Lightening Yellowing French Resin

Good thinking ! I've always used whitening toothpaste to clean my dolls. I always thought people found that weird??
But never thought about using it the way you did! Very nice will be using this trick too!! Thanks!

 

have you got any before and after photos? i'd love to get a narsha but i wouldnt be able to bear seeing her yellow...

 

This same concept works on the urethane resin kids too. *_~ A peroxide baking soda paste and an electric toothbrush did my girl wonders.

 

May I ask about how much water was in your solution?

 

Fitz: my solution? ummm....alot? XD
I added the 3/4ths cup of baking soda into a empty pot, than put in 2 cups of water, than added in the perioxide. Than filled it up to the buttons on the handle area.

Sofar:
i've been draining the surface water whenever it gets chilled. CAREFULLY, to make sure very little of the baking soda comes out. I brushed him down with a toothbrush, and about two hours into it, rinsed him in hot water.

He's looking whiter. and he was yellowed all the way through. I smell resin so i'm slightly worried if he's burning or something else. He'll be done in another two hours so i'll post an update than. i don't have that many before pictures of his body. and his headcap isn't nearly as bad as the rest of him was. ^^;

I had decided to do this because i took out his spare hands and looked at it next to his body and nearly gagged. It was a sickly color of yellow (like the yellow in the picture icon here, and some on the quote thing in the less severe areas) So i was like X_X well, here goes nothing!

Here's a pic of as soon as i dumped him in. he's alot yellower, i just didn't set the white balance properly X_X;
he wasn't milky white >,> more like milky yellow. ...
oh yeah, i also mix the baking soda whenever it settles >,>;

 

Thanks for this!! I guess it's worth to try it.

Baka question #457: Where did you get the peroxide? XD;;;

Looking forward to your results, Hellsing

ETA: I forgot to ask, is that little guy soaking in the solution french resin or urethane? I spy CP boy parts though XD

 

Himitsu ~ XD i just use Hydrogen prixoide ^^ you can get it in any first aid section or pharmacy as far as i know XD i almost used the entire can of baking soda!

XD and yes, it's a BW cp boy XD so urethane

 

Anyone tried using denture tablets??

 

I use an OxyClean soak when I need to get a face up off - it powers through MSC like you wouldn't believe! A couple, maybe 3 separate soaks in OxyClean and hot hot (not boiling!!) TAP water, leave in till the water is cold....

Anyway, it works to whiten resin too. I'm thinking it's pretty much the same as the peroxide & baking soda thing. I believe (but don't quote me on this!) that the "Oxy" in OxyClean is ... peroxide? Seems I read that somewhere....

 

I'm glad i could help ^_^
if i ever get my hands on a yellowed NS doll, i'll be trying the same thing.

afternote;
RINSE WELL! the baking soda sticks! XD

 

There was a thread like this a LONG time ago where someone soaked their doll in peroxide and baking soda because a relative had left it in a window in the sun for a week and it had yellowed horribly, it should probably be stickied or something since yellowing is a common problem and everyone in the hobby faces it... things like this are a great help to the community.

 

Oh wow! Thank you so much for posting this! I'll be trying that very soon!

I know if you use whitening on your teeth, over time it makes the enamel softer and easier to chip I wonder if it'll do that to resin too.

 

ok, so does the water need to be very hot? what happens when it gets cold? ^^;;

 

himitsu ~ umm...the water just settles faster when it's cold :p my mom always told me that cool water does nothing. (well i mean, my sandle that i left in the lake for six years did turn white...it was pink) but hot water kills germs, and is used for cleaning things properly. So i just assume it should stay warm. I just don't recommend putting the pot on the stove to keep it hot XD
but i doubt it'd hurt to let it cool, so long as you stir it to keep the baking soda up

 

So, I'm not having any luck with this. Can someone help me? I've had the headcap I was doing a "trial" on before I did the entire doll soaking for over 24 hours, and still, there is really no difference. I must be missing something, cause its not working at all for me

 

Sterling ~ hmm... maybe lower the water ratio? it worked for me :/

 

this is probably a silly question, but is there anyway to de-yellow the face while keeping the face-up intact?

