Colour changing/leaching added photos

[Sugar]

Hey, everypony!

So I got in a lot of four ponies from eBay today.   There's a beautiful Fizzy, a Princess Primrose who needs ye olde boiling-water-on-her-wonky-legs treatment, and two very peculiarly coloured ponies.  I am going to need your help on this.  (And please forgive the no-pictures, but I'm finding my camera isn't doing justice to the colour weirdness. )

Bright Eyes is a bit on the hard side, though not quite as bad as the Chief I acquired earlier this week.  Does this cause colour change, however?  Because she's kind of got a layer of blue/purple to her body that isn't coming off with a Magic Eraser and is just barely budging with nail varnish remover.  I'd almost say she'd had an ink wash or something, but her hair is stunningly flawless, which is why I'm wondering if it has to do with the composition change of her body.

I've also got a Sweet Stuff who is very apparently losing the plasticizer in her body, in addition to having had a run-in with a pink highlighter (sigh).  She's all shiny and extra-squooshy, but she's also got some sort of a brownish cast to her body.  It almost looks like she's from a smoker household (which is possible, I suppose, since I don't know her entire provenance) but she smells perfectly pony and not a trace of smelly cigarettes.

So I guess the main question is this: has anypony else noticed changes in their ponies' colours as they age, or did I just luck into some weirdly discoloured (for no apparent reason) ones?

[Diamond]

It is hard to tell with out photos, even so so ones can help in a situation like this. 

I have several ponies that have lost there plasticizer and none have had a color shift.  Could be someone tried to paint her?  Nail polish remover is not as strong as pure acetone.  Do you have some around you could try on her belly say? 

As to the other, could be a mold or the like, again a photo would help.

[PinkRosedust]

Your Bright Eyes sounds like the one I got recently. I am thinking it probably is a discoloration issue. I think mine looks kinda neat though, heh.

Sweet Stuff I don't know. I'd guess a similar issue. I don't think there's anything you can do for either of them, unless you want to fully repaint them, which I wouldn't recommend.

[hathorcat]

On Bright Eyes yes it sounds like its probably the dye in her plastic - the purple/blue pigment is clearly the least stable used. This is really common with Windy. Sometimes you will get Windys which if you swipe a cloth over purple ink will come off and it just keeps coming. You also see the leeching of this pigment in Bluebelle who is seen often with whole white/pink sections due to the blue pigment simply leeching away. Several people [including myself] speculate that this blue pigment issue is the source of the white Windys and white Tickles that we see sometimes - i.e. that they have simply lost all of their pigment. Due to the fact this happens for the majority of times in ponies which are in that blue/purple tones across a range of sets confirms that its a pigment issue.

Sweet Stuff could be a couple of things - yes it could be that she has yellowed over the years due to exposure to certain environments or nicotine. She may not smell any more as perhaps she was exposed 30 years ago and since then has lost the scent but not the colour; after all plastic yellows incredibly quickly in the right [or wrong] environment. Alternatively the brown could simply be the flame retardant bromides leaking from her plastic and staining her with age marks all over her plastic.

[Sugar]

Thanks for your replies.   I took some photos but they really don't show the extent of the purpley must on Bright Eyes (except on the inside of her neck, which looks like she had an unfortunate biro leak - but she was still factory sealed... ).  The photos on poor Sweet Stuff show better her condition, and she also has a wonky raised foreleg.  I swear, if Fizzy and Primrose weren't so nice, I'd be a tad on the upset side over my purchase; the photo on eBay didn't do their condition much justice at all.  In spite of her rubbed symbols & blushes (which I knew about from the description), I do still like Bright Eyes a lot, and after a night soaking in Oxiclean & water, she's looking betterish, and I think I'll be able to salvage her well enough.  Sweet Stuff has me concerned, however... thanks for having a looksee!

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Those pinkish spots on her legs aren't there in reality; it's a bad flash photo thing.
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[LadySatine]

I would say that it's just age...these gals are getting to be 30 years old now. They still look pretty nice though, so congrats on that bit!

[hathorcat]

I would try a sun fade on Sweet Stuff as that could well just be a yellowing of age on her. Its always worth a try

On Bright Eyes I think it is the pigment - just make sure to wipe her down occasionally. I think however she may well discolour completely over time but then again she may only leak a certain amount.

[Sugar]

Thanks, everypony!  I'll give a few things a try, and keep you posted on the results.

@ LadySatine:  You're right; I keep forgetting that ponies have been around so long.  (For that matter, so have I - well, okay, longer, grumble-grumble...   At least they aren't frequenting bingo parlours, watching lots of telly, and hollering at the G4s to "get off my lawn shelf!" )

@ hathorcat:  Since you mentioned it, I took a good look at my original pony, Blue Belle.  She still looks mostly blue, but on close inspection, she seems to have an almost uniform dotting of purpleish minidots all over.  As though she might be just on the verge of losing some of her blue/purple pigment?  I don't know, but I do know I'm going to be tremendously careful when handling her from here on in.

[BabyIceCrystal]

Bright Eyes actually is known for this. In fact I understand it's difficult to find her without pigmentation problems. The pooling purple inside her sealed neck is proof that it's her own pigmentation separating. As hathorcat mentioned, the only thing you can do for her is make sure you clean her fairly regularly as this is going to continue happening.

Personally, I've always wondered if there is a way to slow the process. I know salt helps set dyes, so I have a wild totally unscientific theory that perhaps a salt bath might help Bright Eyes but I don't have the appropriate chemical knowhow to decide if it's a good idea or not. The salt might have other unwanted effects. I also don't have Bright Eyes yet to try it out on.