Reviving dropped ex-PBN domain - reindexing and TF boosted

I did this to film a video for my youtube (don't think I can promote). I wanted to see how easy / hard it would be to get a deindexed, PBN domain back in the index.

I started with a domain that had solid content in the past (for about 15 years) and then dropped and had a chequered last 10 years. The domain had been dropped and registered and used for a bunch of different websites, even a PBN towards the end. The domain was currently dropped when I found it and was showing a 24 TF, 31 DA and 80 referring domains.

My plan was to recover an old, white hat, version of the website, then feed it to an AI and have it recreate the website entirely, using the site structure from the original website to create an all new design and new content.

I uploaded the website and started the waiting game. I wanted to see if a pre-existing site structure and new content would re-legitimise the website and get it back in the index at Google.

The domain was reindexed before 4 days had passed.

I made no backlinks, no social mentions, no pinging, nothing. I did not announce the domain was back online or anything. I just relied on the domain having some backlinks that would help in this regard already.

Since reindexing I have also noticed that Majestic is taking a lot more interest in the domain. The TF value has jumped from 24 up to 33 so far.

I am not sure how long the domain will remain but I plan on making some small updates to the website occassionally and just seeing how it goes. I don't have any long term plans for it but thought the findings were interesting.

I am not sure how much detail I can go into with this as I used my own tools to accomplish this (as well as Wayback Machine and ChatGPT), and the video I made does talk about them a bit.

What is your experience with old deindexed domains? Are you aware of anyone else testing these things? I am looking to get more findings on this sort of thing without having to spend a week doing the legwork

I upload a recovered copy of the non-PBN site when possible, then let it sit for a month. If the domain hasn't indexed on it's own with it's existing backlinks in that time, then I've made a poor purchase
But that doesn't mean it's a total loss. I would then start building branded links to the site, and profile-style links to any author pages the site may have had. If/when I start seeing the site appearing for longtails, then I'll add a new 'section' to the site, which is where I then start dumping all my AI content. Depending on the traction it gains, I'll either rework the design to something more appealing and tweak/replace the old copy, or just leave it as it is.