DaveCov's Airfix 1/72 Supermarine Spitfire IX (02081)

[davecov]

As I said in the GB chat thread, this coming Sunday (3rd July 2022), I will have been a member of Scale Models Forum for eight years. I have never participated in a GB on this forum. To put that right and to celebrate my 8th anniversary as a member, I would like to tag along in this GB.

My choice is one of the oldest-tooled Spitfires (originally released 1959) and which I last built in the early Seventies when it was in a polybag and moulded in light blue plastic and before a slight tooling change in 1975 when the pilot was altered. This is the 2005 boxing that I will be building:

The 22 parts are moulded in a medium grey plastic. As would be expected from such an old mould, the parts have a lot of flash and seams to sort out:

The decals are crisply printed and in register and show markings for RAF ace James Edgar "Johnnie" Johnson:

Instructions are printed on both sides of an A3-sized sheet of paper. On one side there is a history of the subject with advice for assembly along with a monochrome painting profile with reference to Humbrol paint numbers:

The other side of the instructions contains four sections detailing assembly. Of particular note is the specified dihedral diagram in Section 2:

It is my intention to do this as an OOB build and I will be putting aside my airbrush and brush-painting instead.

That is all for now.

Dave

 

[colin m]

A true classic build, nice one Dave.

 

[The Smythe Meister]

Good stuff Dave....
.... Gotta love that Box art
Andy

 

[davecov]

Thanks lads.

Having originally thought that this was to be an OOB build, once I started looking at the parts, I realised that I had to make bit of an attempt to tidy it up a bit.

First piece of work was to do something with the "see-through" radiators. I removed the rear pins and glued plastic card strips front and rear:

The tailwheel leg is very long and to prevent it from travelling up too far inside the fuselage, I glued a plastic card stop above the hole for the tailwheel leg:

I added some plastic card detail in the cockpit:

I brush-painted H78 Matt Cockpit Green:

The seat "leather" was painted and I added some rough detail to the cockpit using a pen:

Putting the plane to one side, I started painting the pilot:

That is all for now

Dave

 

[Geoffers]

Good start Dave

Geoff.

 

[Tim Marlow]

Nice start Dave. Just found an (must be pushing fifty) old version of this in my stash….it’s in the hard plastic version of the poly bag….same version as this one, but with less upmarket packaging….

 

[adt70hk]

Nice start Dave!!

 

[davecov]

Thanks everybody

More progress to report.

I glued the pilot onto the seat and joined the fuselage halves. I then masked off the areas where I would be applying filler later on in the build. It is easier to mask off before the wings and tailplanes are attached:

Wings and tailplanes were glued to the fuselage:

The propeller blades and spinner were painted:

The plastic card inserts in the radiators were painted H67 Matt Tank Grey as were the tyres:

That is all for now

Dave

 

[adt70hk]

Coming on nicely Dave!!

 

[The Smythe Meister]

Yes,progressing pretty quickly too
Good idea about masking off around the areas where you're going to apply filler....
.... I hadn't thought of that,as you'll see in my update of my build later this evening
Andy

 

[adt70hk]

Yes,progressing pretty quickly too
Good idea about masking off around the areas where you're going to apply filler....
.... I hadn't thought of that,as you'll see in my update of my build later this evening
Andy

My thoughts exactly!!! A great idea!

 

[davecov]

Thanks everybody.

Time to get the filler out. The joins were given a liberal covering of Plastic Putty:

After sanding the filler, I removed the masking tape and cleaned up the joins with a damp cotton bud:

It is now ready for painting.

That is all for now

Dave

 

[davecov]

Another little update.

Progress has slowed down because I am brush-painting and leaving the paint to cure properly before the next coat. Here is the second coat of H64 Matt Light Grey that was done two days ago:

Here is the third and final coat H64 Matt Light Grey that was applied last night and I am pleased with the result. Tomorrow I will start on the camouflage scheme:

That is all for now

Dave

 

[davecov]

It has been almost two weeks since my previous post but there hasn't been much to show as I have been away from home for a while.

I did get back to painting eventually and over the past couple of days have applied FOUR thin coats of H165 Satin Medium Sea Grey. My use of H165 was really to lessen the amount of H106 Matt Ocean Grey that I needed to use:

After the H165 had dried, I applied the first of two coats of H106 Matt Ocean Grey. Once the second coat has dried, I will begin painting the green camouflage:

That is all for now

Dave

 

[davecov]

More painting to report now.

The second coat of H106 Matt Ocean Grey was applied and I felt that I wouldn't need a third:

It was then time to apply the first coat of green, in this case, H163 Satin Dark Green. I would need at least one more coat:

The second coat was applied but I felt that a third coat would be needed:

The third coat of green was applied and I can now look forward to finishing the minor painting such as exhausts, gun ports, leading edges etc:

That is all for now

Dave

 

[Tim Marlow]

That’s looking rather fine now Dave. Good to see the old Humbrol paint in action. I’d forgotten how slow they are to use though. I guess we are spoilt with the newer acrylic formulations.

 

[davecov]

Thanks Tim.

I am still making progress as I juggle this build with lots of others currently underway.

The leading edges were painted with H24 Matt Trainer Yellow. The gun ports and exhausts were painted with H70 Matt Brick Red:

Masking tape has been removed and the next step will be to apply some Klear or gloss varnish in readiness for decalling and weathering:

That is all for now

Dave

 

[adt70hk]

Coming on very nicely Dave!!!

 

[davecov]

Thanks Andrew.

My final build report now.

I brush painted a coat of Klear on in readiness for decals:

Turning to the decalling, it was a nightmare. The decals were very glossy but were stuck to the backing paper in all sorts of places. Here you can see the upper wing roundels which proved to be unusable after dunking in water. To the right are two line decals that did not have carrier film on them so I had to cover them in Microscale Liquid Decal Film:

The remaining decals turned out to be pretty useless too as the decals were off register - but that wasn't obvious before applying. The upper wing roundels are from a XtraDecal sheet. The white surround of the maple leaf decal stuck to the backing sheet and that will need to be painted later. The two right-angle decals I mentioned previously turned out to be impossible to apply:

Despite the decalling nightmare, I was determined to finish the build without replacing any more decals. I fitted the main undercarriage legs having painted some detail on the wheel hubs. I painted part of the maple decal and then applied some weathering to the wings, fuselage and exhausts. I decided that the propeller boss didn't look right so I filled in the gaps underneath/behind the propeller blades with plastic card and filler. The propeller boss and blades will need painting before fitting.

Final steps now. The Spitfire has received it's Light Sheen coat and I am now using some elasticated thread to rig the aerial:

It is now finished. It is unfortunate that the decals were so lousy but even so I enjoyed building one of Airfix's golden oldies:

That is all for now

Dave

 

[The Smythe Meister]

Well i think that looks GREAT Dave,
Very nicely done indeed.... one thing i did notice is the amount of rivets along the fuselage.... my ICM Mk IX doesn`t have anywhere near that amount ,just goes to show how different manufacturers approach the same subject!
Once again Dave.... I love your build ,
Andy