Technique for adding wood grain to styrene

I was building Model Power's farmhouse kit, and their directions for building the porch weren't very clear. I ended up modifying the parts slightly... in order to get the porch overhang to the right height, I added a new crosspiece above the posts. I happened to have a 1/8" square piece of styrene around, that worked perfectly. Since it would be pretty prominent on the model, I decided the pefectly smooth finish wouldn't cut it. I started using rough sandpaper (80 grit), but all that did was make the styrene kinda fuzzy. I used an 8" mill file next- I used the edge of the file to scribe grain lines onto the surface... that worked really well. And the grain lines were wavy and random. I made to to scribe them deep... once the paint was applied, the effect worked very well.

Just thought I would share!

-otto-

Hi Otto, I've taken a razor saw and by dragging it sideways across the plastic made some nice grain markings.