My Retrobrighting Experience 

I'm amazed at how well simple "sunbrighting" works with no chemicals at all. I've done keyboards, a monitor, etc.. just using sunshine and they haven't faded yet. (i tested some pieces for brittleness that i was going to throw away anyway and i didn't notice any degradation)

"Retrobrighting" the yellowed white print on C64 breadbin keycaps also works! I little drop of the hydrogen peroxide cream that covers the letter, add heat/uv light and it will turn white again! Somehow it doesn't affect the dark brown plastic of the keycap, at least not the two times I tried it!

Great Video! Great Topic! Very informative. The plastic wrap method works because it keep the cream moisture enclosed. But the marbling effect is caused by not 'massaging' the plastic wrapped cream around often enough. I have a method that eliminates this problem (as does the vapor method you mentioned). First you need a patch of cement outside that is in the sun. Then a garden hose, a clear plastic box just big enough to cover your item, and a cheap 5" paint roller. Like you did, clean and then paint brush the cream over the unit. Next use the roller to even out the cream. It does not have to be perfect but the more even the better. Take the item outside. Spray the cement area with the garden hose. Place the item on the wet cement (or raise it a little with some wood to something), then put the clear plastic box over it. The sun will make the inside of the clear box very moist and warm. The cream will will become clear after a while, but it is still working. Check after each 1/2 hour. Add water (but not on the item) as needed. The cement should always stay moist. I have used this method for years and always works. (Even on Atari ST's that probably have the worst plastic formula that marbles easily) Even rolling of the cream, and moist warm environment are the keys to success. FYI

Just a small mirror ball and it would be great for the 8-bit dance party!

I have a SNES from 1992 in my closet. It was never exposed to direct sun light, but its case is severly yellowed. Funny thing: only the top-half of the case is yellowed. The bottom half is still in the original color.

Good overview of the process and associated myths Jan. Keep up the good work.

Good overview of the process and myths. Everything you said matches my experience 100%.

The Oxiclean pre-wash spray works very well. It is thick and sticks to the plastic and is easy to apply. Just spray and set in the Sun.

Bel video. sei un grande Jan,come sempre..

My wife have a sewing machine that has yellowed by fluorescent tubes. You could clearly see where the light from the fluorescent tubes has lighted and this was visible only after a few months.

Always a pleasure to see a new video of you :)

I did a video on experimenting with what actually causes the retrobrighting effect about 7-8 years ago when this process was first gaining popularity and everyone thought they "knew" that it was bromides that caused yellowing and it was UV light plus a "catalyst" that would reverse it. My experiments showed that when using a bleaching agent like hydrogen peroxide, UV light doesn't matter - *any* light worked better than none, and UV light didn't work any better than just regular fluorescent light in my basement. I didn't test just sunlight with nothing else in that experiment, but I knew since then that the UV light thing was a myth because I had physical evidence that proved it. (I had taped off different areas of the same computer case and used different methods/lighting on each.) That also suggested to me that a lot of the other supposed truths about retrobrighting were probably also myths, and it's not surprising to me that they've been proven to be. Ultimately as you say it is just bleaching, and it's also temporary because the plastic will continue to break down. Basically everything that I have that I retrobrighted in the past has now re-yellowed. It can happen more slowly if you keep the environment more controlled, but it will still happen. Anyway, I appreciate any video that shines light on some of these myths, as well as what actually does work, if only temporarily.

Love your videos. Keep them coming!

Enjoyed this a lot! going to build one too using your video as a guide!

I always use liquid hydrogen peroxide (12% food grade, highest grade in Germany freely to get), I'm always worried that I'll get streaks in the cream solution. My box is therefore made of plastic and waterproof, prepared with far too much aluminum foil and secured to the lid with 2 UV lamps (2 because the double pack was cheap on AliExpress). The rescue blanket is a fantastic tip, it makes me really want to remake my box!

I remember seeing your retrobrighting box in a recent video and thought, wow. He really needs to redo that box. 🙂

Keep the videos coming Jan always use you videos if im fixing old 8bit computers

32:08 I remember someone (I think it was Neil from RMC) saying most dish soaps leave a residue or are in some way detrimental to the retrobrighting process, recommending car shampoo instead. I use the very cheap "car shampoo" from the Action store (for all you European readers) and have had great success cleaning plastics and retrobrighting afterwards.

