Ship Decking

[Joey Lock]

Firstly, Do you like to Tile your deck?

Secondly, If so, Which of these colours would you use:

Tan

Old Brown

Dark Tan

Reddish Brown

Since the prices vary greatly, I wanted to see which looked more authentic.

[Commodore Hornbricker]

I haven't built a finished ship of this type but I like the look. When I get around to trying my hand at this I plan to use the tan for a naval ship and dark tan mixed with brown for pirates as I always imagine their ships being a little less well maintained whether its true or not.

[Captain Green Hair]

Dark tan is the best color ever for the decks, unfortunatly it is expensive and hard to get. I hope that this changes in the future, as i most certainly will use it.

Apart from tiling, you can make smoothe decks with bricks build sideways as well.

[Skipper 24]

I would go for primarily old brown but perhaps mix it up with reddish brows for authenticity. Of course CGH probably knows better than me and I am no shipmaster.

[Captain Green Hair]

Ships decks were always lighter then the outside as they were mostly untreaded wood and scrobbed from time to time. The exterior isn't and is painted in many cases.

[Hound Knight]

I personally don't like tiled decks on my ships because then the crews are unable to stand up properly.

[mikey]

I have become a big fan of Dark Tan recently, but it seems only to be available in a limited number of parts (plates limited to 1 x 2 i think?), i'm not sure that you would get tiles smaller than 1 x 6?, so you would have problems unless you mixed with Tan.

A mix of Reddish Brown and Brown would look good I think, but saying that perhaps you do not need to tile the deck? A big problem with surfaces which are tiled is the reflective aspect, I do not think any ship was that clean that you could see your face refelected on the deck. To leave studded allows good positioning of minifigs & accesories, and would stop the deck looking like a mirror! So I think you do not need to tile the deck.

[SlyOwl]

Currently I use a mixture of new and old brown, but in the future I'd like to experiment with tan and dark tan, as they are perhaps more accurate. I'd also like to throw in some dark brown to my current style, to add some more variation.

Cost-wise, brown is best, and widely available.

I don't really like mixing brown and dark tan, or tan and dark tan, as it looks funny, in my opinion, suitable for cobbled-together ships only, maybe. I wouldn't hesitate at using the wood-printed tan tiles in conjunction with normal tan tiles, though.

A mix of Reddish Brown and Brown would look good I think, but saying that perhaps you do not need to tile the deck? A big problem with surfaces which are tiled is the reflective aspect, I do not think any ship was that clean that you could see your face refelected on the deck. To leave studded allows good positioning of minifigs & accesories, and would stop the deck looking like a mirror! So I think you do not need to tile the deck.

Well-used tiles are much less reflective than brand new ones, so getting them used off BL helps.

[Captain Blackmoor]

I really like tan decks on a ship, since they are more realistic then brown tiled decks. I'm not sure if I want to tile a deck since they are, just like CGH said, hard to find and expensive. Also the minifigs fall over pretty easy. That can be solved by placing 1x1 or 1x2 plates on the deck where you want a minifig.

But I still keep the tan, studded decks.

[Teddy]

Dear all,

personally I prefer tiling my deks.

Because with tiling you can create the illusion of planking which gives a ship MOC an additional level of detail.

For regular floors in buildings I prefer to combine old-brown with new-brown. To give it a wood impression.

But, for me, the choice for deck tiling is definitely tan.

On old ships the deck was scrubbed regularly and the surface was kept rough (with no finishing) to give the sailors more "grip".

So they wouldn't slip in rough weather.

The actual color of planking depends on: the type of wood, the age of the wood, has it been scrubbed recently, and is it wet.

Relatively new ships who had their deks scrubbed would commonly have a tan colored deck.

Before scrubbing it could be more like dark tan or even grey. When wet it can even appear a bit "light" brownish.

Overall most decks have a more or less uniform color. The color deviations are commonly much smaller than the color difference between dark-tan and tan is in Lego bricks.

I've experimented with dark tan and a combination dark en regular tan. And i've tested a combination with old-grey, since old-grey is yellowish.

The bottom two pictures below depict the result.

personally, I thought only dark tan was too dark when used on larger surfaces to do the job. I'm also not convinced that combining tan and dark-tan is a good option.

Since, the color difference between tan and dark-tan is much larger than color differences which occur on a given day in "real" ship planking. Old grey is a bit too gray for my taste.

Lacking a color inbetween tan and old-gray, I prefer to use tan.

Well this is my experience and opinion of course. Hope this helps a bit.

Kind regards,

Teddy

Deck planking inside a ship (HMS Victory):

Lego tiles (tan, dark-tan, old-gray):

[Joey Lock]

Dear all,

personally I prefer tiling my deks.

Because with tiling you can create the illusion of planking which gives a ship MOC an additional level of detail.

For regular floors in buildings I prefer to combine old-brown with new-brown. To give it a wood impression.

Can we see the Old-Brown with new brown combination?

[Teddy]

Can we see the Old-Brown with new brown combination?

Dear Joey Lock,

this isn't a large surface, but i think it gives an idea of what I meant.

http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/Johanvan...f0966correl.jpg

Kind regards,

Teddy

[Dr. Steve]

Here is what my ship's deck looks like with the "new brown"

I like the look and lets face it, it's dirt cheap..... $.04-$.08 for a 1x4 tile on bricklink when I bought a whole bunch recently

[Derfel Cadarn]

I agree with slyowl that brown is probably the best choice for most builders due to the fact its cheap and easy to get hold of. If you realy want to go for more detail and accuracy then tan is the way to go, but can be harder to get, expecialy dark tan. I quite like the new dark brown, but im more of a port builder then a ship builder.

[martinsuper]

I know that tiling makes MOCs look cool and all, but I dont feel right about it at all. How are my mini-figs supposed to stand? I for one will never submit a ship or fort with a tiled floor, and if that means I never win anything, so be it!

SAY NO TO SNOT!

[Captain Blackmoor]

I don't really agree with you.

You can put normal plates underneath your minifigs so it looks like they are standing on a tiled deck. Of course this isn't the best option because you can't move your minifig around the ship. The minifig will fall over on a tiled deck and there will be studs on the place where the minifig once was.

It is very helpful for ships meant for display, it is very realistic.

If you go for playability I should leave the deck untiled.