old toys- is this a type of mold or just old dirt???

[mazinz]

I have seen the following below a number of times. They are brown/rust (they are NOT black) colored spots on older plastic. I know that these toy examples below (both old tyco
slot car items) were not in a flood or anything with water leakage, so I am curious just what these spots are? They are not on everything else that were in the same close to 30 year old cardboard box as the two items shown. It does seem to clean off and I notice this more so with items stored in old cardbaord boxes rather than just beinng on the shelf and also seemingly affecting just plastic.

What am I looking at here? Is this a type of mold or is this just old dust/dirt over a number of years mixed with aging plastic? The cardboard box itself was also very clean and as mentioned the same age as the toys that were kept in it. I assume if it were mold I would also see it on the inside of the box and most of everything else.. maybe?

I kept the image larger so it is easier to see

[ShadowAvenger]

It may be "bromine released from flame retardants added in the master batch to facilitate production and later molding. (Bromine, you will recall is a dark reddish brown liquid at room temperature) The loss of bromine doesn't necessarily mean that the plastic itself is deteriorated or unable to give decades of further performance, though a mental illusion often convinces us they feel brittle or rough."

I found the above quote at another forum with "De-Yellowing plastic - the stain isn't permanent after all" as the title of the post thanks to Google.

[mazinz]

It may be "bromine released from flame retardants added in the master batch to facilitate production and later molding. (Bromine, you will recall is a dark reddish brown liquid at room temperature) The loss of bromine doesn't necessarily mean that the plastic itself is deteriorated or unable to give decades of further performance, though a mental illusion often convinces us they feel brittle or rough."

I found the above quote at another forum with "De-Yellowing plastic - the stain isn't permanent after all" as the title of the post thanks to Google.

Interesting. I did see the topic title when I went looking on google to find the issue (which I did not see really on the net), but I originally did not associate this with yellowing, hence I did not click the link. The only slight issue I have is that these items were never in the light for like 30 years (and the spots were not there when they were put away) however it did mention heat, so it is a possibility that the humidity from nasty NY summers may have made the chemical reaction occur. Either way I am glad it is not some sort of mold.

[Gorn Captain]

I think this is mold, the circular pattern gives it away.
I had the same thing happen when a part of my collection had been in storage. I had two specimens tested in a lab, and two different types of mold were identified.
The mold grows in circles, dust doesn't collect that way.

Even when it's not visible to the naked eye, I recently bought a boxed mego that smelled of "basement", and when I cleaned it, the mold showed up in parts of the packaging, with just some parts discoloring.

[mazinz]

I think this is mold, the circular pattern gives it away.
I had the same thing happen when a part of my collection had been in storage. I had two specimens tested in lab, and two different types of mold were identified.
The mold grows in circles, dust doesn't collect that way.

Even when it's not visible to the naked eye, I recently bought a boxed mego that smelled of "basement", and when I cleaned it, the mold showed up in parts of the packaging, with just some parts discoloring.

It may be mildew (which technically is mold but not the black mold), but again very odd. The box had a lid (it was one of those fancy storage boxes that you would fold together). This was filled with old slot car stuff. Some of the things were dirty but nothing in the box had the same issue as the two pieces in the photo. This even includes some small Atlas boxes from the 70's that were the package for "bridge pieces". Even further weird is that all of these were put in the box at the same time many years ago and the shown pieces were clean.

In the end I cleaned every single thing in the box and eventually will transfer it to a plastic storage container with a ton of Silica gel packs to keep things dry. Lysol wipes took care of everything

These are the two items i had originally shown. The "spots" on them were also just on the outside of the toys, they were not on the inside (I looked/checked this) nor on the bottom of the items. As mentioned the cardboard box was also very clean. We have had some really nasty humid summers here so it is possible why or however it decided to start on these is beyond me, but that could be the cause, since the box was stored in a downstairs (a finished downstairs) closet. Also odd is that NOTHING else in the closet (old board games, etc) had this infection. The walls are fine, the floor is fine and everything else in the closet was fine (did a massive spring clean and put in new shelves so i went through everything).

At any rate here they are now, clean:

.

[Gorn Captain]

Mold is a really odd thing. It doesn't always react the same way. Some things in a box get it, while other things in the same box don't.
And they don't always react the same to treatment. I treated some boxes with alcohol wipes (just dabbing the mold with it), and the boxes quickly dried out and were perfectly fine. The mold never returned and the boxes looked clean. Other boxes reacted badly, started discoloring, and you could see the pattern of the mold (even the previously invisible parts of it) on the cardboard, turning paler than the original color of the packaging (ruining the look of the box).
In the end, it's a terrible thing to happen to stuff you love.
On plastic, it cleans up pretty well, so I think you'll be fine with this piece. All my plastic items became "mold free" after treatment.
Or to (sort of) quote Poltergeist: "This toy has been cleansed!"

[mazinz]

Mold is a really odd thing. It doesn't always react the same way. Some things in a box get it, while other things in the same box don't.
And they don't always react the same to treatment. I treated some boxes with alcohol wipes (just dabbing the mold with it), and the boxes quickly dried out and were perfectly fine. The mold never returned and the boxes looked clean. Other boxes reacted badly, started discoloring, and you could see the pattern of the mold (even the previously invisible parts of it) on the cardboard, turning paler than the original color of the packaging (ruining the look of the box).
In the end, it's a terrible thing to happen to stuff you love.
On plastic, it cleans up pretty well, so I think you'll be fine with this piece. All my plastic items became "mold free" after treatment.
Or to (sort of) quote Poltergeist: "This toy has been cleansed!"

I had a second box of slot car stuff that was stored with the first box previously mentioned. This one everything was much cleaner (same exact type of box as the first one and both in the same closet). Only found 3 guardrails that had it, so i just threw them away. Nothing else was affected, though I cleaned everything anyway. Both are now in plastic storage containers and the silica gels packats will be picked up this week. You are right, it is very odd on what is "chooses" to infect, (or what little it does infect)