Worst Restoration Mistake?

[Marlin]

When I finally took her out after waking up, her cutie mark was completely soaked off!! Poor girl is naked now. I cried a little about it

Oh, gosh - yep... this was sort of me waaaaay back in the day   Was new to collecting and restoring ponies and at the time had no idea the fragility of magic message symbols!! I was washing a not too bad Mirror Mirror, and was using warm water (1st mistake). Combine that with my fingers inadvertently rubbing on the symbol as I was holding her (mistake #2) well... I joined the 'I ruined a MM pony' club    

p.s. I cried, too!


I think my worst blunder which still infuriates me to this day to think about it.... was I acquired a literally perfect Powder Puff charm. Perfect but for one tiny, minuscule, almost inconsequential blue dot right in the middle of her three heart symbol.  I almost nonchalantly got out the nail polish remover... dipped the end of a cotton bud - thought for a millisecond 'maybe I should use a tooth pick?' Nah... I'll be very careful and I'll be fine....

Should have used the effing toothpick.

The blue spot came off... and I also smudged the edges of two of the hearts    I was so angry with myself. Seriously the blackest of moods for at least 24hrs     Her hearts are still 98% intact but... I will forever live knowing it was me who ruined their perfection (and seriously - how often do you see Powder Puff with intact hearts!?) all because of one stupid, stupid error of judgement 

[KottonKandy]

Oh man, I just got my collection out of storage recently and have started going through them and cleaning and restoring the ones who need it. I've not had any incidents yet, but this thread is kinda spooky and I'm a little nervous to keep going now lol.

[scarletjul]

I have also taken off a Magic Message pony's symbol in hot water.  Man, those ponies are fragile fillies. 

I've cut off a neck plug.  Once.  Off of a Baby Crumpet. I still have her, too. 

I've also rubbed off flocking a lot of times and occasionally yanked out pony hair when trying to take out tangles.

*sigh*  My poor ponies.

[minamarie]

I used some acne cream on a nbbe Baby Gusty - part of her leaves is white now

[Artemesia's Garden]

Oh yes here's one not mentioned yet:  I used fabric softener too strong and soaked too long and found it can transfer some hair colors to the body. 

That's a good one to know

[tulagirl]

I joined a swap once and bought a mint condition so soft pony for my partner.  However, it arrived in mint condition but smelling like cat pee really bad.  So, I knew I had to get another pony for my partner.  I decided to clean it. That didn't work.  So I sprayed some of that enzyme cleaner for cat pee on the so soft pony.  Left it on the pony the amount of time required.  Came back in the room and the flocking on the pony was falling off.  Basically she had perfect flocking and was nude by the time I got done.  So, I have kept her as she is like my mascot now. I named her Cat Pee Pony.  I was so angry about the whole thing at first and felt stupid for how I ruined this perfect pony.  I guess it was just more fun to turn her into a character I could use to blame everything one that happens that I don't like.  So, now this pony is a fun part of our world.  She still smells a bit but not like she did.

[Artemesia's Garden]

Could this be a wonder product for removing stubborn flocking 

[lostpony]

Wow ruined the flocking and STILL has that smell.

Bummer.

I find ammonia is best on such smells, is that safe on flocking?  Anyone know?

[lovesbabysquirmy]

I think the only thing I've done that I would consider a serious mistake:  NOT even trying to clean up my childhood Baby Sea Pony!  I just tossed her in the trash.

Yes it has been more than 20 years and YES I am still regretting it! 

[tulagirl]

Could this be a wonder product for removing stubborn flocking 

Yea I would say so except you still have that sticky glue stuff to get off and it is much harder to remove...this was by far the most heartbreaking thing I ever put myself through. LOL

I think the only thing I've done that I would consider a serious mistake:  NOT even trying to clean up my childhood Baby Sea Pony!  I just tossed her in the trash.

Yes it has been more than 20 years and YES I am still regretting it! 

