Do you /DARE/ restore a RARE pony?

[Enolaalone]

The majority of my harder to find ponies I bought with flaws on purpose. I really enjoy fixing them up. I just love them! Half of my Nirvanas have needed to be rehaired from having short chopped manes or none at all. I do buy them for myself though, so I want my girls to look nice. After all they are mine.

I agree with this. I don't have any super-rare ponies, but I have an Italian Snuzzle on her way to me with basically a buzz cut, and she will definitely be getting a rehair. I feel sad for them if they looked messed up, I think they would be happier with their proper hair and no tail rust etc. But then I don't buy to sell.

(yes I know they don't really have feelings  )

[BerryMouse]

I've restored some of my nirvana ponies but not to make money with it (restoring will prolly reduce the price anyway) but I want them too look nice in my collection.
Almost all of my brazil ponies had no hair or symbols so YES I did restore them cuz what someone already said, they are my ponies and if I want them with hair, they'll get hair. =)

I don't buy ponies and restore them to sell them later for more money. =)

[Whippycorn]

I think it depends...

I recently sold a Munchy who I had cleaned, de-tail-rusted and partially rehaired. She was so sad before I couldn't not fix her up, regardless of whether I was keeping or selling her.

And I've got a Thundercloud who has been cleaned and is in the process of getting a new fringe and tail (I intend to keep him, unless I get an upgrade).

But neither of those two are mega rare...I still daren't give my Indian Snuzzle a new fringe, which is odd because I've no intention whatsoever of selling her. 

[Enolaalone]

I think it depends...

I recently sold a Munchy who I had cleaned, de-tail-rusted and partially rehaired. She was so sad before I couldn't not fix her up, regardless of whether I was keeping or selling her.

And I've got a Thundercloud who has been cleaned and is in the process of getting a new fringe and tail (I intend to keep him, unless I get an upgrade).

But neither of those two are mega rare...I still daren't give my Indian Snuzzle a new fringe, which is odd because I've no intention whatsoever of selling her. 

You have an Indian Snuzzle  what does she look like? /thread derail

[Sunshine]

I'm on the same page as most of you...

Nirvanas are in another category for me... especially because most of the ones I have are in mehhh shape. I wouldn't think twice about popping off their heads to clean them out. For some reason... those kinds of "rare" ponies aren't exactly the same in my heart. I WANT my Nirvana's to look amazing, but many of them are in bad condition to begin with (Mexico and Peru seem to be notoriously bad!) and that kind of restore... more likely than not I can say those Nirvanas are going to stay in my collection as well. I've never ever had a double of a Nirvana myself (only have a few anyway though...), but I have had doubles of some rare U.S. release ponies.

Let's say you have a U.S. Sweet Scoops... and she has horrid tail rust. There's absolutely NO looseness to her neck-seal at all. Also, for the sake of argument, let's say you are a world renowned pony restorer - aka, you don't make mistakes, so you're not going to ruin her by trying to restore her.

The general consensus is 'It's okay to take off her head and fix the rust' - right?

I too would rather have a clean pony, but again, many of you have mentioned the important point of... well what if the person trying to "restore" the pony doesn't exactly know what they're doing, and messes it up? In my fake scenario, of course only a great pony restorer would try this type of endeavor. Heck I get shaky trying to take the head off of a Yr 2 Windy for Pete's sake....

I'm getting two basic levels of restore:

Basic Level Restore (for all ponies):
1) Remove surface dirt
2) Remove frizz or help hair out the way it is
3) Remove tail rust

Advanced Restore (for your own personal ponies, or if they REALLY need help)
1) Repink
2) Rehair
3) Repaint

Right? Thanks everyone. I LOVE this thread, lol, I love hearing what you look for in rare ponies, and how you may restore them differently to keep them in your own collection. There are certainly some rare girls in my collection who I doubt are ever leaving, who might need some TLC to make them beautiful again.

[Dusky]

SunshinePony Your last reply pretty much covered what I do with my rares. Most of my really rare ponies are chewed/manky in some way, but I *do* clean them out and de-rust them, as I'd rather have a clean pony than one that stinks of mould and could potentially tip rusty metal shards all over someone who head-pops it in future.

I don't repaint/repink/rehair because I don't trust my own skills yet, I have no problem with something that has had a little restoration done. When I look at ponies to buy them, I'd far rather have the clean one with the scuffed symbols, than the one with rust/potential dirt, and perfect eyes and features.

Re: Selling. I always scrub ponies that I get in, for my shelves or because I've got spares in a lot. It doesn't matter how rare they are, they are getting a bath if they're grimy, and I do think this ups/adds to their value, though it is not my main motivation for cleaning them.
If nothing else, it's far easier to sell/describe a clean pony than one where you're not sure how removable marks are.

One that I can confess to is that my Tornado has had his hair removed (buzz cut when I got him!) and had it replaced first with MLP hair, that looked terrible, and got repinked... and then with Nylon hair because I was sick of him looking so daft. I love him to bits!

[hathorcat]

I think that division sums it up for me as well Sunshine Pony

As to your specific Sweet Scoops question yes I would fix the tail rust. To some collectors an in place neck seal is very important [personally it is something I prefer as well but its not a deal breaker for me as a collector] - and for those people you are devaluing her by removing her head. However, I think a no longer original neck seal devalues less than tail rust and I think you ll find that most people would prefer no tail rust and a broken neck seal over tail rust and an intact neck seal.

