Need Suggestions on Modeling Non-Skid Surfaces

DW,

There are a few ways to do this (of course depending on the scale) In 1/72 the textures in real life would be almost a non-starter BUT you can do it close.  If the part you wish to "non-Skid" is a piece you can sperate from the rest, you can "spritz" it with a small amount acetone, which will attack the plactic and give it a slight edge.  Another way it againg spritz it with the acetone and then tap it with a "Hard" plastic toothbrush or small wire brush to stipple the plastic.

Another method is simply laying down a piece of 1/800 -1/1200 or smaller sandpaper from an automotive paint supply store, thus you get the perfect areas covered the way you want.  You can use elmers spray on adheavsive to gluw them together.

Hope this helped.

I'm with Big Jake, in that scale, and would try texturing the paint in some way. or even just laying on a thicker layer of paint so it looks different .

Big Jake,

Thanks!  Your suggestion was very helpful. I actually ended up modifying your approach a little bit. I tried using acetone and using a wire brush, but I don't know if I wasn't applying sufficient amounts of acetone, but it seemed that the acetone just evaporated and didn't have much of an effect on softening the plastic.

What I ended up doing was applying a thin layer of Squadron green putty, smoothed out with an applicator, then I used the wire brush you suggested, tapping on the putty. It ended up looking great!

Thanks again for your assistance and suggestion.

Happy Modeling!

Doug J.

If you can mask the area off okay, and have an airbrush, putting down a very dry coat of a flat paint may give enough texture.  If you can prime it first with a fast dry primer like auto body primer or Krylon primer, and put that down fairly dry, that will have a pebble-like texture that a thin coat of flat color will look good on.

Another option would have been using a solvent cement brushed on then using the metal brush once the plastic has softened.

In the past I have used fine grade wet / dry sand paper.