I use the following stored proc to delete old backup files as a step within a standard scheduled job.

usage: usp_DeleteOldBackupFiles <path>, <file extention>, <age_hours>

i.e. usp_DeleteOldBackupFiles 'D:\MSSQL_DBBackups', 'bak', 36

usp_DeleteOldBackupFiles 'D:\MSSQL_DBBackupsLogs', 'trn', 72

--====================================================================

CREATE PROCEDURE [dbo].[usp_DeleteOldBackupFiles]

@path nvarchar(256),

@extention nvarchar(10),

@age_hrs int

AS

BEGIN

SET NOCOUNT ON;

DECLARE @DeleteDate nvarchar(50)

DECLARE @DeleteDateTime datetime

SET @DeleteDateTime = DateAdd(hh, -@age_hrs, GetDate())

SET @DeleteDate = (Select Replace(Convert(nvarchar, @DeleteDateTime, 111), '/', '-') + 'T' + Convert(nvarchar, @DeleteDateTime, 108))

EXECUTE master.dbo.xp_delete_file 0, @path, @extention, @DeleteDate, 1

END

--============================

-- xp_delete_file information

--============================

-- xp_delete_file actually checks the file header to see what type of file it is and will only delete certain types such

-- as database and log backups. I suppose they expanded this to certain types of log files as well but as you say this is

-- not documented by MS. Just be aware that it will not delete just any file type

-- First argument is:

-- 0 - specifies a backup file

-- 1 - specifies a report file

-- (I'm not sure what the difference between a "backup file" and a "report file" is, since you specify the extension of files

-- you're deleting with the third argument.)

--

-- Fifth argument is whether to delete recursively.

-- 0 - don't delete recursively (default)

-- 1 - delete files in sub directories

--====================================================================

I tweeked this from information I found on the net - Unfortunately, I can't remember where from so can't offer credit where it's due 🙁

Cheers