Original "discolored" steck walls

[Kenny]

Tonight I got out some medieval house instructions and was looking at some of the "official" photos included in the instructions to show how the sets could be combined.

In one photo of a tower I noticed that the steck pieces are in obviously different shades of gray.

Which made me wonder....

Although many of the pieces of steck we find today are discolored from UV or cigarette smoke damage, how much original color variation should we expect?  Are we sometimes being too picky?  Perhaps some of the pieces we label "discolored" today were originally in an "odd" shade of gray?

Thoughts.... ?

-- Kenny

[Wolf Knight]

Again i think we have a problem of colouring in the early phase production process, something with the colour not being the exact one for all pieces out of a diferent production line maybe... cause it takes years for a steck piece to get yellowed etc... and these are fairly early playmobil sets...

[Giorginetto]

I like steck that has a slight color variety , unless not exposed to direct sunlight and smoke etc or left outdoors for long periods steck will not turn yellow easily. i have steck pieces from 1977-79 sets and they are still mint !!! Sunlight is the biggets enemy for steck , thats why i always claim  that steck was made originally for draculinettos 

[playmo1989]

Again i think we have a problem of colouring in the early phase production process, something with the colour not being the exact one for all pieces out of a diferent production line maybe... cause it takes years for a steck piece to get yellowed etc... and these are fairly early playmobil sets...

even in the 90's there were some pieces that were darker than others .... the lighting of the photo is that makes it look a little  yellow ,it becomes yellow by time 

[Playmoholics]

What at good question. Personally, I prefer the discoloration, to a certain extent, because I think it makes the pieces look more authentic 

[playmo1989]

Personally, I prefer the discoloration, to a certain extent, because I think it makes the pieces look more authentic 

[Wesley Myers]

The colour of plastic is determined much like the dye of material. Different dye lots of material will be of different shades even though the dye is the same. I would imagine in the early days before computerized amounts of colour were added and possibly Playmobil outsourced to different plastic pellet makers combinations of the above would play a role.

Now Playmobil gets all the plastic pellets from one single source so there would be greater consistency.

That's an excellent and interesting photo!  Makes one realise maybe we are being too anal at times. Thank you for sharing!

[Giorginetto]

 i have never come across a steck set where the colour was different in pieces , perhaps slightly different in different sets / production batches but not in a set