 

catsinheat ~ nope >,>;
MSC yellows, resin yellows.
To whiten the resin, you must remove the MSC.
removing MSC can sometimes even whiten the doll XD
umm.. inless you CAREFULLY airbrushed or used white pastel on the faceup..i really doubt it.

 

Thanks! This did work much better. I will post a picture of the difference the treatment made. It was not as severe as I thought it would be, but it did get rid of the yellow/ green tinge. Now I will try the entire doll (not just the headcap!)

 

So, here is the picture of the headcap, vs the non treated head. Please, realize this is Luts white resin, so its not a true white to begin with. The green (my doll turned more green then yellow) is gone after the treatment.



I am nearly done treating my entire doll. She is the same color now on the outside as she was only on the inside. So, basically as white as she ever was. This will not make a doll whiter then they were to begin with, but you can achieve the original color of the resin. When I post pictures of my doll, I will write up my process.

 

I have not had a chance to take/ post pics of how mine turned out, but to help the people who are about to do this, this is what I did.

First and most importantly!!! Clean your doll. However you choose to clean off your doll, but if they are dirty, or have MSC on them, this process will do no good!

There are probably many ways to do this, what follows is how I did it. *NOTE* I completely disassembled my doll to do this*

Take the Baking Soda and Peroxide, and mix it until its just a little thinner then toothpaste. Then brush it onto your doll. Leave overnight.

I rinse off the parts.

Then I mixed baking soda, peroxide, and warm water, and soaked all the parts for a full 24 hours. *NOTE* be aware of where you set your doll parts to do this. If its in sunlight, and you are doing this to get rid of sun damage, that may defeat the purpose*

Rinse everything well! The banking soda can be a pain to get off in small crevices, especially on faces. If you did not get all the MSC off before this process, those areas may be white (the MSC seems to soak up the Baking soda). This is why its SO important to clean your dolls to start with!

This is not bleaching your doll. The results are not severe. It will get rid of a discoloration, but it did not make my doll a chalk white.

I tried the denture tablets on a yellowed headcap. It did not seem to whiten my doll any more then cleaning her with soap and water did.

 

ok, I'm trying this on my yellow french resin girl (well, half her body, to compare with the untreated parts), I did the baking soda/peroxide mix like Sterling, and now I left her soaking in hot water with baking soda and peroxide inside a closed jar.

Let's see what she looks like tomorrow! XD

 

I did this yesterday with a yellowed Cp Lishe, worked pretty well, not a huge difference but well enough for me. Only left her for 5 hours though, I did however double the ingredients though. I'll post a pic later tonight.

 

Well, it didn't do anything really :/

Maybe I needed to use less water, but since I posted her for sale, I'm not going to try anymore >.<

 

With my doll, it was pretty subtle. If I had not kept a piece not treated, and then treated a different piece, I don't think I would have been able to look at her and say "wow, what a difference!".

I did do it once, and had to much water in the solution, and that really did about nothing, so I tried again, and followed what I have written above. Also, my doll was not French resin, she was an old CP girl.

 

I'm about to buy some peroxides aswell, but I'm wondering what concentration the ones being used in this thread is. From hair dressing outlets, I can get 30&#37; concentrated peroxides, where as in Pharmacies I can only buy 6% concentrated peroxides.

So it would be very helpful if everyone can state what level of concentration their peroxide is

Thanks very much

 

Does the Peroxide pit resin? My girl is yellowed badly in one spot, but I'm afraid to try this.

 

question... are we talking about actual peroxide, or hydrogen peroxide, or am I being silly and thinking one thing are two different things?

 

Okay, I've tried this once with my Volks boy - it lightened a little bit, but not enough. So today (Two days later) I'm going to give it another go. This time I'm going to keep the water warm by starting with very hot water in a metal bowl, then keeping the metal bowl in a sink full of almost-boiling water (which is much easier to change than the bowl with the solution in it!). I'll take some photos and post them later tonight when he's all cleaned up .. Here's hoping it works this time!

Edit: I've also doubled the amount of baking soda and peroxide in the water - I went with a half-cup of baking soda and 1 1/2 cups of peroxide, as opposed to 1/4 and 3/4 respectively. :0

 

Bad yellowed spots


Extremely yellow hands D:


Soakin'!

