I recently purchased an Artwox wood deck for the Trumpeter 1/350 HMS Dreadnought. I have generally been happy with it, (other than the fact that its thickness complicates attaching any part that attaches to a deck). I was wondering if it will be damaged by spraying clear flat on it when I am ready to overcoat the model at the end of construction. I know I have seen people comment that you can apply stain to it, but I was wondering if acrylic clear flat is also ok.
Water-based acrylic paints & sealers may cause real wood decking products to warp. You may want to look into a solvent-based sealer. Seal both sides and all edges before installation
But the problem is that the self adhesive makes sealing the back impossible.
It used to be this stuff came with scrap, like the punch outs for the barbettes.
You could practice on those.
Dullkote should work, but… its going to significantly darken it, not in a good way.
That has been my fear. Fortunately, I haven’t gone too far in construction. I may just have too dullcote the painted plastic parts before I attach them to the model. I haven’t done the hull yet, so when that is painted, I will dullcote it before I add the deck. All in all, this may be the first and last wood deck I use. Yes, it looks great, but the difficulties caused by its thickness and in attaching and sealing painted areas make it less than ideal.
I personally don’t care for the things. Be really careful to test fit it before you go and stick it down. Theres usually some interference in tight spots, like between the turrets. The usual reaction is to be in the process of sticking it down, and when that happens, press down on the buckled area with a blunt tool like the back of your knife handle.
But…it won’t stay that way for long. It’ll buckle back up and you’ll be pretty upset because by then you’ll be deep into sticking on the brass.
So far I have been fortunate, as I’ve only done the smaller decks. I’m sure the main deck is going to be the toughest, which is why I started small first, to get some experience. This has been a learning experience, and it is tending to turn me away from wood decks in the future. There may be the occasional exception, but if this is how things go at 1/350, I definitely would avoid 1/700, unless it was a carrier deck. Who knows, maybe it would work better on 1/200. I have the 1/200 Missouri, and perhaps I’ll get a wood deck for it when I start building it.
I used an Artwox deck on my conversion of the Tamiya 1/350 Missouri to the 1943 New Jersey. It’s been over a year with no buckling. It fit perfectly and it looks terrific. Good luck with yours!
Bill Morrison
How did you handle the final dull coat?
I applied dull coat before I installed the deck. I have had no problems with it at all.
Bill
I’ve been staring at the dry fitting of my Artwox wood deck to the main deck on my Trumpeter 1/350 HMS Dreadnought (1915) for about a week. I keep fiddling with the openings trying to get all the buckles out. I don’t think it’ll be possible to know for sure whether or not I’ve done a reasonable job until I actually peel off the plastic protective sheet from the adhesive - at that point it’ll be too late to make corrections! I’m like a deer in the beam of headlights - I must bring myself to ACT! [:D]
Mike
I know the older wooden ships used to “sand” with stone those decks frequently- they were not varnished or finished with a clear coat. When wood decks were applied over steel armor, were they still sanded frequently that way? I understand on the old ships they were sanded to make them non-slip since painted or varnished surfaces were slippery when wet.
on the old “Tall” ships they swabbed “flooded” the deck holy stoned then swabbed again prior to applying sand to the deck. The holy stone smoothed out the deck to remove rough edges and splinters to prevent injuries since most sailors didn’t wear shoes on deck except for the officers or senior NCO’s.
The US Navy was still “holy stoning” decks in WWII. Called holy stoning because the sailors were on their knees (in a praying position) and scrubbing the decks with a large porous stone. I believe by WWII the Navy had added handles to those stones (much easier on the knees). It’s also why decks often looked like new wood as it prevented fading and drying out.
Groot
They are still doing that on the constitution and Constellation (the oldest active duty warships in the US Navy).
One very small correction. The Constitution is indeed a commissioned warship of the U.S. Navy. The Constellation isn’t. She was turned over by the Navy to a private organization in 1955. The Constitution has a genuine Navy crew, on the Navy payroll. Until 1975 she had a Navy hull number, IX-21.
The Constellation is operated by civilians. It could be argued that she’s not entitled to the “U.S.S.” designation, but I don’t think that one’s worth pressing. The Navy has, of course, reused her name for an aircraft carrier.
The legal mechanics involved when the government turns over an artifact to a civilian entity are complicated. I’m not sure, but I think the Navy has the legal right to reclaim the Constellation if the Navy ever concludes that the civilian custodians aren’t treating her properly. I know there was some discussion back in the eighties or nineties, when the folks in Baltimore were trying to claim that she was actually the frigate launched in 1797 (rather than a sloop-of-war launched in the 1850s), the Navy might take her back. That’s unlikely to happen, because the Navy would have trouble finding somebody else with the means to operate and maintain her.
I figured I would probably have to do that, so I’ve been doing my assembly work with that in mind. Certainly not the ideal way to do things, and it may be yet one more reason that I may not use wood decks again in the future. Thanks for the information, (it’s always nice to be given confirmation that you’re on the right track, even if that track has a train on it, barrelling toward you!).
OK, I just thought I’d post a picture of how my Artwox wood decks turned out after I got off the dime [:|].
I mentioned that i was like a deer in headlights a few posts ago - I don’t like that feeling so I went ahead and did the best I know how at the moment. There are some screw ups and some irritating alignment problems but I don’t think it’s so bad that I have to chuck it [:D].
At any rate, here is the image.
Mike
Looking good! I have all the decks on except the main deck, which I won’t do until I have the hull painted. I primed and painted the deck and hull, following the same process that I used on the other decks. For me, the big advantage of the wood decks was avoiding having to mask or hand paint all the various deck fittings, and it seems that the wood deck adheres just fine to a painted surface. The hull is bugging me right now, as I had washed it, primed it, and all looked good. Then I put on the gray, and there was a large area near the bow that just turned white! When it dried, it was gray, but a bit glossy, so I’m wondering if I should just strip off the paint and start again after another cleaning, or try another coat. I’ve never seen this happen before, and I’m thinking it may be an area that still has some mold release. On the other hand, that didn’t happen with the primer,so I may just take a chance and do another coat of gray. The big test will come when I mask the area to paint the hull bottom and bootstripe. If it’s a mold release issue, the paint will come off when I remove the masking tape.
My main deck is not attached to the hull yet. I just put it there to look at. I was going to go ahead and mask the hull for the boot stripe but since you mentioned it, I may want to seal the dark sea gray I’ve already painted on the upper part of the hull. I did use Tamiya primer prior to the dark gray so I’m not sure if I should bother to seal it or not but I sure don’t want to have paint coming off with the masking tape!
What would you all suggest - just go ahead and mask, or seal the paint above the area where I’ll be masking for the boot stripe? My inclination is to just mask it but …
Please forgive the off topic post. I’ll create my own thread (WIP) in the near future.
Mike
Sealing ie clear coating paint makes NO difference to the peeling issue. If you seal it and the paint didn’t bond to the primer, you’ll get sealer and paint on the tape. If the tape is going to peel off the paint, the deed is done. Test somewhere you can fix. Or, really de-tack the tape, put it on loosely, take it off just as fast as you can.