Smelly pony problem

JadeCade

Flighty Pegasus
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I’m not sure if this post shouldn’t be under Tutorials but here’s the deal. I bought a lot of ‘project ponies’ from a seller and they arrived today absolutely reeking of cigarette smoke. I immediately dumped them into my sink with water, oxiclean and vinegar and let them soak about 10 mins. Then I changed the water and did it again. Then I bathed them with Dawn and the smell is... tolerable, but still there. Anybody have suggestions to remove stink from ponies?
 
I believe there was recently a thread that addressed this and @bluerose9978 had great advice. I put mine in a ziploc bag with a dryer sheet, bath bomb, baking soda, they've all worked with time.
 
Kitty litter! Apparently a lot of people have had luck getting terrible smells out of ponies with Kitty litter. I am fortunate enough to not have come across this issue yet.
 
Unfortunately I've had a problems receiving some smelly ponies recently. What I've found works best is airing them out outside for a couple days to a week (if it's not raining and they come in at night) and soaking them in a tub with fabric softener for an hour then drying them upside down near a dehumidifier. I'll maybe repeat the process after giving them the smell test. And then put them in a bag with a dryer sheet after they are fully dry for a week. It seems to speed up the process.

I've even gone so far as spraying Febreeze over the tub while they are soaking too. Because I am eager to get that stink out...lol.

I tried kitty litter once but it was just too dirty for me. I like my ponies clean.
 
Thank you for all the great suggestions! I have enough ponies I might try them all to see what works best.
 
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Alternate an open window and a bag with dryer sheets. Worked for my daughter's Chief.
 
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I haven't tried this with ponies, but it's worked with some used books that were outright unreadable because they stank so bad of cigarette smoke. Put baking soda in a coffee filter and tie it up. Throw that in a zip-lock bag with the stinky item. Seal it up, and within a few days to a week it should smell better. If it still stinks, you can change the baking soda/coffee filter and give it some more time. (Keep in mind, I got this method on how to clean stinky books. I can't guarantee it'll work on ponies!)
 
I haven't tried this with ponies, but it's worked with some used books that were outright unreadable because they stank so bad of cigarette smoke. Put baking soda in a coffee filter and tie it up. Throw that in a zip-lock bag with the stinky item. Seal it up, and within a few days to a week it should smell better. If it still stinks, you can change the baking soda/coffee filter and give it some more time. (Keep in mind, I got this method on how to clean stinky books. I can't guarantee it'll work on ponies!)
Baking soda is excellent with paper... I never tried it on a pony. Good idea.
 
I’m not sure if this post shouldn’t be under Tutorials but here’s the deal. I bought a lot of ‘project ponies’ from a seller and they arrived today absolutely reeking of cigarette smoke. I immediately dumped them into my sink with water, oxiclean and vinegar and let them soak about 10 mins. Then I changed the water and did it again. Then I bathed them with Dawn and the smell is... tolerable, but still there. Anybody have suggestions to remove stink from ponies?
I have never tried it with pony’s, but my favorite way to desmell anything is to put it in a drawer or box with a block of cedar wood and leave it for about a week. I got a bunch of smokey yarn from my grandma once and it worked so I think it should work on smokey smell for you. Good luck with whichever methods you try
 
As an update, the smell is lessening with each new technique I try. Rather than the cloud of smoke spreading out from the ponies, I now have to bring them to my nose to smell it. Sunlight and fresh air is the only suggestion I haven’t tried yet as I’m nervous to leave them out while I’m not home. (What if a bird poops on them? What if a hawk mistakes them for tasty snacks? Or a sparrow decides that neon orange hair would make a dashing pop of color to an otherwise drab nest? Lol)
 
I have never tried it with pony’s, but my favorite way to desmell anything is to put it in a drawer or box with a block of cedar wood and leave it for about a week. I got a bunch of smokey yarn from my grandma once and it worked so I think it should work on smokey smell for you. Good luck with whichever methods you try

I have a cedar chest for material. I knew it was great for keeping moths away, but didn't realize it worked on foul smells as well!
 
I have a cedar chest for material. I knew it was great for keeping moths away, but didn't realize it worked on foul smells as well!
Yup it works really well for me, and if the block doesn’t seem to be doing it’s job after a while I can just lightly sand it and it works great again. Though I imagine sanding the inside of a chest would be quite a bit harder lol
 
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i know @MustBeJewel cleaned up some really stinky ponies, maybe she can share :)

Oh gosh, THOSE stinky ponies! Be careful what you buy site unseen, folks! I had to drive home with all my windows down because of the cigarette smell, even after I tied the plastic bag shut!

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That was a big opportunity to try a number of different techniques, and these were my best results:

1) Airing out
I left the ponies out of direct sunlight on my porch for about a week, so they wouldn't be sealed in a container with the smell just... marinating.

2) Standard cleaning
I cleaned each pony with Dawn dish soap and hot water, really working in the soap and rinsing and re-soaping a few times, inside and out where possible, to try to remove any smoke residue on the actual plastic/hair that was retaining the smell.

3) Vinegar soak
I sealed the ponies in a storage bin with a 1:1 vinegar and water solution, and weighed them down with a tray and some glasses on top to stay submerged. Normally I NEVER submerge ponies, but this case was extreme. I left them there for several days. This was probably the single most effective treatment aside #4.

NOTE: Vinegar does weird things to ponies!
  • It will turn Sparkle Ponies, Glow N Show's, or any translucent ponies foggy and opaque, but this WILL wear off as they dry.
  • It may fry the tinsel on Princess Ponies and may strip the color. Skylark and the SHS were fine, Princess Dawn was not.
The acid in vinegar may damage some features or discolor some paint--I can't say exactly what since this wasn't a diverse enough group.


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4) D-Stinker
I used this product with no adverse effects on ponies. I sprayed them generously, let them sit overnight, then repeated step 2 above.

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Results:

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By the time all was said and done and they had dried for over a week, you could only get the tiniest whiff of the original odor if you held them right up under your nose.



Other techniques I have tried and my personal results:


1) Dryer sheets
My personal result was ponies that smelled like both cigarette smoke AND flowers.

2) Cat litter
Same result as dryer sheets, pretty much.

3) Baking soda
I covered the ponies in baking soda, left them for a week. Did not seem to do much in the end.
 
I had a Princess Pristina that absolutely reeked of smoke. I tried submerging her in fabric softener for a long long time. This was back in the mid-2000s when I was just getting into the collector community. I had purchased her on LiveJournal. XD to this day the smell of that fabric softener reminds me of that.

I’m mostly adding this as a “does not really work” anecdote. She smelled more of fabric softener and less of smoke, but there was definitely a mix of the two. She’s mostly okay all these years later, but honestly I still live with my parents and while my dad mostly confines his smoking to one room, I’ve never been truly convinced other things in my household don’t smell. >_>

My grandparents were chain smokers for their entire lives (can’t imagine when they started! They lived to their 90s!) and I still cannot get the smoke smell out of these pantry canisters I loved from their kitchen. The vinegar might be breaking down the ceramic/glaze on the experiment one and I’m afraid to damage it. No way I can store the dry goods in them without a flavor transfer.

Good luck with them all! Jewel has some amazing advise up there and I‘ll totally come back to it if I end up with smelly ponies down the road!
 
Instead of creating a new thread, I thought I'd ask my questions concerning cigarette smoke here. I bought an otherwise lovely Fireball months ago, but unfortunately he reeks of cigarette smoke. I absolutely hate the smell, he's the first pony I've ever received that stinks.

Now, about the various methods: I don't feel confident submerging him in vinegar, as his head isn't loose and I don't want to remove it to dry him after the bath. He's now been in kitty litter (does it matter which one? ours is fine brown gravel that clumps) for a few months and he still stinks. :(

He has also been outside for weeks, no success.

I would like to try the baking soda method next, but I'm not sure how much baking soda I should add to a zip bag. Is there something else I need to consider? Will his hair and body be safe if it spends a month or so covered in baking soda, or will it affect his colours?
 
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Instead of creating a new thread, I thought I'd ask my questions concerning cigarette smoke here. I bought an otherwise lovely Fireball months ago, but unfortunately he reeks of cigarette smoke. I absolutely hate the smell, he's the first pony I've ever received that stinks.

Now, about the various methods: I don't feel confident submerging him in vinegar, as his head isn't loose and I don't want to remove it to dry him after the bath. He's now been in kitty litter (does it matter which one? ours is fine brown gravel that clumps) for a few months and he still stinks. :(

He has also been outside for weeks, no success.

I would like to try the baking soda method next, but I'm not sure how much baking soda I should add to a zip bag. Is there something else I need to consider? Will his hair and body be safe if it spends a month or so covered in baking soda, or will it affect his colours?
Once, I put a pony in a Ziploc with a couple dryer sheets and an unopened bath bomb. I left her in the garage for a couple months. I did change out the dryer sheets once and checked for moisture. When I took her out I left her in the spare room with the door closed. It was over six months getting her de stenched. The lavender bath bomb was trash after. It smelled awful. Yes, I'm strange.
 
I would like to try the baking soda method next, but I'm not sure how much baking soda I should add to a zip bag. Is there something else I need to consider? Will his hair and body be safe if it spends a month or so covered in baking soda, or will it affect his colours?

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you should put the baking soda directly on him. Pretend you're making a really big bag of pot pourri except with baking soda that you add to the zip bag. (I've only done this method with books, so I don't know how effective it is with ponies. With my used books, sometimes it only takes a few days. However, my worst-smelling book took a year!)

There is a nifty web-site I found that talks a bit about how/why the coffee filter with baking soda method is supposed to work if you're interested. https://www.thekitchn.com/baking-soda-coffee-filter-odor-tip-23026893
 
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you should put the baking soda directly on him. Pretend you're making a really big bag of pot pourri except with baking soda that you add to the zip bag. (I've only done this method with books, so I don't know how effective it is with ponies. With my used books, sometimes it only takes a few days. However, my worst-smelling book took a year!)

There is a nifty web-site I found that talks a bit about how/why the coffee filter with baking soda method is supposed to work if you're interested. https://www.thekitchn.com/baking-soda-coffee-filter-odor-tip-23026893
That's a great idea. It makes sense, too.
 
I know after my Oma had quit smoking for many, many years. We used a vinegar and baking soda mixture to rid everything of the cigarette smell. It worked. Some things took a few applications but it did work. Ultimately, you may have to remove his head (sad I know) as if he stinks on the outside, it’s definitely on the inside as well. :(
Also, I know people use the crystal cat litter as it removes the odours and ammonia from cat business.
 
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