Thank you all for your input! I'll leave them alone then (besides the general cleanup I need to do) - that's a huge relief, because I really didn't want to have to remove any heads. I don't trust myself and my clumsy, inexperiences hands. Some of them are already coming unglued (presumably from age and rough play) but I'd rather not damage them further.

I'll probably post in the Pony Brag forum with pictures later if anyone is interested in seeing the haul it's nothing super interesting, but it's very exciting to me and I want to share that.

Yesterday, after years of looking at listings from afar and lamenting my monetary struggles, I got my hands on my first new ponies since I was a child! It's very exciting to me, I might post about that in the brag forum later.

Most of them have pen marks, and one of them has a slight haircut, but they're in good condition overall as far as I can tell - my main concern is that some of them rattle when shaken. There is obviously something loose in there, and since as far as I can tell the heads have never come off of these ponies the only thing that should be in there is the tail washers.

Which leads me to my concern. How could the tail washers be rattling around loose like that? All of the ponies still have their tails, and have more than likely never been opened up. Additionally, I'm not seeing any signs of rust, so if the washers rusted and fell apart they did so without staining the tails in any way - which feels unlikely to me, especially on three different ponies in the same box. But what else could have happened? Is there something I am overlooking? Am I overthinking it, or should I be concerned?

Pretty much all of the ones I had as a kid, but I believe Magic Hat was my favourite back then. Majesty, Parasol, and Gusty also stick out in my mind.

Putting aside nostalgia value for a moment, I also really like Glory and Moondancer.

They aren't easy to repair. I've done a couple of rehairs and the piece inside the head is a very awkward shape so unless you've lots of experience with customising then removing the head isn't a good idea. Its also not glued - its kind of melted in with the plastic of the neck. There's a little peg shaped piece on the top of a stalk and if that breaks there's no way to fix it.

The restoration project has my photos of the inside parts of a pony
http://www.mlppreservationproject.com/misc.html

Thank you! Although my issue isn't with me wanting to remove the head - I want to put it back on, as it's been broken since I was a kid. Looking at it now, I think the peg-shaped piece is the issue. I (or my brother, I'm not sure) must have broken that when we were playing years ago. That's probably what's making her head rattle, too.

I don't think I've got the skill to fix it though, nor the guts to cut her apart, so she'll just have to sit with her head awkwardly balanced on her neck. Oh well.

Thanks for the responses!

The parts of the mechanism that is in her head seem to be stuck in there really good. I'm assuming it was glued in? I think heat can loosen glue, so maybe heating it up would be worth a try. But I'm not a professional, so I dunno. Don't take my word for it. The only thing I can think of would be to cut it out, and taking a knife to a pony seems like a pretty bad idea...

Honestly though, at this point, I might just glue the head back on. The mechanism wouldn't work, which would be a shame, but it's not like I plan on selling her or playing with her or anything. I guess I'm lucky that mine doesn't need rehairing... good luck with yours, Shileah.

So I mentioned in my introductions post that all of my childhood ponies are in storage - there's one exception to that. I've got a BnG Ringlets that's been sitting on a shelf in my room for as long as I can remember. She was put aside because either me or my brother (can't remember) broke off her head and my dad never actually got around to fixing her. I think it's something in her mechanism broke off, because her head rattles when I shake it. The head sits on the body fine.

Aside from that glaring issue, she's also got some yellowish discolouration in some spots - mainly around the tail and the tips of her muzzle and ears. I think it's probably to do with her age or something, it definitely occurred naturally. They're very subtle and probably wouldn't ever be noticed unless you were looking for it, so if there's nothing much I can do about it I'm completely fine with that. It just bothers me a little knowing they're there. But if anyone has any idea if there's something I can do about either of these issues, I'd really appreciate some advice. Thanks in advance.

Here she is before...
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.....and after a sponge bath and a good brush
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Since taking these, I've also braided her tail and tied it with an old ribbon. I think she's cute, although I'm going to need to wash (and maybe curl) her hair in the future.

I think she might also be faded... one of the streaks in her hair definitely is. I'm okay with that and the slight frizziness too, she's been like that for as long as I can remember. I'm actually pretty impressed that she hasn't suffered more damage, really. I got her second hand, so I imagine some other kid probably spent time playing with her back in the 80s, and then both me and my brother definitely played with our ponies a lot as a kid. And yet - no markers, no haircuts, no damage at all aside from the aforementioned.

(I didn't think to take any pictures of her head mechanism earlier, unfortunately, and now my phone's dead with no charger. I'll see if I can get some pictures of that later.)