After years of cleaning my glass often daily, I've found this system to work great. And it all costs less than 5 dollars for months of cleaning!
-Isopropyl Alcohol 99%
-salt
-Q-tips
-sealable plastic container
-electrical tape (if you dont own a downstem holder)
For the slides and downstems, fill container with (preferably recycled) isopropyl, and leave your slides and downstems sitting in them overnight.
Next day, pull out your slides while still covered in iso, dip you Q-tip in the iso as well, and brush off the accessible residue with EASE!
As far as your downstems are concerned, clean what you can with the Q-tips, then use a downstem holder with some iso and salt to shake out the rest.
As far as your tube goes, Ive used many mainstream "degrunging" solution. And nothing compares to the Iso/salt mixture. just shake that through for a minute and she should be sparkley!
You should never have to spend more than a minute or two tops to clean your glass again!
Here are some tips:
-Isopropyl doesnt lose potency in liquid form it is as strong as when you opened the bottle (resin in it or not), so if youre recylcing your iso in a sealed container you should be able to stretch a 2 dollar bottle for months
-Isopropyl does evaporate, so keep a lid on your container
-If you dont own a downstem holder, use this method. Clean and dry the exterior of the downstem, wrap the diffusion area with tape (i use electrical tape, comes off easily afterwards!), then fill with iso/salt mixture, hold both ends and shake out the rest.
-WARNING: 99% Isoproyl will fucking DEVOUR labels, keep a good distance