YOU'RE YELLOW! VF-25F turning all sorts of colors

[MKT]

My YF-25 and Yf-30 have also majorly yellowed like @enphily's pic above. But that was own fault as well as didn't properly keep it away from sunlight in early days of collecting.

Speaking of which, Bandai needs to reissue the YF-30. Kinda strange they didn't milk the mold for this.

 

 

[Raikkonen]

10 hours ago, ValkAddict said:

The thread always makes me sad

I know. It's like looking at cheese age. lol 

[Sandman]

I was browsing BBTS and i came across this:

 

https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/VariationDetails/295196?o=9

 

Anyone have experience with this product? Does it prevent yellowing?

[m0n5t3r]

7 hours ago, Sandman said:

I was browsing BBTS and i came across this:

 

https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/VariationDetails/295196?o=9

 

Anyone have experience with this product? Does it prevent yellowing?

What would really be great is, if someone would invent something that permanently restores yellowed plastic. 

[GreenGuy42]

On 12/19/2024 at 2:02 AM, m0n5t3r said:

What would really be great is, if someone would invent something that permanently restores yellowed plastic. 

A bath in a hydrogen peroxide mix and exposure to a UV light will do it. I did this to restore an old, white Kenner TIE fighter. You’ll have to do some disassembly and need to expect any stickers to degrade. 

[PvtPrivate]

10 hours ago, GreenGuy42 said:

A bath in a hydrogen peroxide mix and exposure to a UV light will do it. I did this to restore an old, white Kenner TIE fighter. You’ll have to do some disassembly and need to expect any stickers to degrade. 

Peroxide bleaching is unfortunately not permanent. In my experience they will go back yellowing after about 1-2 months, tried on a Yamato VF-1, Yamato VF-22S, DX YF-30, DX VF-25, all turned yellow again. It does help on severe sun damage though, at least it only goes back to slightly yellow not sunburnt dark orange. Also please do not use UV light, what peroxide bleaching actually needs is the HEAT, not the UV light. We already have cases of UV burns and partial blindness because of unsafe retrobrighting setups that use UV lights.

[PvtPrivate]

I wonder if sealing it with a UV blocking topcoat will help it from returning back to yellow 🤔

[GreenGuy42]

7 hours ago, PvtPrivate said:

I wonder if sealing it with a UV blocking topcoat will help it from returning back to yellow 🤔

I have an old PS1 that I used the above technique and it hasn’t re-yellowed. Begs the question how much it’s tied to the chemistry of the plastic.

I’m curious if that product from BBTS would help prevent yellowing after re-whitening the plastic. The only issue with any top coat is it’s likely not easily removable to re-whiten if it doesn’t work. 
 

[BlueMax]

20 hours ago, PvtPrivate said:

I wonder if sealing it with a UV blocking topcoat will help it from returning back to yellow 🤔

Tried this. Answer is no.

[RealJayDee]

Hey guys! not a Vf 25, but just discovered my TV Super VF 1S Yammie, fell victim to father time. 

It was yellowing but seemed to hold pretty good, however just discovered it quickly worsened on the right side, it was on display on a most of the time dark room, with no direct sun light or artifitial light. Funny that one side has yellowed more than the other...

shame! maybe i'll try to cover it with a custom weathering

[Froy]

27 minutes ago, RealJayDee said:

Hey guys! not a Vf 25, but just discovered my TV Super VF 1S Yammie, fell victim to father time. 

It was yellowing but seemed to hold pretty good, however just discovered it quickly worsened on the right side, it was on display on a most of the time dark room, with no direct sun light or artifitial light. Funny that one side has yellowed more than the other...

shame! maybe i'll try to cover it with a custom weathering

Is that a TV VF-1S or DYRL? Judging by the color of the metal plate under the intake I guess is a TV.

[RealJayDee]

11 hours ago, Froy said:

Is that a TV VF-1S or DYRL? Judging by the color of the metal plate under the intake I guess is a TV.