Great t-shirt Jan!

I spent a year as a hitch-hiking musician, traveling around France and Spain during my youth and I lived under one of those emergency blankets for the entire time (at night, obviously. Anything else would've been weird!) - so I feel qualified to confirm that the thing is in there to stay for a good long while chief! Nice work!

Super interesting!

You could consider using a cheap plastic seedling propagator as a container. It will be more rigid and more resistant to spillage. You can buy them with built in heaters or use a heating mat. As the lid is transparent, you can just put the LED light on top with some small spacer to keep bulbs from touching plastic. Cover it with an inverted box if you like, with ventilation holes of course.

great job on the box!

Jan, I'm not a chemist either, but I wonder if the yellowing of the plastic is an end result of what kind of plastic was used to make the case and keyboard covers ?

Extra RetroBrite! Nice box.

Nice video. I had the same problem using a grow light and unevenly bleached parts. The side of the part closest to the grow light gets done much quicker, leaving the other sides still slightly yellow. I guess a box with a grow light on each side would be the perfect solution :)

If retrobright really were just bleaching, presumably all plastics would turn white, or pale, instead of returning to their original colors, which is what we observe. Grey returns to grey, cream returns to cream, etc.

My retrobrighting experience is I used peroxide cream and it worked after a week of really hot sun and a lot of effort making sure it didn't dry out. Then I managed to completely wreck a set of Amiga keys by putting them in a jar with 6% liquid peroxide for 2 days in the sun. Some parts of the letter/symbols fell off and they permanently look like they have chalk spilled on them.

I have thoughts about restoring brittle plastics to a more supple state. While restoring the red seat belt buttons in cars that fade to white over time, one can put them in boiling water for a little while, or even carefully use a heat gun. The color comes back. Best practice here is to then put the heated piece in some kind of oil, I like transmission fluid for it. It seems to put something back into the plastic when you do that. Different plastics are different, and from what I understand about ABS, for instance, to "restore" it, you really have to remelt and add back in the plasticizing agent that's evaporated over time. But. I'm kind of obsessed with the idea of putting flexibility back into brittle plastic, and I think heat plus oil over time might work well. Basically, a sous-vide heater in an oil bath at around 40 degrees (about 100F in freedom units) is something I'd like to try. Anyone already tried this? Any chemistry nerds with ideas about what sort of oil (or other substance) would be best for what type of plastic? Or other chemicals to try? And before anyone yells "fire risk!", no, that's not hot enough to ignite the things we put in our cars to make them go or keep them lubricated.

Great video! Would be nice if you try vaperbrighting in the near future.

Great video! It's kind of strange that if the UV-radiation is the cause of the yellowing, why does it reverse the effect when putting it out in the sun ? But yes, overdoing with hydrogen peroxide can definitely damage the plastics. I once retrobrighted some C64 brown keycaps too long. They turned grey.

If I have money: Vaporbrighting No money: Sunshine

So, UV makes plastic brown but also retrobrights?

would Clorox work for Retro brighting?

I've used this method a few times now and always had good results without marbling and I haven't noticed anything becoming more brittle as a result. I'm keeping an eye on things though - some parts I did a year or two ago are showing signs of slight yellowing again.

Danke für das unterhaltsame Video. Geile Idee mit der Rettungsdecke!!!👍😂Evtl. könnte man den Boden mit ein paar Schichten Klarlack noch etwas resistenter machen.

Something that "indoor gardeners" always taught me was that flat white paint is more effective at reflecting light than aluminium foil. Thinking about it I can see no good reason why this wouldn't be true for UV light as well but I might be very wrong there.

I have only tried the peroxide cream covered in saran wrap setting all day in the Sun method. I had mixed results. the first 3 pieces worked great!!! However, subsequent attempts resulted in various degrees of disaster. Marbling, streaks, faded colors. I didnt do anything different

Would it be better to just paint the cases or keyboards?

I always use ozone. I use a small ozone generator and dissolve it in water. ozone dissolves much bettwer than oxygen/air in water. put the plastic in water and put the bubbler of ozone in the water. I use an aquarium air pump for the ozone generator and aquarium air diffuser/bubler. it takes a while.

Would a UV-blocker could prevent yellowing? I remember from when i worked in the plastics industry, we used a layer of plastic to block uv light for packaging plastics used for beverages. Better to prevent then heal, right?

