I was recently gifted an old Macintosh SE in need of some love. In addition, it came with a keyboard and mouse. All three pieces have some of that “classic” yellowing. These old computers and other electronic hardware many of us know and love have a serious disadvantage. The flame retardant chemical additives in the plastic yellow over time, especially in UV light. It makes many of us forget what they used to look like.
In the past few years, there have been a couple of do-it-yourself methods to chemically fix the plastic. They all involve a potentially dangerous level of hydrogen peroxide, but handled CAREFULLY, work very well.
The “quick and easy” one is to use cream peroxide, primarily intended to bleach hair. This is weaker than the Retr0Bright recipe you can find at the link below, and requires more time in the sun, which can potentially cause unwanted streaking.
Members of a couple vintage hardware forums and some chemistry geeks got together and determined an easy-to-make solution that can be spread on the old plastic, plastic bagged, and put in UV light for a period of time to reverse the yellowing effect. I will not detail the recipe here, as again, this is an “AT YOUR OWN RISK” procedure not condoned by Small Dog Electronics.
The mixture can be made with off the shelf products from the supermarket, and should take only an afternoon to have your old Apple plastics good-as-new.
Visit Retr0Bright for more info on this procedure!
I’ll post an update when I’ve completed my own experiment!