... annnd six hours later.






And the verdict iiiis..: no real help. After six hours of hot-water soaking with double the dosage of baking soda and peroxide, nothing really happened. I even stirred it up a bit every hour or so.


I really have no idea what else to try.

 

I've tried the perioxide/bakeing soda soak lastnight on my first verison shiro-t (one of Volks first pureskin dolls.)

His 'aged' yellowish skin is now more to the color of volk's newer pureskin. I had soaked the parts in a white plastic bin, just filled with hot water high enough to submerge the parts, I let him soak for 5 hours, stiring every once in awhile.

It wasn't untill the next day that I could see any differnce.

But..... I had also soaked the head as well, and it is now a shade or so lighter then the rest of the body! O.O;;;

-_-;; It's alright, thought, since I had intended the charater to be a vampire anyways. I like the paler-skin.

 

did anyone try the denture tablets at all? What about just straight whitening gel? Would that work?

 

Yeh I wonder how one of the expensive tooth whitener in 2 hours or so would work.

 

I just wanted to put in my two cents. I have been a hairstylist for 17 years, you are not, I repeat not supposed to use metal with peroxide. This maybe only with peroxide mixed with hairdye because of the fact hair dye has ammonia in it. Just something I thought I'd throw out there. The peroxide at the phamacy is suitable for human use, as in you can put it on you skin and it won't burn you.
Peroxide used in haircoloring will give you a chemical burn. These are 10 volume and up. I believe the kind at the pharmacy is something like 3 volume. If peroxide in high volume is left on hair for a long time the hair will disinegrate. I am not sure if that is helpful or not.

 

Sorry for bumping this, but... is this peroxide the same as Hydrogen peroxide? It seems that I can get this Hydrogen peroxide at the drugstore here in Norway, but I can't find anything about just peroxide.. ^^;

 

it's the same thing, it should be 1% to 10% hydrogen peroxide. if you were to get a stronger solution, it could damage your doll. (they sell stronger peroxide solutions at beauty supplies; up to 40%)

 

I wonder if this is really just whitening because it is removing the old, yellowed MSC. Has any one tried this on a doll that is known to NOT have MSC coating? I'd love to xompare results on a MSC covered doll and a non-MSC doll.

 

I think my boy is a little yellowed and I would like to just "stay on top" of the problem without taking very drastic action. It's coming up to the time when i would like to take him apart and clean him completley, and I am considering trying to restore the paleness he has ever-so-slightly lost. I don't know what his official skintone was - i didn't choose it, and he came from a small company - but do you think if I were to scrub him with whitening toothpaste after a soap-and-water bath (all dismantled), it would be useful?
I also intend NOT to do his head - he has a nice face-up and I don't want to lose this. However, do you think it would be difficult to make the colours of his head and body match in the future when it has eventually worn off, if the body has had more thorough washes than the head?
Finally: Any particular type of toothpaste to use.... or avoid like the plague?

 

Hi guys! I just want to make sure I've got this....you can't do the baking soda/peroxide thing if your doll has a faceup and the coating? I have a haneously yellowed Narin that I really would like to lighten, but he has a faceup and I'm assuming it has whatever coating they put on it to seal it...
thx!

 

stephanie:

My doll wasn't sealed with MSC and I used only baking soda and it worked too. :3 I have no comparison though, but color differences between parts also got better. She was really badly yellowed at some parts and now it's not annoying anymore. With little bodyblushing the colordifference isn't noticiable anymore.

 

I soaked my friend's french resin Narsha in the following solution for about 24 hours, checking every 4-6 hours for lightening/resin inconsistencies.

97% alcohol [75% of solution]
Hot water + Palmolive Oxy Plus dishwashing detergent [25% of solution]

He went from a tangerine/lemon yellow down about four or five shades lighter. We were both really happy with the way he came out.

I know that others have lightened their dolls much more by leaving them in that solution for 2-5 days, but since the Narsha wasn't mine - I wasn't going to risk longer exposure. I kept his headcap the original color, and it's such a drastic difference. o____O

With a faceup, and in the shade at the zoo...

