Lionel's wood grain pattern on car inserts

Lionel used the lithograph process to print the inserts. They were printed on larger sheets and then the individual pieces were stamped from these sheets. That is why the wood grain pattern varies.

We have in the past painted the inserts and doors a solid color, & then hand painted black thin lines w/ a 2-3 hair bristle brush. (not doing it anymore, my hand is 'shaky')  ,also the #124 station doors.  

Harry 

Good info here, thanks guys!

That must have been a very tedious job, Harry. Hope you didn't have very many to do.

I knew a guy who custom painted an AF #4042 wide gauge observation car. He used a very fine engineering drafting ink pen and a very small circle template to duplicate the original lithographed rivets. Don't know how many hours he had in the project but it looked awesome when finished. Looked like it was lithographed, not painted.