I can see myself doing this. I still remember all my toys in bags in the kitchen when mom moved.  She wanted me to take everything.  I was like 22 at the time and thought I didn't need that stuff.  Man I could just kick myself you know where now.   I let go of a lot of stuff. 

[Filthy]

I had a very nice Quarterback with a lot of rust inside I think it was. So he went into an oxyclean bath for just a couple minutes to get it out. His symbol lost all it's color, now it's just white! And it happened so fast!

This just happened to me couple days ago!  I was going to just quickly soak him in there, but my grandma called so I forgot him. And his symbols were really good before this. I hate myself right now.

[HelloGoodbye]

My first G1 pony was Milky Way and let's just say I was veeeeery nervous about cleaning her up and absolutely convinced I'd do something and ruin her forever and ever.  I remember making some positively frantic posts about her on here  Thankfully, with many more pony spa days under my belt, I've realized that most ponies are made of sterner stuff than I originally feared. 

Anyway, I cleaned her up and then I felt pretty good about myself.  But then I completely freaked out when I gave her a squeeze and realized she was full of water!  I was sure she'd be completely full of mold in now time flat.  So then I decided her head needed to come off.  I couldn't pull it off, so I enlisted my brother's help to loosen the head up with his pocket knife (I think you all see where this is going).

For some reason, I kind of just assumed he would know that there was a neck plug and didn't tell him about it.  Why I assumed someone who wasn't a pony person would just KNOW that is absolutely beyond me.  I kind of thought he'd just run the knife around the outside of her neck to break the seal with the glue.  But instead he just started to cut right through!!  To be fair, all I told him was "please help me remove my pony's head with your pocket knife" so I really shouldn't have been surprised.  I saw what he was doing and stopped him but poor Milky Way was already partially decapitated.

Not going to lie, some tears were shed    She looks absolutely fine though from the outside, and I have no intentions of ever selling her, so everything worked out fine in the end. 

[Galactica]

I kinda forgot an entire jar full of adorable baby ponies (being prepped for customs) in a jar of 100% acetone.

They kinda melted...

On the upside an artist friend of mine made some really cool art with what was left! 

Post Merge: July 26, 2017, 10:53:52 AM

My first G1 pony was Milky Way and let's just say I was veeeeery nervous about cleaning her up and absolutely convinced I'd do something and ruin her forever and ever.  I remember making some positively frantic posts about her on here  Thankfully, with many more pony spa days under my belt, I've realized that most ponies are made of sterner stuff than I originally feared. 

Anyway, I cleaned her up and then I felt pretty good about myself.  But then I completely freaked out when I gave her a squeeze and realized she was full of water!  I was sure she'd be completely full of mold in now time flat.  So then I decided her head needed to come off.  I couldn't pull it off, so I enlisted my brother's help to loosen the head up with his pocket knife (I think you all see where this is going).

For some reason, I kind of just assumed he would know that there was a neck plug and didn't tell him about it.  Why I assumed someone who wasn't a pony person would just KNOW that is absolutely beyond me.  I kind of thought he'd just run the knife around the outside of her neck to break the seal with the glue.  But instead he just started to cut right through!!  To be fair, all I told him was "please help me remove my pony's head with your pocket knife" so I really shouldn't have been surprised.  I saw what he was doing and stopped him but poor Milky Way was already partially decapitated.

Not going to lie, some tears were shed    She looks absolutely fine though from the outside, and I have no intentions of ever selling her, so everything worked out fine in the end.

Oh... that's so sad!

[Kazzellin]

Mine was in trying to clean a chunk of crusty red junk from the back of a SS Wind Whistler that was otherwise near-perfect looking. I didn't know warm water would loosen the glue.

[Saiko]

I kinda forgot an entire jar full of adorable baby ponies (being prepped for customs) in a jar of 100% acetone.

They kinda melted...

On the upside an artist friend of mine made some really cool art with what was left! 

Do you have photos? That sounds (morbidly) cool!