Well I have only been brewing for close to 2 years now and I only use bleach water to clean my bottles and carboy. I don't own a bottle brush and I have only used my carboy brush once. It just couldn't reach the kreusen ring. What I do is rinse out well after use, soak my bottles in bleach water before bottling day, rinse well, then and sanitize. My carboy I rinse all the debris out thoroughly and clean by using bleach water and shaking vigorously. I may store it upside down to clean the ring. I have found that soaking removes all the stuck on debris. I try to keep my carboys in use, but when not in use I store them with bleach water to keep them clean.