Spitfire F.Mk.XIVe - AZ model 1/72

[Leonl]

I have been struggling to keep update on this thread, and other threads, due to a very busy period. Just had a 30 minute window to catch up and glad I did. Looking marvelous Mr B. About to start work on my own Spitfires now so have a particular interest in this one now.

 

I'm very impressed with the casting, I'm not brave enough to try!!  

[Cookenbacher]

9 hours ago, CedB said:

Remembering your problems with the floor stopping the wing going on I dry fitted the wing last night:

It was actually the new Sword kit where the bottom of the cockpit interfered with the wing fit. The AZ low back fit just fine, but we both know that the AZ high back and low back fuselages don't exactly agree with one another. I believe that the high back was more of an afterthought in the design process at AZ.

[keefr22]

Not long back from a weekend visiting daughter & family in Hampshire, with very little time on t'net, so playing catch up too. More good modelling on another not so easy kit Ced! Liking your progress on the clone pilot production too - I'm sure you'll soon have that process cracked too!

 

Keith

[CedB]

6 hours ago, TonyTiger66 said:

I feel extremely guilty about this Spit now Ced. It's proving to be quite a pain in the butt ox.

 

Thanks Tony - please don't feel guilty, it was a kind gift and, as Cookie says, it's no Airacuda!

 

6 hours ago, Procopius said:

That's what I do on this -- cut the entire bottom of the IP off below the compass platform.

 

Thanks PC - one side of the i/p snapped off anyway when I trimmed it (it's very thin in the middle of the bottom) but I won't tell if you don't.

If you chop the whole bottom off, how do you keep the floor up?

 

5 hours ago, Leonl said:

I have been struggling to keep update on this thread, and other threads, due to a very busy period. Just had a 30 minute window to catch up and glad I did. Looking marvelous Mr B. About to start work on my own Spitfires now so have a particular interest in this one now.

 

I'm very impressed with the casting, I'm not brave enough to try!!  

 

Thanks Leon!

 

3 hours ago, Cookenbacher said:

It was actually the new Sword kit where the bottom of the cockpit interfered with the wing fit. The AZ low back fit just fine, but we both know that the AZ high back and low back fuselages don't exactly agree with one another. I believe that the high back was more of an afterthought in the design process at AZ.

 

Thanks Cookie - my fault for not checking, even with the labels.

 

1 hour ago, keefr22 said:

Not long back from a weekend visiting daughter & family in Hampshire, with very little time on t'net, so playing catch up too. More good modelling on another not so easy kit Ced! Liking your progress on the clone pilot production too - I'm sure you'll soon have that process cracked too!

 

Keith

 

Thanks Keith - I hope you had a good weekend  

 

I've progressed a bit with the Spitfire and now reached the 'you should have done it the other way' bit - dry fitting the wings.

Some people fit the bottom wing to the fuselage and then the tops of the wings.

Some people say NO, fit the wings together and then fit them to the fuselage.

Either way you won't overcome the short-run problem:

 

Untitled by Ced Bufton, on Flickr

 

The wings don't fit. Take your pick.

You can also see where the split wing parts (the flaps are part of the top half) force the leading edge out. You could sand the back or the front.

So many choices...

 

I'm being very patient waiting for the rubber to cure. More tomorrow.

[Procopius]

42 minutes ago, CedB said:

 

Thanks PC - one side of the i/p snapped off anyway when I trimmed it (it's very thin in the middle of the bottom) but I won't tell if you don't.

If you chop the whole bottom off, how do you keep the floor up?

 

I've never had any trouble keeping it up (fnarr!) with just the framing behind the seat as an attachment point.

[TonyTiger66]

It's not often I have a cunning plan Ced, but here's one I sometimes use.

 

To avoid upper wing root gaps.

 

I've had a lot of trouble with these; I used to make (models but don't...anym...), lots of old KP eg La-7, their old Spit Mk IX, lots of Amodel etc, the RPM and also old Hasegawa BF-109E kits in 1/72. All gappy in my limited experience.

