The difference in the colour of the halves is due to use. The left half has been used extensively while the right half has been sitting in a box.
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Its a fascinating phenomenon that you are able to play one half of your yoyo while the other half is sitting in a box…
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Half swap!
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I am guessing it has to do with oxidation?
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OK… I’m gonna give you guys a simple and fairly accurate assessment of what’s going on with the different colors of those yoyo halves.
Ano colorization of yo-yos is wafer thin. A certain color saturation is established, and the color is identified.
The color you see… Let’s just take it for granted that nobody’s colorblind to grasp this explanation
Whatever part of the color spectrum the yo-yo falls into, the mind identifies the color based on what is transmitted to your brain in the available light at the moment and angle and distance. The yo-yo is from the front of your face basically.
So let’s establish for this example that yo-yo is medium blue. Most of us agree that it is a medium blue. But remember that medium blue is based on the color saturation at the time you get the yo-yo.
As you use the yo-yo very slowly, the anodization wears away. It’s not just the friction of your hand against the yo-yo. But it has also to do with how sweaty or salty and oily, and whatever your hands are. And the degradation of the anodization can also accelerate in certain types of weather.
So when you do a half swap and 1/2 of sitting in the box, it’s obvious that that particular half is being subjected to nowhere either by friction or by chemistry. So that half collecting dust will stay the color that you originally remember.
The half that’s a news is never gonna be as new as the day you start using it.
Realize this also. Underneath the anodization is aluminum that at the very least has a satin or somewhat glossy finished to it. So as the perspiration of your hands and the friction were away at the finish of the one blue yo-yo half the substract being the silver is going to influence the color that your eyes perceive, as whatever available light affects the color that bounces back into your eyes.
Think of it this way. It’s a nice sunny day outside. And the sun isn’t blazing hot, but it’s pretty darn bright. You look at the sun, but no glasses of any kind on just for a second cause you don’t wanna melt your eyeballs. Then you look away, put on a pair of sunglasses And stare at the sun again for a couple seconds. Then you look away, you put another pair of sunglasses over the other pair. And then another pair and then another pair. The same son is still there, but every additional pair of sunglasses you put on causes the sun to have less of an effect on your eyeballs. Think of it as sunglasses saturation. When you’re staring at the sun with a stack of sunglasses on your head, you take away one pair at a time and the sun gets brighter.
I understand that’s kind of an abstract analogy. But you should get the picture as a color saturation wear thinner. The color will appear lighter. It will still be in that same part of the color spectrum because it’s gonna be blue no matter what. But it will get lighter and lighter and lighter.
If the yo-yo wasn’t half swapped and you just played that one yo-yo and wore it out evenly, it might take you longer to realize and recognize that color was/is fading out. If you bought two yo-yos of the same color because you liked it so much obviously if you set one on a table next to the one that’s just sitting on the table inside the house in the shade Then you say damn, these two yo-yos are different colors?
As the ano gets thinner the color will naturally become lighter
Simple
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My guess is that not only is the anodized layer wearing off a bit, as others have said, but also oils from your had may also have an effect.
But hey, that’s just a theory…
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A yoyo theory!
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Does sunlight affect ano getting lighter? I ask because i have two yoyos of the same model and colorway batch. One is very light (almost bleached out looking) and the other much darker and more vivid. I’d just chalk it up to one being played and the other sitting in a case, however the bleached out one is like that all over, including the inner cup where it would experience very little friction and oils.
As sunlight lightens and fades colors on a painting is it the same with a yoyo left out on display?
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Seems like it may be.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1155/2021/5520448
By the way, for the yoyo above, the phenomenon is the opposite. The colour of the half that got played became darker and more rich, and the rose-goldish colour became gold.
Below are images of the original colour of the yoyo:
