Retro bright

[Tyler S]

Yesterday I did a little experiment to see if I could retrobright my hard top grab handles back to their original grey color. Yellowing is caused by Bromine in the plastic/rubber breaking down over time.
It seemed to work well. I used a 12% hydrogen peroxide hair cream bleaching product. Masked off the affected area,  applied the product, covered with plastic wrap, and then exposed it to UV under 2 black lights for 4 hours. Will rinse and repeat for the second handle.

[Pawel66]

Nice result!

[Jonny B]

Quite a neat approach.

[kampala]

Inspired!

Obviously can only be thought of by someone with hair. That’s why it never occurred to me.

Pretty impressive. 

[Tyler S]

Oops. Almost forgot this pre process photo. You can see the difference in color where the chrome escutcheon covered the end of the handle.
Another interesting point my original sun visors were also originally factory gray but looked creme because of the yellowing. Upholstery code #201 called out for white headliner, grey sun visors and grab handles, and anthracite sill mats.
I’m wondering how many cars had their originally grey sun visors replaced with creme or biscuit, not knowing the original color was light grey because of the Bromine damage.

[49er]

 After reading this, I dug out an old photo taken in '69 to compare with a current photo of my car's sun visors which shows the original cream color seems to have held up unchanged over the years. Maybe the grey pigmentation was more susceptible to the bromine degradiation?

John

[ChrisInNashville]

Wow...I should have paid more attention in high school chemistry...