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Thank you, from a chick here who used a whole jar of white spirit, made an awful mess , and still a messy brush. Will now head to the shed to reclean my brush 😂

Great tip. However, you can save yourself loads of time doing it the way I've been doing it for decades. Just put plenty of white spirits in an old mug, wash your brush in it, wipe it off with paper of a rag, and pour spirits into a jam jar with lid. The jar stores nicely in the mug ready for next time. After a while, the paint drops to the bottom and you can then decant spirits into the mug and clean the next brush. This process can go on and on for years until there is so much old paint in the jar. Time for a fresh jar.

My dad was a painter and, when painting with oil-based paint, he used to put his brushes in a tin of water (rather than wrapping in cling film) to prevent them drying while we had a tea break. Then you simply shake off any water clinging to the brush and continue painting.

For your audience outside of the British Isles, Wikipedia tells us that: “White spirit (UK) ... or mineral spirits (US, Canada), also known as mineral turpentine (AU/NZ), turpentine substitute, petroleum spirits, solvent naphtha (petroleum), Varsol, Stoddard solvent, or, generically, "paint thinner", is a petroleum-derived clear liquid used as a common organic solvent in painting.”

Absolutely marvellous tip mate! I’ve been washing my brushes out wrong for years and wasting so much! You have made my weekend! Keep up the videos they are great 👍

Great video and very informative. I'm aged 73 now and thanks to you Charlie,I'm still learning. If I may compliment your technique. I always take my white spirit cleaned brush to the sink and standing the paint brush on end, bristle pointing up, squirt a small amount of dish/washing up liquid onto the open end of brush, then using a hand, grip the top of the bristles and work them round making the liquid penetrate right down to the captive end. You will be amazed at just how much paint, varnish, whatever the medium gets flushed out. Do this a couple of times rinsing well with hot water. Finally I always rinse the brush in clothes softener. The bristles shine and are much softer next time you use. Thanks once again Charlie

Thank you for tip; also, you have a very pleasant way of keeping the viewer engaged.

Great system for paintbrush. I was a little disappointed that you didn't have a super duper filter system for reclaiming the white spirit. But that works quite well enough! Also I wear rubber gloves as white spirit makes my skin rough! The jar with the paint residue can be left inverted on some newspaper and should in its own time fall away, leaving a nearly clean jar.

Wow I'm impressed 🙂 I'm a lady aged 76 and been decorating all my life in my homes' I've always been upset contaminating waste water, never again, better late than never. Thank you 😊

I normally end up throwing away some good brushes, so today I’m going to give your method a try 😊 thank you

Great vid for cleaning and saving paint brush. Reclaiming the white spirit was gob-smacking-ly brilliant!

Brilliant !!! And the tip at the end on how to re-use the white spirit, priceless. Many thanks for making the video.

That bit at the end was like magic. It would really make you think how not to waste.

You absolute STAR. I use so much white spirit cleaning my brushes that I find it more economical to just throw the paintbrush away and buy a new one. THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIP.

Thank you very much for this video; very helpful. And an amazing tip about saving the white spirit for 5 days and then pouring back. I would never have thought of that. Thank you!

Going to try that. If it filters the black paint I will be really impressed. Cleaned some paint brushes yesterday.🤞

Fantastic information. The letting it settle my grandfather showed me that eons ago. Thanks for the vid!

Thank you Charlie, your guidance in this video helped me a lot, now just waiting on those jars of spirit to do their magic and I'll have saved spirit in another 4 days.

Never thought about recycling the spirits..clever that..class video.😊

As a newbie painter I found your two jar method works really well. Just a couple of my own twists. I used old newspaper instead of toilet roll coz it's free and premium paraffin (not the nasty heating stuff) 5ltrs cheap from B&Q as I use it to clean motorbike chain. Brushes came up like new, even one I had left from two days intending to throw away.

Nice one Charlie - saving brushes AND the planet! I'll never have to buy white spirit ever again!

Thanks, that's great for the environment too

I was shown by a retired painter to clean brushes in a similar fashion, but after the first dip in white spirit (the purpose is to just wet the bristles, not to get all the paint out) and then to work in a few drops of washing up liquid and then rinse water. To keep the shape, I wrap the bristles in a piece of kitchen roll, or even a strip of newspaper and fold over at the tip and leave to dry. I too leave the white spirit to separate and salvage the good stuff.

Nice one Charlie, what I like about your video's is that you tend to use tools that most of us have. There are many tutorials about DIY and woodworking, were the presenters have hundreds and sometimes thousands of pounds of tools and equipment.

Great tip to recycle thinner, the only reason I’ve been throwing oil brushes away, the cost vs the thinner!

