Cleaning Vertical Blinds

I have finally finished the very last step of the office refurbishment by cleaning and refitting the vertical blinds. It occurred to me that tips on cleaning vertical blinds might make a good 'frugal living' post.. Our blinds have been pretty much untouched for about 14 years! - maybe the odd dusting, but never a proper cleaning, you can only imagine the state of some of them - and my better half was thinking of throwing them out. I 'googled' for some cleaning tips and weighed up the suggested methods. A few people had put them in the washing machine with varied results - most people seemed to agree that a gentle washing in the bath was the best method.
I used about 4 inches of hot water in the bath with first of all some washing up liquid, and then later some liquid used for hand-washing clothes (the results were the same). I also found a clean nail brush that I used to scrub the worst parts (the top and bottom of each blind - mostly the top). Although they still looked a bit grubby whilst still wet - once they were hung on the line to dry, they looked fairly clean. (they must be hung out straight to retain their shape, not hung over anything)
I should issue a few cautionary notes - don't use too much cleaning solution or water that is too hot as it might adversely affect the glue that holds parts of the blind together. Do this on a day when you can leave them on a washing line to dry for a few hours otherwise you will have pools of grubby water wherever you leave them to dry...
Earlier this week, I took delivery of some bottom chain links for the blinds that I found on eBay, they even have the weights and the tops that you may need for blinds that have parts missing. The links were only £1.65 for 100 links (20 were needed for the blind in the picture above), and they finish the job off really nicely. The blinds have been in place overnight and look fantastic compared to how they looked before, I just have about 7 more sets like this throughout the house to do now....