Pony with age spots/pony cancer... full body repaint?

[Artemesia's Garden]

Hi all,

Was just hoping for some up-to-date advice as to whether it is worth painting ponies if there is evidence of plastic breakdown?  I don't want to spend hours painting around hair plugs and doing thin layers only for the paint to fall off.

I have a boy that wasn't as described but I couldn't bear to part with him and now I'm hoping to customise him.

Cheers in advance

ArtiexXx

[Baby Sugarberry]

Depends what your intentions are.
If you're going full custom, age spots / vinyl deterioration don't seem to make any difference to paint (at least not that I've seen anyone mention). Plasticizer leech is a whole other ballgame and definitely does. 

For 'fixing' ponies (rather than full custom body repaint), painting over isn't recommended, as the paint's chemicals tend to do more damage to the underlying color/vinyl than whatever is being covered up in the long-term.

[Artemesia's Garden]

Depends what your intentions are.
If you're going full custom, age spots / vinyl deterioration don't seem to make any difference to paint (at least not that I've seen anyone mention). Plasticizer leech is a whole other ballgame and definitely does. 

For 'fixing' ponies (rather than full custom body repaint), painting over isn't recommended, as the paint's chemicals tend to do more damage to the underlying color/vinyl than whatever is being covered up in the long-term.

I'm going to customise him but try to save his original hair and FBR him the same colour.  It's Slugger, he has a serious symbol rub on one side as well as multiple cancer spots so he's going to get new symbols that I've designed rather than new footballs.  Thank you for replying!

[Baby Sugarberry]

Should be fine then, FBR doesn't run into the same problems as 'patch jobs'. You'd probably get better advice on paint / sealing and the like over in Customs, if you're not sure about which materials work best or tips / techniques; isn't a personal area of expertise.  G'luck!

[FarDreamer]

I paint over cancer spots when I can't get rid of them other ways and haven't had any ill effects.  I'd be interested in seeing photos of where people have had issues with it, to see what they're getting.

With slugger's colors, you might be able to get rid of the spots with a peroxide/sun soak.  Ponies who tend towards more flesh colors seem to do better with this.  I got rid of all the spots on my Baby Cherries Jubilee this way, as well as her yellow staining and stench from cigarette smoke.

[Artemesia's Garden]

I paint over cancer spots when I can't get rid of them other ways and haven't had any ill effects.  I'd be interested in seeing photos of where people have had issues with it, to see what they're getting.

With slugger's colors, you might be able to get rid of the spots with a peroxide/sun soak.  Ponies who tend towards more flesh colors seem to do better with this.  I got rid of all the spots on my Baby Cherries Jubilee this way, as well as her yellow staining and stench from cigarette smoke.

Thank you, that's handy to know! I heard people had probs with paint peeling over cancer spots. I'll do a few tests and report back but it may be in5 years time 

[FarDreamer]

Thank you, that's handy to know! I heard people had probs with paint peeling over cancer spots. I'll do a few tests and report back but it may be in5 years time 

Maybe I haven't had problems because I seal the paint after?  Depending on how many spots and how large of an area, sometimes I'll just spray the entire pony with mod podge.  (My collection looks really nice, but most of it probably isn't worth much, lol.)  I also don't touch them a lot once I'm finished with them.  PVC is known to be difficult to get paint to adhere to, they do stuff to it like sanding and applying acetone when they need to paint it for things like houses.  And they use a special paint mixture.

I guess I'm pretty laid back, but it wouldn't bother me if it peeled off after awhile, I'd just paint it again.  Now if it's causing discoloring or something that is larger than the original spot, that would worry me.

[Baby Sugarberry]

I've had problems with paint and vinyl, mostly bleeding with certain pigments.  Red and orange in particular on lighter colours, given enough time will get fuzzy around the edges - which is why most customizers advise sealing a custom before applying surface paint for symbols.  Had issues with a purple coverup too, mind you all of these took years, some cases decades, to show, it's not like they suddenly start having problems weeks after painting in most cases. 

You should always be wary of introducing potentially volatile chemicals to plastics, which are inherently unstable.

[FarDreamer]

Well, it sounds like the solution would be to seal over the spot you are trying to hide before painting it.  The pony I have that's had spots painted over the longest is dark blue and has had the paint on probably for around 3 years with no issues so far.

PVC is very stable, but it is porous, so it would make sense if it absorbed some of the paint.  The pigments in some colors separate more easily than others.  I tried looking into why red always causes so many problems, but didn't find much.  All I found is that modern red pigments are more stable than they used to be.  I doubt the paint is damaging the vinyl so much as just staining it, but it is possible that some paint may have chemicals in it that pvc reacts badly to.  I'm too tired right now to research it much.  http://www.calpaclab.com/pvc-polyvinyl-chloride-chemical-compatibility-chart/

Personally, if a spot was really bothering me, I'd prefer to paint it, then have to re-paint over any staining in a few years.  I'm pretty laid back about this stuff though.  Since pvc takes hundreds of years to decompose, and most of our ponies look pretty darned good after 30 years, I figure they're still going to look pretty good in another 30.

I love all the information people share in these threads, by the way.