I've been recycling my white spirit for a while in just that way. It's saves a fortune and I don't have to mess around going to the trouble of disposing of the chemicals safely. Good tip about the bogroll and wire brush.

Used this method when I decorated my house. Loved being about how to recycle the old white spirit. After I had put the old white spirit to separate in a jar the paint solidified not only on the bottom but also around the sides of the jar leaving the white spirit in the middle. Recovered loads but looked weird.

Amazing video. Very helpful and with added bonus of being able to recycle most of the white spirit. Thank you Charlie & Z man.

Terrific video! I have been just throwing away used brushes. Now I know what to do. Thanks!

Great thanks. Love the tip about recycling the white spirit.

So pleased I found your channel . This is a fab tutorial on brush cleaning .

that last tip was great, thanks to you and your viewer :D

Also in order to reclaim your paint thinner straight away instead of trying to sloose it out after letting it set up. Take a coffee filter and rubber band and with a small diameter tall jar or bar glass, push as much of a droop sag as you can down into the glass with the coffee filter as you can without being too low to not stay clear of the area the liquid will occupy, and wrap the rubber band round the filter onto the glass, then just pour it in. The healthy amount of droop sag will impart more weight into the filter helping it thru. When u get to a point where it stops flowing gently agitate scraoe the filter with a plastic spoon more will continue to flow. When you get to where you've poured the entirety of your thinner into the filter and its stopped flowing, carefully unwrap the rubber band off the material taking the loose end of the filter together in your hand closed where you've now got a bulbous sack of liquid in your hand and slowly twist tighter and tighter forcing the liquid thru the filter into the glass being VERY careful not to let the paper rip. After its all wrung thru and into the glass, pull out 1 more new coffee filter, do it once more, (this time it will flow thru it much much faster) And Walla you've now got pristine liquid ready to be poured back into its original container, successfully executing the 'Breaking Bad' extraction method.

As a gentleman said in a comment below I've been cleaning brushes wrong for many years and wasting vasts amount of white spirit thank you for a great video

Brilliant tip . I will be doing it this week . Thank you .

Great tips for me as a beginner, thanks

This is a eye opener for years I just threw the spirts out no more !

Thank you that was so useful I've been throwing out paintbrushes each time because I found it so hard to clean them and didn't know what to do with the white spirit! Now I'll buy better quality ones and reuse them.

Great, Charlie. I envy your thoroughness.

great tip on the white spirit

I don’t use oil based paint anymore due to the advancements of water based paint and hybrids but I still use oil based polyurethane. I let the mineral spirits sit after cleaning my brush to separate the polyurethane but it sometimes picks up moisture from the air and hells. I’m going to try filtering it next time. Thanks for the video

Absolelty one of the most helpful you tube videos I’ve ever seen thank you so much.

You can use an old pair of the mrs tights (or yours 😂) as a filter when pouring the used white spirit.

Thank you very much Mick i seldom using paint brush so don't know how to clean it,

Nice one , been doing it wrong for years , thank you

Great video. Thank you for your time and effort to do that. Greetings from Croatia.

I use alot of polyurethane in flooring and some finish carpentry and furniture finishing. The same trick works for cleaning your polyurethane brushes. Leave out the mineral spirits for a few days, and the polyurethane with turn into a yellow wax looking solid in the jar and you can just pour off the spirits. Some times the spirits remain a little cloudy but still more then clear enough to clean brushes.

thanks mate. i will try it tomorrow. wasted a lot of white spirit today.

Nice tip Charlie. But I use a Brush mate storage box. Not cleaned my brushes at all for two years now and still working perfectly. I've been doing a lot of painting in that time to be fair. But for the occasional paint job your tip is a good one.

I remember you. I watched your condensation video a few months back. The no breathing thing I mentioned your comment section didn't work out by the way. Anyways, thanks for the heads up on this. I've just been glossing the skirting boards and I'll definitely give this tip a whirl. Stay awesome my friend.

Never thought about it. I just assumed once it was used it was done. Shall do this from now on, I have loads of jars with air tight lids that had candles in them.

Great video .Also I I love to use brush cleaner as it seems to get more out of my brushes and seems less tacky than white spirit.

Thanks a lot for your great tips. Wasted so much brushes 😪 before. I like you recycling tips as well. Many thanks again

Should have paid more attention to this the first time round. Have a reasonable amount of residue on one of my brushes and I thought I’d cleaned them quite well.

What a genius little tip! Thanks 😃

I let my white spirit settle too but I then pour it into another container through a coffee filter so it is perfectly clean!

Thanks for sharing and also thanks to Zed Man.

That was amazing ! Thank you so much for your time and effort.

