Airfix 1:48 Mk1 spitfire

[Guest]

Yep another from me.

I got the Douglas badar kit, but it contains everything needed to make either a mkv or mk1 spitfire so im going to build as a mk1.

I need to get some suitable aftermarket decals for it to put it at the BOB.

Box shot

Not a new tool kit but an old kit mixed with newer sprues.

I cant see much flash on the sprues and the fit although isnt great shouldnt pose much of problem.

Cockpit components sprayed weathered and given a wash.

Fuselage together.

Wings together

A bit of filler needed in places but nothing major

[AlanG]

Looking good Paul. Some putty will fill those gaps nicely

[Dave W]

My step daughter gave me this kit for Xmas.I'm going to build mine as the early Mk1 with the fixed pitch two bladed prop.Looking forward to seeing this one When you've finished it.

[Guest]

Nice one Paul, supposed to be a bit of a good kit this one.

[Guest]

Bit more progress after major screw up by myself.

Decided to make the elevators posable so i cut them of with a knife and glued them in the down position.

Cannopy masked and gluued in position.

Primed

Camo pattern sorted and sky grey painted underneath.

Fabric red gun covers sprayed on

Prop and landing gear sorted

The major screw was i sprayed over the first primer with silver alloy and then applied liquid mask, then sprayed the camo pattern over the mask and rubbed it off revealing a nice weathered chipped look, but i over did it and it looked like a plane worth scrapping, so i repsprayed over again it all went pearshaped, and looked awful so i spent 45mins with x20a removing all the old paint off and started again.

I cant do any more now till my BOB xtradecals arrive so i hope they dont take long.

[stona]

Errr.... for future reference the underside colour should be Sky not sky grey or sky anything else. Sky is a colour itself the same as the earlier "Camotint" and is variously and innacurately described as duck egg blue,duck egg green and even duck egg blueish green. Much pulling of hair and rending of sackcloth about it. I use the Xtracrylix offering which is as good as anyones.

This signal demonstrates the Camotint to Sky transition. The "type S" referes to the smooth finish and does not refer to the colour in any way.

This was a new colour and within two days of the order to paint all fighter undersides in the new colour someone realised they didn't have enough of it and this signal was sent.

So at least some aircraft continued operating in the black/white split underside colour.

There was confusion about the colour at the time. Sky blue was a colour familiar to the storemen on RAF stations and some aircraft undoubtedly got a coat of this in error. There are other accounts of squadrons mixing their own versions. A further "clarification" was sent.

I doubt this helped much.

Much later some signals were still referring to "sky blue" and "duck egg blue" in error.

If people were confused at the time it is hardly surprising that we get confused seventy years later!

Cheers

Steve

[Guest]

So now you know! Thanks for the information Steve, you can't get much more reliable information than that.

The Spit is looking good though Paul and you've done a lovely job of preparing the surface. Sorry it went pear shaped but we all have these challenges every now and thgen.

[Guest]

Ok all the decals are on a mixture of xtradecals and the airfix ones, the xtradecals look superb really good quality.

A coat of klear is on and drying next step is a promodel wash of dark dirt.

[Guest]

Ok finished but im not happy with it.

Im not sure just how dirty these would have got during the height of the Battle of Britain, but i expect they would have done a sortie then landed and probably would have refuelled and armed and went straight back out or certainly not sat on the ground for long anyway. So with that i wanted to do a really dirty stained plane, but i think ive gone overboard on the gun and exhaust staining.

Ill get some better pics tomorrow

[Guest]

Ive depicted this as a heavily used (but not damaged) aircraft showing dirt and smoke/gun stains.