Would mirrors work if you cut them to fit and glue in place?

If you want to build an long lasting box, take a look at Odd Experiments page "Making the Ultimate Retrobrighting Box". His setup is one of the best I have seen. He uses Liquid Peroxide instead of the cream to prevent potential marbling.. I know some can't get it in gallons or it may cost to much to get it...

Can you retro rite the cable?

The only thing I find strange is that simple led's would have any effect. It's visible light with almost no energy to affect anything, have you ever tested if that indeed works without the bleaching?

Hi Jan, good video as usual. Just a bit of a heads up: in English we rarely form a plural for materials by adding an S. For example, we don't say "that cherry, walnut, and oak are woods." We would say "that cherry, walnut, and oak are wood." This applies to plastic as well. We would rarely say "plastics," unless we were really trying to emphasize their differences, or perhaps if we were writing an academic paper (for example, someone *might* say plastics if they were wanting to emphasize that they were talking about two very different types of plastic, like between polyvinyl chloride and polypropylene). This is some odd exception we do with materials. We do it with metal, glass, plastic, wood, water, and even bread! (I guess we think of bread as a material?) I have no idea why. English is weird. It's not enough of a mistake to make your meaning confusing, it's just non-idiomatic to use the S. It took me a minute to think through why it sounded strange, and then I remembered that we do this with almost all materials.

That t-shirt should be added to every country's constitutions!

In der Textilindustrie bekommt man fast reinen Wasserstoff (bis zu 90%) in großen Kanistern. Was ich mich jetzt Frage: Was würde mit einem extrem vergilbten Keyboard passieren, wenn man es mit reinem Wasserstoff behandelt? Ich vermute mal, dass es entweder zum "Turbo-Brighting" oder "Turbo-Kaputt" kommt.

lol luv that t-shirt!

hi, hab schlechte Erfahrungen mit der Wärmeschutzdecke. Die haben eine Plastikfolie als Kern und das Metall zerfällt binnen weniger Monate/Jahre je nachdem wieviel uv drauf fällt.

👍🏼👊🏼💥🍻

There's still a lot of unknowns about how it all works, but the basic gist I get is that heat, UV light and peroxide are the magic ingredients, would be nice if there were actual studies into it done by chemists and physiscs people to finally put it to bed so we know what is right & wrong about the theories... :)

For years I thought the yellowing was due to cigarette smoke. I wish I had seen retrobrighting all them years ago . All best from the East Riding UK .

Cool shirt... But why is it red? It should be either white, or yellow... ;)

That keyboard was almost as dark as my A4000 front. I didn't get it quite all the way back to the original colour but it's close enough to make me content with it.

Disco! And I'm even more old enough to call it "Tanzen gehen". 😂

In my humble experience. - The plastic wrap method is dangerous, it leaves stains due to creases if care is not taken to continuously stir the cream. (If you have done this you have been lucky). - direct light in the sun, you have to be careful about heating, never put the internal components in the sun , disassemble the parts anyway, and check that they do not warp. - and in any case not all plastics react the same way to the sun, better the porous ones, much less or not at all the smooth and reflective ones. - finally I suspect that the main cause of bleaching is heat and no uv as such. (i suppose) bye :-)

You retrobrighted the bottom of the retrobrighting box 😂

Die 300 Watt könnten passen. In der Pflanzenleuchte befinden sich 96 LEDs. Und 2 oder 3 Watt LEDs sind mittlerweile nicht mehr ungewöhnlich. Ich denke, dass man mit flüssigem Peroxid weniger Arbeit hat, als mit der Paste. Teile rein, Lampe an, gut ist. Kein pinseln oder massieren. Alle 2 Stunden mal schauen, statt alle halbe Stunde. Und nachdem die Box ja jetzt Jan-sicher ist... 😉

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There is no efficient way to stop yellowing, besides painting the part. You can only repeat all the retrobright-process every time - for years. I'm still that opinion, the cream stuff is more dangerous and time consuming, than other methods (no massage every 30min in other methods needed). Finally you mentioned the fluid method and also the vapor one - but exactly in the case of the Atari mouse, the simplest method would be the fluid peroxide. It's also more secure in handling, costs less and the chemical is re-usable. Much better for the environment. You should mention this, too.

- edited - Said something I meant well / was supposed to be funny but could be misinterpreted as an a$$hole comment.