 

Enki,

I have a yellowed Unidoll and wonder if this would help her.
Do I have to remove her faceup? Or can I do her as she is?
Will it mess up her faceup?
97% alcohol--what is this? Rubbing alcohol?

I'd be interested in seeing a pic of his yellowed headcap next to his new lightened resin.

 

I imagine all french resin is similar... I would test out a hand first, if you're worried. I had no ill effects though.

As for her faceup, if you soak her in alcohol - it's bound to come off. The Narsha boy she has was coated in UV Cut MSC and it came off like a second skin in the water. It will definitely mess up her faceup if you leave her in it.

The alcohol I used is for Salons. I bought it at www.idonails.com - but they have a $25 minimum order. The 32 OZ bottle was $4.95.

For a large SD doll, it would take about 2-3 32 OZ bottles to cover the body completely. She's sending down her white skin MNF El for me to do another alcohol bleaching this month. Lex said I can leave him in the alcohol for a week to get him as white as possible - so once I start the process I'll borrow a camera and post photos of him.

 

I soaked overnight (one day about, 24h) and put some plate on top of the cattle so it would stay warmer longer. Also try different temperatutes? I had pretty warm water when I did this. Also I let it be over night and put again next day with new soda and water. The worst parts I did the treatment third time and differensies between one hand and the body got better. :3

Also I have heard it will not work for some resins, but I am not sure if they let it be long time there enough.

 

Heat speeds up yellowing. I don't see how the hot water baths help as much as keep your hands warm while cleaning the doll. Luke warm or cool water would be better for the doll and won't really affect the peroxide bleaching action negatively. If yellowing is a major worry, try to do everything you can to slow it down. Heat is only going to speed up the process.

I have my doubts about bleaching... How much is it removing the yellowing, as it is super cleaning a aged and soiled doll? A good clean always refreshes the look of a doll. With french resins especially, the translucency we love about them allows the UV damage to go all the way through. You can clean and sand the surface layer off all you want, the insides won't change.

The reason peroxide is so good at cleaning clothes is because it is a strong oxidizing agent. Oxidization is part of the reason our dolls yellow in the first place. This is why even dolls kept in dark closets in boxes still yellow. The air itself is reacting with the surface of the doll continuing the yellowing process. I'm afraid that the bleaching may only be a temporary fix, and could speed up the yellowing process in the long run. I say this because hydrogen peroxide is a reactive oxygen species, and so it is more liable to react with the resin than just atmospheric oxygen. It will react with the grime on the surface of the doll and cause bleaching of the dirt, but ultimately it is more exposure to one of the very things yellowing the doll.

Alcohol, a solvent, just dissolves whatever is on the surface of the resin. A cleaner doll will appear to be less yellowed. Again, I don't see how it is bleaching to reverse yellowing as much as cleaning the doll to look renewed.

By all means, clean your dolls every so often. Remove all the old coatings and freshen them up. But I wouldn't expect miracles. In the end, the resins will age and will yellow. We can do all we can to prevent it, but why set ourselves up for disappointment by thinking we can reverse it? Any bleaching, cleaning, sanding, and what have you is only a temporary fix.

 

okay guys, here are the results of my experiment:

i took my old tan french resin narae apart and put her into a solution of 70% alcohol (the majority of the solution), 10% hydrogen peroxide, and a whole box of baking soda. i left her in for 24 hours.

when i washed and rinsed her off, i did notice that the edges of her yellowing had faded dramatically; of course i think her yellowing overall has decreased, but more importantly, she no longer has hard, noticeable "tan lines."

i will add some photos when her head returns with its new faceup.

the downside:
apparently there were some spots where her previous owner had attempted to sand away at her yellowing. i believe the alcohol really latched onto these spots and lightened them a bit more than the rest of her, because the last time i tried to remove her yellowing, i didnt use any alcohol and didn't get this result.
however, this effect has been gradually fading to match with the rest of her body.



wow, that was a lot of text..

 

Have you tried a toothbrush and a bar of soap in those areas? Sometimes Alchohol leaves residue when it evaporates...if the issue is fading, it might just be residue that accumulated in her rough spots

I'm really interested to see pictures.

