Facanh

I've had a few cheaper bottles that always had a pretty strong plastic smell no matter what I cleaned them with, and they made the drinks or water taste funny too after a while.

I bought some Specialized "purist" water bottles, they claim:

"The Purist WaterGate Bottle features an amorphous silicon dioxide coating that's infused into the inner-wall of the bottle. Essentially, this forms a glass-like finish that provides a totally natural, and completely inert, solution to the problem of your drinks staining the bottle or leaving behind any residual aftertaste. This infusion also shields your fresh water from tasting like plastic on very hot days, making it akin to drinking straight from a sparkling clean glass."

Well, not exactly true. No matter what I put them in it will taste weird, a bit less than cheaper bottles but it's still there. No matter how thoroughly I clean them I can always taste the previous drink a bit too.

So any recommendations for bottles that don't make your drink taste weird AT ALL?

Thanks.

C.Jester

I used to work for DuPont and I asked one of the chemical engineers about this same thing once. He recommended dumping boiling water in it, letting it cool, and doing it again. Do it several times. I ruined one water bottle doing this and helped a few others. Kind of a crap shoot depending on the bottle. Has something to do with the chemicals in the plastic and blah, blah, blah. I don't know. But it did really fix a few of them that I had. Again though, I did melt one of the thinner one's down pretty bad too.
He also recommended strong amount of Vodka to cover the smell and flavor if hot water didn't draw out the oils and such too. So there are options.

CliffordK

Any of the clear plastic (or tinted transparent) bottles (polyethylene or polycarbonate) will be tasteless. Also stainless steel.

The polyethylene or polycarbonate bottles will either be rigid, or crinkly, and are sometimes found in very cheap water bottles.

Several of the Contigo bottles in either plastic or stainless fit very well in water bottle cages, and the flip tops work well.

They are also pretty good with keeping drinks either warm or cold



Oh, the biggest downside of the Contigo bottles is that they rattle in metal bottle cages. Also, get bare stainless, not painted.

shoota 

CamelBak Podium bottles don't make water taste bad.

Colnago Mixte

Every new water bottle I buy gets filled with water and a tablespoon of vinegar and left to sit overnight.

This procedure never failed to neutralize the bad plastic taste in any water bottle I've tried. If I don't do this, I'm tasting plastic on and off for the next year, which is completely unacceptable.

Richard8655

mstateglfr 

I need to get my tastebuds checked out.

The 1 Specialized product I buy is the 2nd Gen Big Mouth water bottles. Its the typical water bottle that so many shops have their name on or organizations use for promotion. Love those bottles.
Hot water to clean em out and they never smell odd or make water taste bad.

I should say- if water sits in one for a few days, it tastes different. Its also 3 day old water thats been in a bottle in the heat of a garage(typically) so i tend to not drink it anyways. \
Fresh water though?- never tastes like anything but water.

Facanh

Thanks for the tips everyone!

I'll do it for you and i'll even give you a discount just because i'm such a nice guy.

elcruxio

I use steel bottles. No taste, no odor, no nothing.
Also can be boiled or machine washed as much as I like

MPE

bobwysiwyg

Still using two bottles I bought with a bike several years ago. After getting home from a ride, I empty them if necessary, rinse them and the caps in hot tap water. Shake out water, invert them on a paper towel. Before putting them away, one last shake and put the caps on loosely. Never had problems.