It's the tv hikaru super vf1s, which was supposed to be full white 

 

[David Hingtgen]

My 1/60 Roy DYRL VF-1S has recently turned yellow similarly.  NEVER exposed to sunlight, always kept in a windowless room.  And for the past couple (5+ actually?) years, kept inside its windowless box in the closet.  It wasn't yellow at all when I packed it up.  Unpacking it a few years later--yellow.  

[treatment]

 

https://x.com/simsim5479/status/1947650440591487431

web-translated:

 

[borgified]

Looks like that Heppoko Samurai  has not been reading in between the lines in the respective threads in regarding the yellowing of the various valks in its proper threads or just experienced it now.    

 

[Raikkonen]

The thread of horrors... Quite paranoid with yellowing lately... so much that I'm having second thoughts of a Metal Build Eva-00 pre-order due to having some white parts... 

[Devil 505]

I haven't opened up my VF-25F or my Nora SV-51γ at all, and now I'm afraid to see what I'll find.

[Pontus]

I thought I read somewhere that the styrofoam these were packed in was the cause of yellowing.  If that's the case, then keeping them in the boxes may have been the problem.  

[borgified]

That was one of the theories that a former member on the boards mentioned it @Pontus (have zero idea if it’s actually true). 

Styrofoam and plastic clear trays are made from stuff that can “gas” out fumes and leech onto the surface of the next item that it contacts it, plus that item itself that we got it also may have other materials that have off gasses that may cause yellowing as well. 

It’s like pleather on some 1:12 and 1:6 scale figures. Pleather is a curse in these things as it know as a cheap version of synthetic leather and it will destroy itself in very humid environments, but there are cases that it has zero effect on other instances. 

* Sidenote: Bonded leather materials are also s*** as they will definitely degrade overtime and you’ll be left with multiple flake material that looks like snake that just recently molted. 

[Raikkonen]

I'm been looking into this for a while, especially after some of my white lego pieces from the same set yellowed yet others haven't. Same story with another set but with light grey peices. It's like those really used vintage Stormtroopers from the 70's, where every peice is completely different tone of yellow except for one that is still reletively white. 

There's many factors behind yellowing and a lot of times is a combination of many elements to even just a single one like humidity or sunlight, or to artificial like cigarette smoke or the chemicals released by it's packaging. Sometimes, and here's the shocker, it's not even about coming into contact with any external element, but just the quality of plastic simply aging. 

At the end it really comes down to that, the quality of plastic and paint. With plastic it's initial reaction could be when exposed to the air too soon after injection or when the mold isn't cleaned sufficiently between a certain number of castings. While for paint, some external element got mixed during application, and for both plastic and paint a likely probability are the chemicals that form them just weren't mixed 100% properly, or some batches just weren't at 100% exactly of all the compounds that form them. 

And... there's no escape when yellowing starts. Followed quite a lot of video fixes where the white returns to it's pristine state... but guess what? The yellowing returns and sometimes even faster after each treatment. 

I have one interesting item however, a Bandai Gundam Fix Figuration from 2002, the Gerbera Tetra I believe it's called, which is painted all matt white minus the disguise armour. Anyway, it's 23 years old endlessly posed, displayed in humid enviroments, displayed in hot dry enviroments, displayed in a very sunlit room, moved between 3 different countres, even left it closed in some cheap plastic packet for years and... it's still pure white. 

Meanwhile, other Bandai items that were once white and barely touched while stored in cool and dark cabinets, are now fit for a desert storm sequel. 

That said, along with the dreaded yellowing, most of the early 2000s figures and toys made with PVC like the early Kaiyodo Evas or Bandai statues, have an even worse reaction when going against time... they release a sticky goo which is almost impossible to remove, and if successful in clearning it off, eventually returns. I can testify to this nightmare with many casualities. And at times, this PVC instead of releasing that sticky goo, dries up so much that it begins to brittle apart especially at the joints where there's less paint. 

Diamonds are forever, but toys sure ain't. 

Edited August 16 by Raikkonen