My dog has long and thick hair. Keep on buying the cheap wire bristle brushes and they keep on breaking in his fur not even half way through brushing him. Sick of spending all this money on these cheap brushes. What is the best brush i can buy for my dog that will get the job done w/out breaking?

So at my old barn we’d just throw all the brushes in a big bucket with some soap and water, rinse them and let them dry. Those brushes were all plastic and basically horrible brushes so it didn’t matter what happened to them. Do you clean natural bristle brushes the same? I’d worry about the water ruining them! What about leather backed brushes?
I run my brushes through a curry comb every day so they aren’t very dirty or anything, I’m just curious and it would be nice to be able to de-germ them just in case someone gets a fungus or something.
edge6661- I run them through a rubber curry comb every few strokes. I don’t have a metal curry comb and I don’t think that i have room in my brush box….
like Pony Girl said, my dirty brushes are much cleaner than lots of people’s clean brushes so I’m not too concerned. My mom isn’t going to let me put the brushes in the washer- I have to go to a laundromat to do saddle pads! Brushes are out of the question… any other ideas?
What sort of bristles do you have and how do you shape them with florists wire?