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Cleaning up the basement and rediscovered the triplets.

Cam

Well-known member
So I cleaned up some boxes in the basement, an look what I found.
Stil MIA is the keyboard, and the power adapters, but otherwise complete. Anyone have a solution for the sticky feeling that's built up over the years? I'm guessing it's from the degradation of the rubber coating.
 

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Iesca

Well-known member
I aqcuired not too long ago some boxed G3 iMacs and with them an accessories box with a hockeypuck mouse that had gone sticky. Isopropyl alcohol was able to clean it up.

Conversely though, I tried rubbing alcohol on the rubber grip of an old digital camera and it  turned sticky, albeit temporarily (thankfully).
 

splorp

Active member
I can vouch for the use of isopropyl alcohol to help remove most of the stickiness from those Newton cases. It works 90% of time, based on my experience.

If you can’t locate the keyboard or power adapters, let me know. I have a number of spares that I can send to a new home for a decent price.

Also, what’s up with the screen on that OMP/MP100?

Is that a crack or a reflection?
 

Byrd

Well-known member
Yes wiping down rubberised plastic like this will only make it "more sticky", I find sometimes some use of the devices make them more tolerable, like a bit of oil and dust settles things
 

Cam

Well-known member
I can vouch for the use of isopropyl alcohol to help remove most of the stickiness from those Newton cases. It works 90% of time, based on my experience.

If you can’t locate the keyboard or power adapters, let me know. I have a number of spares that I can send to a new home for a decent price.

Also, what’s up with the screen on that OMP/MP100?

Is that a crack or a reflection?

Just a reflection.
 

MacUp72

Well-known member
you have a similar problem with some 90s camera lenses, the rubber plasticizers desintegrate and the rubber parts get very sticky. This is a 'normal' chemical process over 30 years and almost nothing really helps, it is even dangerous to touch these desintrgrating rubbers.
I heard from a doctor this stuff can alter DNA. This is referring to these camera lens plastics of course..
the only thing that made them stop being sticky is talcum, as in baby powder. yes.:p
 

Cam

Well-known member
you have a similar problem with some 90s camera lenses, the rubber plasticizers desintegrate and the rubber parts get very sticky. This is a 'normal' chemical process over 30 years and almost nothing really helps, it is even dangerous to touch these desintrgrating rubbers.
I heard from a doctor this stuff can alter DNA. This is referring to these camera lens plastics of course..
the only thing that made them stop being sticky is talcum, as in baby powder. yes.:p
The DNA thing is odd, but I don't have any plans to lick my Newtons, so . . .
I can see how baby powder sounds would reduce the sticky feel so I'm going to give it a try with a VERY small amount of powder.
 

dcr

Well-known member
So far, my Newton hasn't developed a stickiness problem, but I do have a Flip video camera that has. After having made something else stickier by using isopropyl alcohol on it, I opted to jump straight to powder. In my case, I used mica powder which is used in rubber stamp production. I used a soft bristol brush to apply and remove any excess. That pretty much resolved the issue. I would guess reapplications may be necessary as the rubber coating continues to deteriorate but for now it's holding up.
 

Cam

Well-known member
Interesting. I'm going to have to look for what colour of mica powder would work with the Newton.
 

Juror22

Well-known member
I'm going to have to look for what colour of mica powder would work with the Newton.
I have been using alcohol variants to successfully address rubberized coating degradation on several items (usually it works by removing the outer degraded coating, which is not desirable for all use cases), so I find this use of mica powder intriguing, not to mention that while looking further into that, I found another powder to experiment with, strontium aluminate glow powder!

It is used like the colored mica powder, but it glows in the dark. "Oh no, where did I leave my Newton?", turn off the lights, "Oh, there it is!".
 

Iesca

Well-known member
I did try cleaning the rubber-like surface of an early digital camera only to find that it went sticky with the isopropyl alcohol. Fortunately, it resolved on its own, but it does go to show that iso isn't always safe on all plastics.
 

dcr

Well-known member
I found another powder to experiment with, strontium aluminate glow powder!
Is that the one you have to be careful about getting wet? I remember when I was obtaining glow powder for some projects, there were ones that could not be mixed in with water-based paints because the water would do something to cause problems. They had glow powders that were encapsulated in something protective so they could be used in water-based paints.
 

3lectr1cPPC

Well-known member
Same issue plagues 90s era ThinkPads. Many of them coated the entire case in soft touch rubber, yuck!
I've never heard of anyone mentioning Mica powder. Will have to look into that.
 
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