Retrobright Experiment

I finally got around to trying the Retrobright technique to remove yellowing. You need UV light, so doing this in Norway is a bit tricky because the weather is quite unpredictable and we do not have a lot of sun. Also, the Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) needed is expensive and only comes in maximum 6% solution. I have an old computer mouse which was very yellowed and a perfect candidate for this experiment due to its small size.

There are several different methods and recipes to use for Retrobrighting, but I chose the plastic wrap method and using only H2O2 and corn starch. I put the 6% H2O2 into a cup and gradually added corn starch until I thought the mixture was thick enough. Afterwards I poured the mixture on the plastic wrap, put the yellow part of the mouse on the mixture and wrapped it together.

It was supposed to be a sunny day so I put the wrapped mouse outside at 08:30 in the morning, and then retrieved it at 18:30 in the evening, so it got around 10 hours of sunlight in total. All in all I was quite satisfied with the result.

Here is a picture showing the before and after and the different stages, you may notice the small bubbles appearing which is a sign the process is working.