How's the underlying plastic? Any smearing, discoloration or damage to the plastic itself?

 

I've heard that the yellow on his shoulders is painted and was recommended that the only way to get rid of the battle damage is to paint over it in a matching yellow.
Source: A semi-recent episode of RFC, obviously right around the time Springer got into people's hands.

 

Springer is indeed painted on those parts and the battle damage is on top of those apps, so you lose both when you try to get rid of one.

 

No damage to the plastic, and I worked around any areas with paint apps, like the faction symbol and the red paint on the wings cause i didnt want to smear it. So there's still some of the battle damage paint on the red stripes of the wings on my figure.

 

I'm attempting to use 99% on starscreasm..i have SOAKED the arms and used cotton swabs...that stuff is not budging.

 

I had a bad feeling about that. I used 91% and no matter how hard I scrubbed, it didn't make a dent. The stuff on the wings and fuselage, though, came off okay.

Does anyone have suggestions for getting at the details, though? I've removed the big splotches, but can't see to get at the stuff in the molded-in detail.

 

ok so, for clear plastic, when it turns cloudly like that, hit it with a coat of future [i hand brush it on].

for example, removing the tint from the univ 2.0 swipe mold makes it a bit cloudy
https://i.imgur.com/JCo1nyQ.jpg

but a coat of future fixes that up
https://i.imgur.com/Uo0LGzX.jpg

 

The paint on Springers legs is easy to remove. Not made any progress on his chest yet, doesn't want to budge.

His shoulders are weird. I use what's known as surgical spirit which contains Ethanol of 91% I think, maybe more (here in the UK we can't get isopropyl alcohol in store) one of the shoulders was a dream, the silver came off and the yellow remained. But when I attempted to do the other shoulder, using the same method it started taking the yellow paint off too. Gonna have to repaint the yellow now.

Not thought about attempting to remove the battle damage on the dark green bit on his back.

 

So I ordered a 35th Megatron to remove the cell shaded paint. Below is my results. It took a long time and it could use a little more work but I'm pleased with the result.

 

WARNING: Do not use isoproyl alcohol on Mirage's legs. I HATE Cybertronian writing and was successful in removing it from Prowl, when it came to Mirage however, the writing is on the clear plastic legs.

Alcohol and nailpolish remover will cause plasticizers to leech out of the plastic. My legs just completely crumbled into pieces after a few applications waiting for the paint to dissolve/dislodge. Clear plastic became un-plastic  

 

I'd like to give this a bump for a dumb question. Because of the current situation of life right now, it tends to be difficult to grab regular Isopropyl in stores and online, but the usual last ones to sell out in my area are "Wintergreen scented"..... Would this affect the removal process in any way other than the smell?

 

If it's any consolation, I was able to find a box of 70% Isopropyl alcohol wipes and used them on Siege Barricade - they seem to work, but it takes a lot of scrubbing.

 

Why the 35th Anniversary version, though? Wouldn't it have been easier to clean up the regular edition since it had less paint apps to remove in the first place?

 

I did both. If you look at the pics you will see the regular version by itself in one. I did that one early on when they first came out. The reason I decided to do the 35th version is I like the plastic colors.

 

Which one do you think was easier to clean?

 

Regular Siege.

 

On the normal red Siege Sideswipe, does anyone know if his lower legs are molded in black and painted red?

Mine arrived with some kind of annoying black scuffs on the areas that become the rear of the car mode, and I'm not certain if they are just black paint smears on top of the red, or places where red paint has scuffed off, revealing the black plastic underneath. The marks bug me but I don't want to make it worse by trying to remove them if it's the latter.

Otherwise I removed the battle damage from him, and it wasn't difficult, just time consuming to get into all the nooks and crannies with q-tips and toothpicks.
If you don't push your luck, it's quite easy to remove the black battle damage paint from his feet, even though they are silver paint over black plastic.
Just put some 70% isopropyl on a paper towel and gently wipe. The black paint will come off of the silver paint layer before the silver paint layer comes off the black plastic feet.

 

His lower legs are molded in red.