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restoring plastics yellowed with age

toplessHO

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has anyone tried restoring yellowed plastics with hydrogen peroxide and sunlight?
I see some commercial products that claim to do this,one being hair coloring creme.
Another is a product called retrobrite thats pretty spendy.

Theres also the home brew with hydrogen peroxide and oxi clean.


I have some light grey plastic panels in my truck that have this yellowing where its exposed to sunlight,that I would like to safely remove without destroying the graining. This seems like it may work but would like input from others.
 
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darkzero

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I've done it using this. Worked for me. Purchased at a local Sally Beauty. I swear, that's the only time I've been in that store! :lol:

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darkzero

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I have some light grey plastic panels in my truck that have this yellowing where its exposed to sunlight,that I would like to safely remove without destroying the graining. This seems like it may work but would like input from others.

Sorry for being so vauge. You posted looking for info so I probably should have shared my experience.

The product I posted above is hair developer used for lightening hair & to aid with dying hair... or something like that, I really have no idea. 40 is the strength, more hydrogen peroxide I assume. They come in 10-30 also, get the 40 since it's the strongest. I've heard there is 50 volume & higher but I could not find any. The 4oz bottle I got was the smallest, they come in bigger bottles.

Consistency is like hand lotion. The thicker the creme the better so it stays on the part. You don't want the creme to dry out while exposed to the sun. So I put my part in a zip lock bag. If your part is big, wrapping in saran wrap should work. Works best in direct sunlight. Here in SoCal it gets hot & I was trying to do it around summer time. So the sun was too hot & dried it out quick. I almost resorted to buying a UV light but didn't want to spend the money on one. I ended up putting it on a window sill but had to do it a number of times (multiple days) since that window only gets sun in the mornings.

This trick is for plastics but it doesn't work on all types of plastics so you'll just have to try it if you decide to give this a shot. I was trying to do it on a fiberglass like material, Mitutoyo calipers. It actually worked but not nearly as good as it does with plastic & didn't completely get all the yellowing out.

My pics don't show it that well but here you can see the yellowing (in front of the 0 & after the 50) & the original area that is not yellowed from where the read head sat most of the time.
d0d95b2993c65213d7cfbe88685835f2.jpg


And here it is after. I know you probably can't really tell the difference before & after but these are the only pics I have, I sold that caliper.
44f5c61c72ba726d50af036648ca9518.jpg


This reminds me, I still need to do one more of my timers.
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darkzero

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Heat gun.

Maybe this example will help you out, then again maybe not.

https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showpost.php?p=7661032&postcount=301

Heat gun works for black plastic parts that turn white from oxidation. But it won't take out the yellowing from plastics. I used to use a heat gun on my truck flares & front lower valance before I got them painted. But I've found that Mr Clean Magic Erasers work just as well if not better. Much quicker & easier than a heat gun & no risk of warping the plastic.
 

LXCam

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Heat gun works for black plastic parts that turn white from oxidation. But it won't take out the yellowing from plastics. I used to use a heat gun on my truck flares & front lower valance before I got them painted. But I've found that Mr Clean Magic Erasers work just as well if not better. Much quicker & easier than a heat gun & no risk of warping the plastic.

Copy that, your examples turned out perfect. :beer:
 
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toplessHO

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darkzero

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Will it work on restoring a faded black plastic?

Covered in post 8. Heat or magic clean erasers. Doesn't have to be Mr Clean brand. Generic ones from Walmart work just fine. No detergent needed, just water, but I always wash the parts clean first.
 
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Ralf11

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if the yellowing is on the surface you can use a variety of ways to restore it

but how old is your turck?

if the plastic is 40 years old then it is brittle all the way thru and will crack, fragment, or turn to dust since the plasticiser is all gone from the plastic

old sports car forums or other cult vehicles (VWs) have info on this and the failures of people to keep their beloved windshield washer tanks or gas overflow tanks
 

nbpt100

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Covered in post 8. Heat or magic clean erasers. Doesn't have to be Mr Clean brand. Generic ones from Walmart work just fine. No detergent needed, just water, but I always wash the parts clean first.

Thanks. I should have been clearer. I was meaning the Volume 40 product which looked amazing and easy results on white.

I have used Armour All plastic restorer. It is ok But it has its limits. It shines it up but has little long term effect on darkening faded black. It would not do what the Volume 40 cream did in the AvE video.
 

darkzero

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Thanks. I should have been clearer. I was meaning the Volume 40 product which looked amazing and easy results on white.

I have used Armour All plastic restorer. It is ok But it has its limits. It shines it up but has little long term effect on darkening faded black. It would not do what the Volume 40 cream did in the AvE video.

Ah I see. AFAIK the hydrogen peroxide method only works on plastics (usually white plastics) that turns yellow from UV light/the sun. Someone asked above if it works on clear plastics that have yellowed. That's a good question, I've never tried, but I don't think it would work. I'm curious to try someday.

For black plastics that looks faded (turns whiteish) is usually oxidation and/or drying out. So if you apply a conditioning liquid on it & it still looks white or quickly turns white after the product has died up then usually there's oxidation build up that needs to be removed first. That's when the magic erasers work to remove it. Or heat which basically cooks the oxidation off.

I'd say try the magic eraser first, then apply the Armor All or whatever after.
 

Monza Harry

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Ryan and contributors I added a link to this thread over on H-Body .Org
:http://forums.h-body.org/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=46967&p=281769#p281769
I hope everybody is OK with this, if not let me know and I'll remove it. I am thankful that this information is shared, as for our cars (H-Bodies) there is almost no aftermarket support so we have no choice other than accept less than optimal parts or fix ours, and a thread like this is beyond valuable to us Thanx in advance Harry
 
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toplessHO

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I had some 3% peroxide on hand so I m beginning to experiment.
with that low of a concentration I dont expect it to go very quickly.
One piece is inside a ziplock bag the other is sealed in syranwrap.

Neither piece is going to be used again so it doesnt matter if I ruin something.

Its pretty evident that its sunlight that causes this,taking the a/c vent apart shows where it was exposed and where it wasnt.

Note,all parts should be lt grey
 

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toplessHO

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I read that but the restobrite "experiment" I posted seemed to be more inline with what Im doing.
While the coolant tank was cleaned rather impressively,I dont see how that would be considered UV damage.
I ll keep the sulfamic acid trick in mind the next time I need to clean an overflow tank tho.
 

torqueman2002

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This guy has built a UV light box to whiten yellowed plastic, using Hydrogen Peroxide.

Making the Ultimate Retrobrighting Box
 
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toplessHO

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So far so good
I ll give in one more day in the sunshine before I pull it out of solution.
Im sure I can speed things up with a stronger solution (using 3%) and adding the oxi clean,
but Im pretty impressed with what I see so far using only about $.20 worth of peroxide.
 
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toplessHO

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So I broke down and bought some real peroxide (12%).
I went to Sally beauty supply and the nice ?guy? helped me find some that was liquid.
1 qt was $5 so thats about equivalent to the 3% from the drug store.
I put a few drops on a door panel that was pretty yellowed and covered it in saran wrap
and a couple hours in the sun, I could see a big difference. So it does work.
Next is to mix up some of the hot stuff with some corn starch and a little oxi clean to make a paste.
 
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toplessHO

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pics of the panel I put a few drops on
amazing
 

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