[Pickenprod]

[internal rust and/or mold] ... a. it hastens serious problems like mould, rust spots, cancer etc and general degradation of the pony and b. it can potentially be a health hazard, especially if shipping overseas.

Yes, I agree with this!!
I also can't stand to soak a pony that still has its head on. Just thinking about all that water trapped inside, going stale and creating humid conditions inside the pony... blech!! I would be sad to see the obvious recipe for cancer spots just sitting there. It's heads off for bathtime in my house.

[Sunshine]

I think that division sums it up for me as well Sunshine Pony

As to your specific Sweet Scoops question yes I would fix the tail rust. To some collectors an in place neck seal is very important [personally it is something I prefer as well but its not a deal breaker for me as a collector] - and for those people you are devaluing her by removing her head. However, I think a no longer original neck seal devalues less than tail rust and I think you ll find that most people would prefer no tail rust and a broken neck seal over tail rust and an intact neck seal.

Great! That is exactly the debate I've been trying to rectify. I understand each collector has their own preferences, but I have to agree with the fact that tail rust is just soooo ugly, I'd rather have one who's head is loose (of course, not so loose it's swinging around and not staying in place!), even if it's Sweet Scoops.

Now - what about reglue-ing the head? Is there any use for that (again noting in the sale description that it has been reglued) - would you suggest doing this? Is there a specific type of glue that is best to use?

[goddessofpeep]

What I would do to a "loved" pony would depend 100% on what I was intending to do with it. 

If my intention was to buy the pony and then resell it, I'd give her as good a wash as I could, make her look as presentable as I could without damaging anything(including pulling off the head if it was still sealed) or doing anything permanent to her, and just leave her mostly as I found her for the next owner to fix any way they wanted.  Every collector has different ideas of what devalues a pony.  If the pony is not going to stay with me, it's best to just leave the restoration decisions up to the final owner.

If I had purchased a pony for my collection, I'd do whatever I wanted to make her look nice including painting scratches, cracking her open to remove rust, re-pinking, and whatever else I felt that she needed that I could safely do.

[Eskara1862]

Hell Yeah, I'd restore her!

The before photos of this German Skydancer are sort of crappy.  At the time, the digital camera was top of the line, but over the years technology has moved on. I got this pony when Skydancer was still selling for about $200-$300 because she was a super rare German variant. She was purchased with the intent of restoring and selling.  However, after all the work I put into her, I just can't part with her! She now lives in my collection and is the best example of my skill as a restoration artist. Please note, the hair was done by StrawberryFair as I didn't rehair at the time.  Now I do rehair The rest was all me!

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[Whippycorn]

Wow, that's a great restore on Skydancer! 

For Enolaalone, a (rather terrible) picture of my Snuzzle.
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Would you give her a new fringe, [you]?

[Enolaalone]

Wow, that's a great restore on Skydancer! 

For Enolaalone, a (rather terrible) picture of my Snuzzle.
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Would you give her a new fringe, [you]?

Aww she's cute! I love Peachies and Snuzzles. I would leave her fringe as is because I think it gives her character. Plus its not an awful cut. If she had no mane at all I'd be tempted to rehair.

[FantasticFirefly]

SunshinePony,
I'm only against beheading perfectly good ponies- on a good one the seal adds to the value at least for me. So if I couldn't find any signs a scoops has mold/rust with a lightbulb test or looking through the base of her tail I'd NEVER dare behead her. If she was rusty, I'd clean the original parts and replace. It's time consuming, but worth it to me on rarer items.

Most ponies will behead fine, but some like newborns people can rip the neck plug right off if there was enough glue used and the plastic is thin enough. Also, some people use utility blades to score the glue and do NOT do a tidy job! That's part of the reason I tend to avoid ponies who've had heads removed like the plague on ebay. I check carefully for tailrust and sometimes you only see a couple strands of rusty colour mixed in, but if it has rust- it gets cleaned.

I have the similar idea about original hair. I'm fairly good at smoothing it out, I've restored hair that 5 years ago most people would have yanked and replaced. The pony I used as an example on the first page, her original hair devalued her. Not only was it cut short, but very sunfaded and brittle, frizzed and she was a seapony so there was mold oozing out of the base of each plug. If she had otherwise nice hair- I would have treated the mold but hers was a lost cause anyway so I yanked it and used donor hair to match.

 I warm both parts with a hairdryer and twist them back together and the necks have always cooled nice and snug. I don't add more glue to the ones I've cleaned inside....because I don't know how good the formulas are, and I'd hate in 2-5 years that a pony has a yellowed or discolored ring around her neck. I've used lots of adhesives for other things and some non-yellowing glues (some will say "resistant to yellowing") still yellow after a few years. 

[Eskara1862]

Wow, that's a great restore on Skydancer! 

For Enolaalone, a (rather terrible) picture of my Snuzzle.
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Would you give her a new fringe, [you]?

Nope!  That fringe makes her cute and adorable=) However, if she's in your collection and is going to live there, do what makes you happy!