to clean or not to clean?

Thanks for the reply. I might try the mild dish soap route. I'm still a little hesitant as I'll need to take the guy apart as I'm always worried about water getting inside the toy and sitting there causing worse problems than a minor tack problem. I may give it a try this weekend and post an update.

 

I would use Ivory bar soap first. You don't have to take it apart. If any water gets inside it shouldn't be much, and it will dry out.

 

I received a Hawaii spray Mephilas in the mail today. It was very dirty. The vinyl is quite brittle feeling so I did not try to take it apart. I washed with soap and warm water and used a toothbrush to get into the small spaces. I think it cleaned up pretty good.

A few photos below. More here: https://imgur.com/gallery/tORkXft

 

Nice job! Your gentle soap and scrub must have taken quite awhile (gold stars on cleaning the heavily textured legs and the hip joints), and the metallic finish is nicely intact (the blue chest, silvered "mouth", and gold eyes!). Congrats on a great adoption! Thank you for showing the before and after photos, always nice to see a comparison.

 

Wow. That 1st picture was pretty rough. This cleaned up real nice. Still has some vibrant colors. I'm sure it was an act of patience and it payed off nicely.

 

p.s can we please see what's on those shelves? Looks like a lot of goodies!

 

@NewChrissy that cleaned up great. The paint is still really nice under all that dirt. Ive noticed a lot of japanese sellers dont attempt even a basic cleaning before auctioning. I guess they are worried about damaging the paint.

 

'Astonish'

Mould and mildew blaster. No need to scrub.

<5% Anionic Surfactants, Non-ionic Surfactants. Chlorine based bleaching agents.


This product might of been mentioned before, but I don't think so. Not sure. Anyway, i wanted to clean mould/dirt off a beautiful vintage ball. I'd tried all my cleaning tricks, and resorted to vigorous scrubbing, which didn't work either. So I bought 'Astonish' on a whim, and guess what, it worked incredibly well. Spray it on, leave it for a bit. Repeat a few times, and then I rinsed it off with cold water. The rubber ball was completely rejuvenated.

I started trying it on all types of plastic, rubber, soft vinyl. Admittedly, I haven't tried it on Sofubi yet. But so far, every single vintage toy I've tried it on has benefited from being sprayed with the stuff. It seems to have no detrimental effect on paint applications at all, I was worried about the bleach, but I've had zero problems over the months I've been using it. I initially tried it on a box of old vintage squeakers I'd bought as a lot. An attic find on eBay. They were absolutely filthy, so very cheap. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to clean them satisfactorily, looking at the photos, but they were cheap enough to give them a go. Mainly rubber and soft vinyl, and it worked a treat again. It definitely freshens up older plastics, especially if the plastic has more of a matt finish.

Another good example is a toy I have with light yellow blow-mold wheels. The axles have rusted many years back and the rust looked like it had kind of melded with the plastic of the wheels. Again, scrubbing with the usual cleaners had no effect at all, but this product kicked arse. It made the wheels look almost new again, with just spraying and rinsing.

It does leave a faint lingering bleachy/chlorine smell on the toy for a while. But I've confirmed that fades after a few days. Overall I've seen no negative effect on the various plastics/paints at all. It hasn't worked on everything but overall its well worth trying.

I wouldn't pretend to understand the active ingredients, but if you can find it or a similar product in your own country, I'd recommend giving it a bash ...

 

@NewChrissy - Excellent clean up on the Mephilas. I know that it can be somewhat stressful to clean the more expensive vintage toys, especially the ones might have brittle vinyl or fragile paint. I think you did a great job on this one. There is something very satisfying about bringing back the luster of decades-old paint and vinyl on these wonderful toy monsters and heroes.

@XVivaHateX - Jonathan, I believe it is true that most private sellers will not clean the found toys, and I have also heard it is used as an obvious way to show the vintage "patina" to prove the authenticity of the toy. It does seem though that there are other collectors and shops in Japan that are cleaning up found vintage toys. I had recently purchased a specific toy from a collector there that had been much improved from when I saw it last at auction a few years ago. In the auction listing, it was very dirty and had a lot of color transfers along with some pen marks on the eyes. Most of these imperfections had been cleaned up to the point of barely being noticeable anymore when I saw it again this year for sale. I am very interested in the topic though as I sometimes wonder what ratio of collectors in Japan clean vintage toys or not. Some of the toys I purchase have some disgusting muck on the inside. I could not imagine just putting that on the shelf to let rot forever.

@The Moog - Interesting recommendation and I would be curious how it reacts to Japanese sofubi and vintage paints.

On a similar topic, I purchased a bottle of Twin Pines Formula-911 for a specific project, and I have some mixed results to report back here. I have two vintage sofubi that are heavily affected by smoke/tar damage. They must have been on display in a chain-smoking home because the toys have hardened discolored sections of vinyl where it just looks like the tar has fused with the vinyl itself. I have tried both the the outdoor airing method for many weeks and also stored them in a paper bag with fresh kitty litter for over two months. It seemed to help out quite a bit, but now the smoke smell has been slowly returning again. I diluted the Formula-911 in half with water, and gave it a try to remove some of the surface tar and discoloration. Although it did seem to be lightening up the dark tar discoloration, I found this cleaner to be too harsh on the vintage soft vinyl and it was making thin spots and removing the shiny luster of the original vinyl. This could be because the tar had already damaged the vinyl, but in the end it was making the surface look worse. I was also trying some general cleaning with the product to see if it would help with any smoke smell, but I got nervous about how it would react with metallic paint. Does anybody else have experience with this product or removing surface tar?