 

so guys, i left my french resin narae in a mix of alcohol, peroxide, and baking soda while her head was off getting a faceup. i didnt think it would significantly change her color so that her head would no longer match her body, but i think this is EXACTLY what happened. when her head came back, it was nowhere near the color of her body.

the mixture definitely removed the yellowing, and may have even lightened her up a bit more than she was originally. unfortunately, that means ill have to remove her beautiful new faceup and soak her head before reapplying a new faceup. i dont want to remove the faceup, but the color difference is just too extreme for me

here is a photo of the color difference between her unsoaked head and her soaked body:


drastic, huh?

 

Sorry to drag up an old thread but I'm slightly confused;;;

1) Should the solution be hot or cold?

2) Where in England can I buy Peroxide?

3) If the MSC is not completly off, will it not dissolve in the solution anyway?

Thanks!

 

1) some people use a hot or warm solution, but since heat speeds yellowing, i always use a cold one. it works just fine.

2) i'm not sure where to buy peroxide in england, but i think you should check the first aid section of your local grocery stores, because that's where it is in the US.

3) peroxide isnt the ingredient that helps remove MSC, the alcohol is. and it wont dissolve it completely unless you are rubbing it a bit to help it come off. usually making sure all the MSC is removed involves a bit of scrubbing with cotton balls or magic erasers or other soft surfaces.

 

Do you think this would work on a non-yellowed doll simply to try and pale down the resin itself?

 

it might work. i think my narae definitely looks lighter now that she's been soaked than she did originally, yellowing aside.

 

Just dropped my yellowed french resin Angell Studio Cain in a bath of 32 oz of hydrogen peroxide, about 400g of baking soda (not quite a full box) and enough wate to completely cover him (about two bottles of warm water)

Hopefully pics tomorrow!

EDIT: 4 hours in and the results are alreay obvious. I AM EXTREMELY HAPPY RIGHT NOW XD

 

I just got my lovely, pre-loved Narae who has yellowed a lot, but fortunately very evenly... right now, about half of her body, apart from the torso and head, is soaking in a warm alcohol/baking soda mixture. I'm taking the parts out of the solution every couple of hours and rub them with a magic sponge... I can see some differences comparing the soaked pieces to the untreated pieces already, but I'll let them soak until tomorrow and hopefully will post some great results then

@Ari-chan: Would love to see your results, too ^^

 

as promised, some pictures I took yesterday evening and today...

yesterday, with artificial lightening:

with flash:


without flash:


treated arm vs. untreated torso (with flash):


Arms with flash:


lower legs with flash:


and without flash:



and here are the pictures I took today:

Feet: under natural light, the difference is not as obvious... Maybe because they haven't yellowed as much as the rest of the body, being covered in shoes most of the time...


upper arms: not a real great difference here, either (treated arm is on the left)


hands: more of a difference here


lower arms: as well as here


tighs: not so much here (treated tigh on the left)


lower legs: here again, more of a difference


The pictures themselves aren't too great, due to my terrible camera... the resin actually has a stronger greener tone to it...

conclusion: Well, it does work after all, I'm thinking about letting the treated parts soak for a little more time yet (I didn't leave them in the solutinon overnight), but I'm concerned that too much soaking could harm the resin. Either way, I'll have to get really finde sandpaper and smoothen all the parts... ummm... yeah, and of yourse treat the rest of my Narae's body too ^^;;;

 

Wow, that looks great, Noema! A few years ago, when I got into the hobby, I pretty much accepted that the inevitable yellowing would be permanent. It's reassuring to know that it can be reversed, at least partially.

 

@Nymphetish: Thanky, Nymphetish... I'm afraid the results aren too great, though... I soaked the whole doll for some more time, and while some of the yellowing got better, the resin color is now pretty uneven compared to back when she was overall yellowed... as you can see in the above pictures, for some reason, it just worked better on some parts... plus, the spots where her seamlines were sanded got lighter than the rest, too...
I'll give her a good sanding and see how that turns out, if she is still patchy after that, I'm thinking about trying out retrobright: see info on it here...

 

Interesting. Although I wonder if it affects the resin in ways other than changing its color?