How would you clean out a wooden canteen that hasn't been used in years.I posted this on the yahoo group but got a 1000 different ways.

Just use it for show.

Hi Jess
If you really want to use the canteen to hold water when your on the field you will probably have to soak it in water so as to make it water tight again .
So fill the canteen with a mild solution of bleach & water and just let it sit .
This will swell the wood seams of the canteen and make it water tight again as well as killing any Krusty germs that may still be living inside the container . Lets face it Krusty is still alive so there maybe some of him still inside the canteen
After you have let it sit for 2 or 3 days rinse it out really good to get rid of the bleech taist .
Then you should be all set .
You will have to keep putting water in it so that the wood doesn't dry out again
which will allow the seams to shrink again .

Capt Dave

Ok

Jesse,

Fill it with a solution of water and baking soda or, better yet, water and peroxide. (4:1 of either). As Dave said bleach will work but you might have a very bad reaction to it if you don't rinse it well enough.

Let swell for four days. Rinse and flush with cold water several times. Then fill with room temperature water and let stand until the day you intend to start using it in the field and then add new water once again.

Good luck.

p.s. If the original manufacturer of the canteen used some sort of pitch inside then you may end up with loose debris inside of it. There won't be much you can do but it'll still be safe to use. Hoepfully there is nothing inside to seal it. The "wooden boat" construction process for those canteens is best,.you simply have to keep them filled and flushed with fresh water all the time or keep them, when empty, in cool (not totally dark though) places between fills, swells, and refills.

Cheers,
Pud
(Jesse)