What should you do with the jar that has the gunk in?

Not a lot new there except the idea of using only small amounts of white spirit each cleanse which is worth a try so worth watching your videp, thanks. P.s. A old nail brush can be used instead a wire brush, probably gentler on the bristles.

You are absolutely right about duct tape and verucca removal. It got ride if mine.! It deprives the verucca of oxygen and if applied well also moisture. 😊

To stop the residual white spirit diluting the next coat, I get rid of the last traces of white spirit by swishing the whole brush up and down in a sink of diluted washing up liquid, then instead of duct tape use folded kitchen towel held in place by masking tape, works a treat!

Thank you! I thought I ruined my paintbrush, but with a little bit of white spirit it looks good as new

That Is Amazing Thanks Good Tip

I knew that trick!! .I think you are wonderful mostly for a perfectionist like "moi" Thanks!

Been doing that for years. You can use more white spirirt in the glass to clean the brushes, you still get most of it back. It also works for turps.

For a quicker way to clean the white spirit I use coffee filters in a funnel. Works great.

Thank you for sharing. I use a cooking syringe to draw the clear mineral spirits that has separated from the used paint.

Thanks for this tip. I’ve used it & it’s brilliant .

Brilliant tip. Thanks to you - and Z Man!

Same method as I use, if you leave the white spirit for a couple of weeks the paint forms a hard plug in the bottom of the jaw and the spirit on top is perfectly clean. I have a dirty jar, and a "cleaned" jar. I bought 1 litre of white spirit more than 10 years ago, I still have half of it left, I estimate the wastage in cleaning a brush to be less than 1tsp if you use this method and have a small selection of glass jars on hand for the dirty spirit to settle in. The only paint this didn't work on is the black gloss I use on my front door. It never seems to settle out of the spirit so I just use a disposable brush for that paint now.

This was very helpful thank you . Fabulous tip at end for saving money

You've made my day 😄 off to clean my brushes👏

Another good tip is get a turkey baster and siphon the clear liquid out. Works great too!

Subscribed. Thanks for all your trial and error.

Magic! I love this method. Totally cool! Thanks so much for these top tips!

2020 calling to say that you might as well buy 10 sets of ALL paint brushes instead, since a single loo roll is worth more ;-) Thanks for the video :-)

great video - many thanks. It's important to put a lid on the jam jar otherwise the white spirit evaporates.

absolutely awesome, thank you so much for making this video.

Once again - very useful. Thank you.

I am not a perfectionist like Mr. Charlie. I don`t care if brush fans after drying or has a bit of residue left. I also am lazy.. 1)Get jar or can, put white spirit in -enough to get paint on brush to thin . 2)Get yourself an old newspaper. 3) Repeatedly wipe brush on it -changing pages until brush is left with minimum residue. 4) Water in new jar or can -leave brush in for a minute. 5) New dry pages of old newspaper -start wiping brush until drier. Job done. Saved loo roll for a bigger job,ahem! The newspaper is not recycled. Thank you for reading .

This was very helpful! Please share how to handle and dispose of the waste by product (paint sludge, TP with the excess paint, etc..)

I leave the brush in white spirit, when I need to use it, wipe it dry with a paper towel, and it’s ready to use. This method prevents the paint brush from clogging up with paint when painting and you get a much better finish.

Wow, thanks for this !

Love it! Just about to start painting my room. Excited about the clean up now 😊

If you make a grill to put an inch or so up from the bottom and fill the jar or bucket with white spirit an inch or so up from the grill you can keep using it as the paint falls through the grill

Cracking video mate!!!!! Many thanks for the info

Very useful. Many thanks!

That's absolutely fantastic! Just realised how much spirit I used unnecessarily. Wondering if there is a similar process to clean the excess down from the brush after using water based paint.

Very good.......fan of oil based paints.......I always waste so much cleaner......thanks...

You can clean hardened brushes with old paint with no effort at all with hot bicarbonate of soda, leave till cool and it's as good as new.

When you use an oil based paint brush just leave it sitting in normal tap water in a jar or bucket also emulsion brushes and rollers can be wrapped in a plastic bag for a couple of days and if you have a dirty tin of paint ie oil or water based use the leg of a pair of old tights as a siv to clean paint

Really helpful and informative! Thank you very much.

Omg ... I've just poured about half a litre down the sink! 🤦🏾‍♀️ Wish I'd watched it before. Thank you for the tip.

Thanks for brush cleaning

I'm definitely giving this method ago as I'm currently glossing 8 door frames 😬

Fantastic trick again, thanks!👍

Good presentation great tips and something new learned as well

Thank you so much for the marvellous tips!