Old toothbrushes

zieak ♦ April 27, 2007 ♦ Leave Your Comment

I replace my toothbrush as needed but i don’t discard them. There are scores of uses for them and here are a few that i use and a few that i have found suggested online.

I keep one old toothbrush in my toolbox with the markers, pencils, magnetic wand, and other fine tools. I have used it to remove a small amount of paint with a little thinner or to clean rusty bolts with some CLR. I keep another with my plumbing supplies to slather flux paste on copper pipe before soldering.

One seems to always end up under the kitchen sink and i have used it to scrub the threads of my water bottles or other cleaning in hard places to reach with a sponge. I have not tried it but now that i’m thinking of it i bet it would work great to clean the tiny holes in my garlic press or cheese grater. (One suggestion was to use an old toothbrush to polish between the tines of silver forks but since i have never polished silverware i doubt i’ll ever use the kitchen one that way.)

Another is under the bathroom sink or in one of the drawers. I hope i never mistakenly end up using it because i scrubbed a seam of the shower enclosure with it when i was replacing the shower door. If we ever put highlights in my hair at home using an old toothbrush would apply the bleach better than the brush that comes with the kit.

I think i’ll put one in the laundry room for scrubbing spots with Spray and Wash instead of using my fingers.

One would be great for spot cleaning a pair of shoes to get mud off or to clean the tread of some dog poo. Naturally this would be that toothbrush’s last duty before being discarded.

For a crafty use they can be used as a rudimentary paintbrush or some can be boiled in water and then bent to form bracelets.