Tail rust help please?

[Gogobinsin]

Thanks for the help I really appreciate everyone's posts Thank you for the brilliant guide Ringlets, it makes it look like a piece of cake Nice n' Spicy's head seems to be stuck down pretty hard, I'll have another go later

[Ringlets]

You are welcome hun. I'm happy to help   
Some of the later g1 ponies (as well as others such as boys and TEs) do seem to have stronger glue , so heating and softening the neck seal with a hair dryer or with warm water  is usually necessary   

[Sarah-Bee]

Ringlets, that tutorial is great!

Urm, am I totally overkilling tail rust by using bleach rather than toothpaste? (just the affected area, not the whole tail)

Just be careful as bleach can take the color out of the tail as well as the rust    it can also dry out the hair

lol yeah, I bleached a whole tail once (Baby Ribbs) and while the colour was fine it was SO dry. And then.... I used straighteners on it and it just disintegrated!! So there you go, my newby mistake - don't do this Lol

[mlp4me]

I'd suggest a nice gritty toothpaste, like an arm and hammer whitening, it helps to loosen up stuck on rusty washer chunks and lightens tail rust.

Also, if you don't like using chemicals to loosen up neck glue, boil some water in a tea pot and pour it directly onto the neck seam, this will help to loosen it up. Boiling water will also help to loosen up anything crusty inside the pony...

Good luck!

[Ringlets]

Ooh  almost forgot to say this ! -  do before and after pics if you have the time    those are always fun to see
LOL Sarah   my first rust removal newbie mistake was to put the cable tie on the tail .... before I pulled the tail back through the hole *facepalm*      
 

[Baby Sugarberry]

? I always put the cable tie/zip tie on before reattaching the tail.  Simply thread the ribbon from the outside to the inside, and pull the loop out the neck hole.  Insert tail through the ribbon loop, making sure the loose end of the tail is closer to the loop than the end with the tie/metal clamp. Pull back through and you're done.


Unless you meant tying it before you had cleaned the tail. n_n;

[Ringlets]

I always do it the other way  (put the cord around the tail, pull it out through the neck hole and then attach the cable tie - like in my tutorial) . I've done it your way when replacing a whole tail including washer and clip from a donor pony, but when I tried doing it that way after putting the cable tie on first  I couldnt get it to go through properly 

[Cate_Dartfinger]

Most hardware stores sell plastic washers now, I went and bought a whole mess of them when I got my girls out of storage. They all got a pretty intensive spa treatment inside and out, and new washers on the tails. My Sugarberry had her behind looking like she sat in something unpleasant, and when I popped her head off, she was brown on the inside. I freaked and thought it was mold, but it did just turn out to be rust. A little splash of CLR on a soft toothbrush made quick work of the yuck inside, but I would be super careful with that sort of chemical, since it can be corrosive. AND the fumes might make you a little lightheaded. I don't use it often, only if somepony is pretty seriously rusty, and nothing else works... 

[PinkRosedust]

..as for the clamps I figure if the heads been off I can replace the clamp if it rerusts away,I dont really like taking off original clamps...am I the wierdo for leaving clamps?

I leave them too. Mostly because they seem impossible to remove for me. o_O But also as Baby Sugarberry said, they often are not even very rusty, if at all! Which I find odd but definitely favorable.

[Ringlets]

..as for the clamps I figure if the heads been off I can replace the clamp if it rerusts away,I dont really like taking off original clamps...am I the wierdo for leaving clamps?

I leave them too. Mostly because they seem impossible to remove for me. o_O But also as Baby Sugarberry said, they often are not even very rusty, if at all! Which I find odd but definitely favorable.

wow you guys are fortunate then!      most ..in fact  almost all (except for maybe one or two  ) of the ponies I've treated for rust have had really manky rusty clamps as well as washers 

[Baby Sugarberry]

Huh, that's really strange.  o.O I've popped heads off at least a hundred ponies and maybe found one or two rusty clamps, but tons of rusty washers.  I wonder if there was a difference in materials between the ponies sold in Canada and those in the USA?  Or maybe it has to do with climate?  It seems statistically improbable to be a coincidence.

[Gogobinsin]

So this pony's head is being reeeeeally stubborn, I tried acetone around the seal which didn't work, I tried heating it up with a hair dryer which just made the plastic squidgy but did nothing to the glue and then I ran a hot tap till it was so hot I couldn't touch it and put the neck area under it for a couple of minutes whilst turning it so all around the seal got hot. With a knife this has worked at softening the glue around the back of the neck and I've managed to partially open it but now I'm trying to get the sides and front loose the hot water is doing nothing Any other tips for a pony that just doesn't want to part with its head?

[Baby Sugarberry]

Have you gotten partial access to the inside? Like, under the outer ring?  If that's the case, it's usually pretty easy to use something like a hemostat or needle nose pliers to pry the head loose, by inserting it under the head and levering.  You can also try dripping a small amount of acetone into the neck seal and letting it sit a bit, that'll often help loosen the remainder.  Patience, persistence!  Don't rush things, you'll get it off eventually. 

[Gogobinsin]

No I can't get any part of it out yet, I can see the plug piece when I pull the head and body apart slightly but I just can't get it loose enough around the sides to be able to pull it out at all, I think if I tried to just yank it apart I'd 'rip' the plastic. It doesn't look like the head has been removed before but the glue is so hard it looks like it's been super glued on :/ I'll try putting some acetone in the the bit I've managed to get open so far and leave it for a while then, thanks Guess I'll just keep working at it slowly, spent about 4 hours getting this far

[Ringlets]

sometimes when its that stubborn, you need to use a craft knife  (not to cut the head off , but to carefully score around the neck seal glue). be very careful though!     .  You might not need to do it much as it can just crack the glue and it then comes off easy (does that make sense LOL? its late. perhaps I'll have to clarify it a bit tomorrow   )
If you do manage to prize the head partially off by using the acetone/heating method etc, there might be a bit if the plastic lip left attached inside the neck that tears off the main part of the head (this doesnt happen very often, but if it does, it shouldnt cause a problem. You'll just need to glue the head back on after cleaning the pony out)