The Ship Model Forum

I've never purposely weathered a wood deck with either alcohol, or oil thinned paints. Try with some of the surplus from the wood sheet to see results. Oil thinner with oil paints, and alcohol with acrylic paints. Maybe any other modelers out there would have an answer?
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[quote="drasticplastic"]You can still do a good job by painting the deck. I'm addicted to wood decks, but in cases where a wood deck isn't available, I'm forced to paint. Start with a light sand color and when dry, brush a black/brown oil wash to accent the plank lines. When the wash is dry, lightly drag a white pencil (Crayola, or similar - but not wax crayon) parallel to the decking to highlight plank edges, and to add variation to wood color. [i]Practice first![/i]
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I affixed the foredeck and it turned out as good as I could hope for.


Luckily, it turns out I don't need wooden decking for all the bridge platforms, only the wheelhouse floor. See aerial photo. The main deck is clearly different texture and color, and the bridge floors are more golden yellow.

Drasticplastic, since the Artwox wooden deck looks a bit too crisp and yellow for my liking (should be a tad darker) is it possible to use black/brown wash to weather it? Or if wet would a wooden deck lose its grip and peel?

You can still do a good job by painting the deck. I'm addicted to wood decks, but in cases where a wood deck isn't available, I'm forced to paint. Start with a light sand color and when dry, brush a black/brown oil wash to accent the plank lines. When the wash is dry, lightly drag a white pencil (Crayola, or similar - but not wax crayon) parallel to the decking to highlight plank edges, and to add variation to wood color. [i]Practice first![/i]
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I haven't attempted the foredeck yet. What I did do was the main deck and the bridge platforms. However, these parts are also resin replacements by Ark Models and differ to the original. What happened was an awful mess, since the wooden adhesives are far too small to cover the surface area. It just looks really amateur and out of place.


One of the bridge platforms is to be painted russet to represent linoleum, so that's fine.


The other 4 or 5 remain decked with wood. I could remove these ill-fitting wooden parts and paint them tan/yellow but its still going to look odd as it won't match the main deck.


The other option is to just remove all wooden decking including the main deck, throw it away and spray paint the plastic deck tan/yellow, so that it all looks uniform and neat. It will end up looking like a cheap Airfix kit deck, but at least it would look clean.

If you're very careful and keep all your cuts along plank lines (as much as possible), and straight and square, and add the narrow border planking around hatches, etc., you could pull it off! Post progress pics!
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Ugh...not looking forward to this. I'm sticking with option 1. This wooden deck wasn't cheap and I don't want to waste it.

You have a few options: 1) butcher up your Artwox deck by adding new openings to accomodate the new hatches, etc., and fill in the old openings with bits of surplus wood. Probably won't look too nice! 2) get a generic plank sheet by Artwox. It's in 1/350 and the plank width might not match exactly the 1/400. Cut and trim to fit. You'll have to make all border trim planking yourself and take that into account when making measurements and cutting. 3) Do individual plank-by-plank decking. This will be the most difficult and frustrating, and time consuming. You'll still have to plan for the border planking. 4) Then there's the simplest option: paint all the plastic kit wood decks.
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I got the Artworx 1/400 cruiser [i]Aurora [/i]wooden deck adhesive for my model, but the foredeck is for the older version of the model. My kits foredeck (Ark Models [i]Aurora[/i], in her 2017 form) is pictured below side by side with the original Artworx deck. As you can see, anchor chain holes are removed in my kit, and bulkheads and hatches are different places.

I can't [b]not[/b] use the wooden deck on the foredeck as the rest of the model will have the Artworx on it. How am I going to get around this? It is tricky enough already as its my first time using such an aftermarket wooden deck on a model.

The most prominent feature is the hatch and bulkheads/bollards on my foredeck. I would need to cut openings in the Artworx in order to show it. But one wrong move, or 1 millimetre too much, and I will ruin the wooden deck! Even if I accomplish the cutting, the completed model will still look very odd with all the extra shapes, stencils on the Artworx foredeck that weren't used.

Does anybody have experience with customizing wooden decks before? What do you suggest I do to salvage this project as best as I can?