1/48 Airfix Spitfire MkIIa

Gallery Article by Andrew Holloway (kaysersoze) on July 15 2009

 

This kit was bought as a spur of the moment purchase in my local hobby shop. I had wanted a Hurricane, but they had sold out, and then I saw the Airfix box. I realised I didn't have an early Mk Spitfire, and having always wanted to do a Battle of Britain era one, reached for my wallet.

I decided that after a 4 year break from model making, I would dive in at the deep end, and added stretched sprue and some additional scratch built parts to the cockpit to 'busy it up'. My trusty datafile was soon dog-eared and finger marked....

The only niggles I found with an otherwise painfree build, were the lack of the fuel filler cap, and a Malcolm hood canopy that a) wouldn't fit, and b) turned opaque after I used Klear on it. All the other canopy parts were fine....guess the gremlins got to that before I saw them. When I get the chance, I will replace it, so for now it remains loose.

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For painting and weathering, I decided that I wanted a war weary kite, one that had seen a lot of action. Instead of going for the option of using the Dark Earth and Dark Green as advised by the instructions, I went for colours a couple of shades lighter, as the fade of the paint was to be extensive. I used preshading for the first time, with some mixed results. Will need to practice to make perfect I guess. Paints used were a mix of Humbrol and Revell enamels

For weathering, I used artists oils for the first time to simulate oil streaking. The 'sludge-chalk' wash was used to pick out the panel lines, and crushed chalk was used to create both cordite and exhaust streaking. I also used crushed chalk to create the 'dark to light' patches that I had seen on a picture of a very heavily weathered Spitfire courtesy of one of my fellow ARCers.

The kit decals were used, and settled perfectly with applications of Klear. I used Humbrol Matte to dull it all down. 

In my mind, the Spitfire has just returned from a hectic sortie over Kent. The lack of bullet damage goes to show the combat savvy of the pilot. The evidence of the hard combat is shown by the amount of cordite smoke that stains the wings. At some point, the Merlin engine has popped an oil line, and has resulted in the pilot needing to pancake quick at the first available airfield. As soon as the ground crew effect repairs, re-arm and re-fuel, then she will be ready again to defend the skies over the South coast.....

Andrew Holloway (kaysersoze)

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Photos and text © by Andrew Holloway (kaysersoze)