My next project will be to convert a NIB flatcar with a plastic wooden deck to one with a real wooden deck. I've been searching photos of real trains for a couple of hours now and haven't come across many good photos of those. Most of the real train photos are of the side, and don't show the deck much. The photos of the deck are all of model trains. I have someone that will put together a laser cut deck for me, so I would like to provide as much info as possible.
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Overhead photos of wood deck flat cars are hard to come by. Here are links to a few pictures I found on the web. I won't post them due to copyright policies of the forum.
To simulate a weathered wooden deck, plastic decks can be painted with a base coat of grey, dry brushed with a few shades of brown and grey, then finished with a wash of India ink and alcohol.
Laser cut wood decks have an unnatural grain pattern. This one below was stained then colors were dry brushed on. Not a great look.
For this laser cut wood deck, as with the plastic deck, I started with a heavy base coat of grey, dry brushed with a few shades of brown and grey, then finished with a wash of India ink and alcohol. This hid the grain pattern.
Finally, this non-scale car has a deck made from low quality coffee stirrer sticks. They were pre-stained with Hunterline light grey stain. There is a lot of natural color variation due to how much each stick absorbs the stain. Plus there is warping and splintering of some sticks. All of this gives the best appearance with a lot less work (dry brushing is very time consuming). The sticks are cut to length with a NWSL Chopper and glued to the deck with contact cement.
There are many good tutorials on weathering flat cars (plastic, wood, or laser cut wood) that can be found with a google search.
Bob
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