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I personally don't care about the appearance of the spots, the thing the only thing that bothers me is the fact that it may spread from pony to pony?
'pony cancer', 'age spots' and vinyl deterioration all refer to the same thing - the small brownish diffuse spots that eventually show up on most old ponies. That doesn't necessarily mean they're all caused (and likely aren't!) by the same process. Every batch of ponies had a different formula, and they've all aged differently so at this point it's impossible to control all variables. As for the bacteria / mold vector, I'm not convinced it's causality and not commonality. Just because two things show up together doesn't mean one was the direct result of the other. Paint doesn't so much deteriorate the plastic as it does deteriorate the condition of the pony - because the pigments and sometimes other chemicals (sealants, binders, glues, suspension medium, etc.) are attracted to the porous vinyl and leech out. The edges may 'bloom' over the months/years, making the paint fuzzy or leaving rings of discolouration around the affected area. Not all paints do, for the vast majority of commercial pad printed symbols there are no problems, while over in the Nirvanas it's sometimes impossible to find certain ponies with much symbol left at all. Structurally the vinyl itself is fine, it just looks ugly. Temperature, humidity and exposure to reactants (including UV) are the main factors in breakdown acceleration. Certain components are more or less susceptible - that's why we can sunfade most ponies, destroying the ink pigments without the vinyl being impacted. Not all pigments are equally light-fast (aka resistant to UV) - reds/oranges tend to be the weakest, blue the strongest. There's no way to predict what exactly will happen when you take Specific Pony A and combine it with Specific Paint (or other chemical) B. In general though, paint doesn't accelerate deterioration; it causes its own problems instead (primarily dye leeching) which are often even more unsightly than the original issue.
Geeze no, I don't believe in baiting ponies for minor issues. And I think most people agree.
Quote from: Taxel on December 09, 2016, 01:03:07 AMAt this point I think we as a community need to start accepting ponies for what they are: simple plastic toys made for children that were not intended to be collected for decades. We should take better care of the ponies that are still around, flaws or not, and stop baiting just because a pony is dirty or has tangled hair.Yes . . . I've made customs in the past and I enjoy looking at customs, but dang it seems like some ponies get baited for having the least flaw. (G4 customs are in a different boat, since every time one is bought off the peg, Hasbro makes another . . . G4 customs of current ponies don't reduce the number of "original" G4s around.)Hasbro used to sell blank white G3s for customization . . . I wish some intrepid customizers would band together and produce blank ponies in G1 molds.
At this point I think we as a community need to start accepting ponies for what they are: simple plastic toys made for children that were not intended to be collected for decades. We should take better care of the ponies that are still around, flaws or not, and stop baiting just because a pony is dirty or has tangled hair.
Do you mind if I quote parts of this on the site? You explain it really well. Customizers have come up with a lot of solutions for this, such as sealing under the paint, etc.
While I'm by no means an expert in plastics, I do have a background in museum sciences and the golden rule for conservation is "Do as little as possible." balanced against the collection serving its purpose of course.
I will probably re-boil my afflicted Bright Eyes and continue to love her, and continue to love my afflicted Gingerbreads especially the first one because she was donated to me for cancer study by a very generous arena member and I'm only holding off on her treatment because I want to understand why Gingerbread darkens in the sun rather than whitens so I can be sure I can have the best chances of returning her to "service" of being enjoyed on display and handled, not sacrifice her.
Thank you all! I hope my baity Seashell will be okay! Might make a custom out of her, because i already have a good Seashell!