A quick break from the structure building posts to work on some vehicles.
I have a bunch of old Wiking models of Volkswagen vehicles that were given to me by a friend years ago when he tore down his layout. These models have great accurate bodies and solid clear plastic windows but lack any type of realistic paint detail, particularly on the tires. Because of this I have never really used them on any of my layouts or modules. The beetles and vans in particular were quite common in the 1960's and 70's so I decided to get some of them out and do something with them.
These models come apart easily. There are just 3 parts: The chassis in a silver or gray color, the body in various colors, and a solid clear plastic part to represent the window glazing. After getting these apart, I painted the tires black with Mission Models tire black acrylic paint. When those had dried, I painted the bumpers with Model Master silver acrylic paint.
For things like hubcaps, headlights, tail lights, door handles, etc. I use Sharpie pens. These are available in an assortment of colors. This can be done either before or after re-assembling the vehicle. I store the pens in a zip lock bag in an effort to keep them from drying out.
These now look much more realistic and I am happy to have them on the layout. I just did these two for now and still have quite a few more. Next batch I want to try painting the bodies in some colors I remember seeing and with the van getting a two-tone paint job with the white on top which was common.
