screw-top, even when unembossed, can be collectible. I have a few embossed screw-tops that hold a few dollars of value. Milks like these are always collectible. Inks are good when embossed or pre-1900.Something weird like this will always generate interest. Was the one your cousin found something like this? Clean, dry, catalog and organize your bottles into boxes based on company, type, &c. till you figure out what to do with them.

Thank you! So many helpful people! Love the idea of the sand and soap. I have a baby bottle brush but doesn't reach corners etc.
yes the one my cousin found was very similar to that. ill see if I can borrow a camera to take pics. I'd say I have about 3-400 left that I haven't recycled. (We always just put screw caps and broken bottles in recyclables)

If it has the blob top to it, it's likely pre-1930s and even more likely earlier. Most are imported from England, and they made blob bottles into the 1930s.