On a lighter topic, sometimes you find amazing things while cleaning old toys... like vintage dinosaur eggs:

 

I recently received this beautiful Bullmark Varan from an interesting collection that had characters from early Marusan to late Bullmark kaiju toys. The condition on the pieces in the collection has varied from pristine to rough, and it's been difficult to tell if some of the issues were from original owners or from display or storage over the years. The caked-on dirt/dust on the Varan was really baked on and seemed to be very old. It looked like it might have cleaned off easily, but if wiped with a damp cloth it would just reappear again after drying out. It had me wondering if the collector actually displayed it this way after finding it, or if the dirt was picked up from storage at some point. The collection was also described as being from an elder member of the family and could have been in storage for many years or decades:




I would rate the cleaning job as moderately challenging as it required multiple sessions and the Varan sculpt is covered with very detailed textures. It was a time commitment to clean, but I could not imagine putting it on the shelf with that much dirt and calling it good. The metallic green sprays are really something special on this red/orange vinyl. These photos do not really do it justice:

 

Purchased a real filthy double stamped marusan Goji.

Took him apart, gave him a nice warm bath with some mild soap, scrubbed him with a tooth brush and finished getting rid of all the gunk with q-tips.

Good as new

 

Sup fam? Had this super fun Astro Boy coin bank in my last Buyee box. I really dig him, but he appears to have mold IN the vinyl. Is this the dreaded Kabi!? Will it spread? Should I waste any time on this, or throw him in the trash? Already did a hot bubble bath with dish soap to no avail. Thoughts? Suggestions? Ty in advance and happy Sunday!

 

I think most people think Kabi is debunked? Don't correct me please, my belief seems to be keeping everything at bay in my own collection.

I wouldn't try this with all of the toys I own, but probably it would be all right with your Astro Boy: put some dish soap and Oxi Clean in some super hot water in a big bowl and soak your guy in there. I think it will help to brush the affected areas with a tooth brush too. After you do that, soak him in some hot water and let him dry. Doing it more than once may help clean out those tiny dirty bubbles.

The Oxi Clean I have used with success is the powder "Oxi Clean Versatile Stain Remover" laundry detergent. I got out very similar spots in a vintage Bullmark Kamerking. But of course, try any cleaning method at your own risk. I removed silver paint from a vintage toy doing this once, an Enterprise Shugaron. The other paint was fine but the silver came off like it was fresh ketchup or something. That was a sad day.

 

@patrickvaz agree with Chris, the whole kabi thing is kind of a myth IMO. Ive never had any success getting this kinda dirt out of the small vinyl holes. I would just enjoy him as he is

 

Perhaps it's not organic material like dirt or mold. Perhaps it's the result of oxidization or some similar chemical process that happens to the vinyl over the years.

 

+1 for dirt in micro air bubbles.

 

It's the loss of innocence, grief, and madness.

 

Do you think the vinyl might be succumbing to some sort of molecular ennui? That the polymer chains are breaking down due to boredom? Caused by the soulless minions of orthodoxy?

 

@patrickvaz Just curious, but was the Astro Boy really dirty before you washed him, or was the only dirt in the bubbles?

I know there were 1 or 2 people here who really believed in 'kabi', but I don't think anyone ever produced concrete evidence of vinyl mold that supposedly spreads from piece to piece. 'Kabi' literally just means 'mold' in Japanese, so it's not a special term or anything. It's definitely possible for vinyl to grow mold under the right conditions, but it usually cleans off fairly easily.

The one thing that makes me curious about these vintage vinyls that show up from time to time with these micro-bubbles and impacted dirt, is how the bubbles form and how the dirt gets into those tiny holes. You almost never see modern vinyls with surface micro-bubbles, so what caused them to form in the vintage toys? Just less quality control? I also rarely see vintage vinyls with clean micro-bubbles; they almost always have this impacted dirt appearance. Moreover, the dirt collects in odd patterns- for example, on the Astro Boy, it looks like there is impacted dirt almost all the way around the base of the head. Unless it was stored upside-down, why would dirt collect on all sides? I have also seen some examples of micro-bubbles that appeared to have impacted dirt with some degree of staining in the vinyl around the bubbles (which might suggest that it isn't dirt at all). Although I don't think the explanation is the infamous 'kabi', this part of the micro-bubbles + dirt explanation has always bothered me.

I almost wonder if Roger is on to something and there is a slow chemical reaction or physical state change that is happening in these toys. Maybe the 'bubbles' are actually forming in the vinyl over a long period of time, and the 'dirt' is a grease/oil byproduct from this process.

 

@akum6n - That is a very interesting theory. Something like the PVC is breaking down and this is a symptom? Seems odd that it would create air bubbles or holes within the vinyl itself without extreme heat but stranger things have happened, especially in storage conditions. I observe this symptom the most on some very old Marusan vinyl that does indeed appear to be softer and of a lower quality compared to other vintage toys in my collection. Many of these toys seem to have very many microscopic "air bubbles" or whatever this symptom maybe, but not all of them display the the darker discoloration around or in the holes unless the bubbles are open on the surface.

 

I mean he was a lil dirty, but not like covered or anything. It definitely appears that these are all micro bubbles filled with dirt though. Regardless if dirt was rubbed in, grew mold, or even a chemical reaction.

 

If it is dirt I wonder if an ultrasonic cleaner would dislodge it. Though I have no idea if that would be safe on vinyl or not.

 

You also don't want to dislodge the paint.

I say we should all just embrace entropy. It is the way of all things.

 

I recently did a quick literature review on vinyl conservation methods. The attached article by Shashoua and Segel was good. The discussion of plasticiser migration and mitigation in vinyl will be of particular interest to those on the forum. I also made a solution of isopropyl, distilled water, and polysorbate solidified with methylcellulose to make a gel. It was reasonably effective at removing marks and slightly lightened permanent marker without removing paint but I'm not sure it was worth the effort as compared to standard cleaning methods.