 

Always huge wing gaps, much filler, lost wing root detail due to my occasional ham fisted sanding.

 

I then started a wierd approach:

 

Dont assemble the wings; adopt this order: glue the upper wing halves to the fuselage first. If there's room, strengthen the join with spare plastic card, some two part epoxy if you can.

 

Leave the model drying with a suitable jig to get the required dihedral.

 

One it's fully dry, add anything that needs adding *then* glue the one piece lower wing in place. It sometimes takes some very brute force and much clamping, but the result is usually, no gaps.

 

When the lower wing seems too big, just physically bending it 'up' to meet the dihedral will negate this and the clamping actually maintains the dihedral. Hard to explain unless one tries it.

 

On eg the Avis Bf-109 a/b/c/d one has to beware of one wing adopting more dihedral than another. I eventually found that in that kit it was due to a thick 'hump' in the lower wing knocking things out of whack. But that whole kit is horrible to build imho, and I've tried, often.

 

Maybe too late for this Spit Ced, but worth storing for later.

 

It really is great to see you not giving up on this beastie.

 

All best regards

TonyT

 

PS: If gaps are already inevitable:

 

A lot of people fill wing root gaps with eg Tamiya putty or (the simply lovely) Humbrol filler. The trouble is sanding it away can lose wing root detail. On so many BF-109's I lost the little 'bumps' at the mid point of the roots.

 

Likewise strips of plastic can lead to the same after a slip of the scalpel or sanding.

 

Copydex and I don't get on here either, it seems to sink and still leave a slight trough. Finally PPP and I really don't get on; I understand that this latter really must be my fault, as so many other people get good results  .

 

Here's one for the brave:

fill the wing roots with a little two part epoxy (a cocktail stick to apply little bits of very slow drying epoxy at a time is good), and wipe off the excess quickly with a cotton bud. I think I use a quick swipe of nail

polish remover for that. Check on scrap plastic (sprue/runner/sprunner/Danny La Rue-nner ) first, that the nail polish remover doesn't melt it.

 

The result is no gap, no sanding and a really strong join. I used the overnight two part epoxy, and always Araldite, not horrid Poundland/Dollar Tree Chinese etc glues that simply don't work correctly.

 

Sounds scary, but it works. As Vic and Bob would have said many years ago, it creates a "Strong Bond" 

 

All the best

TT

Edited January 23, 2017 by TonyTiger66
PS added and spelling corrected

[Biggles87]

You could try sanding down the wing fillet before you fit the wings, it looks like there's less detail to loose there.

 

John

[CedB]

Thanks PC - 'keep it up using support behind the seat', good advice

 

Thanks Tony for the 'Tiger method' - 'I then started a weird approach'; cheeky! The problem on this kit is the short-run / old moulds resulting in curved, rather than straight, joins... check out the 'short shot' leading edge and the curved fillet

 

 

so even the 'Tony method' would be gappy. It will succumb to sanding / trimming and filler! I find PPP works best using the 'Rob method' - applied with a small spatula, smoothed with a moist finger and cleaned up with a damp cotton bud. We shall see how these work out - I might have to use Humbrol filler or Milliput to allow re-scribing and re-shaping and will probably try some Milliput while I'm filling the tailwheel.

 

Thanks John - in my ignorance I had to look up 'wing fillet' and, assuming it's nothing to do with cuts of chicken, I now know it's the bit on the fuselage that covers the wing join. Something else learnt. I think you're right that that's the main problem, although both parts are curved at the join rather than straight so I'll need to try and straighten them up.

 

More later!

[keefr22]

That looks like it might be a prime candidate for a good application of sprue gloop filler Ced - would maybe add some strength in there too, doesn't seem to be much joining area at the moment?

 

Keith

 

[AlexN]

That's a complete mess.

 

By the manufaturer, not you Ced, he said hastily.

 

You've sorted worse. Much worse.

 

Cheers,

Alex.

[TonyTiger66]

Ooo crikey that is indeed a difficult one Ced .

 

That, as Tom Waits said somewhere on an Easy Street corner on  'Nighthawk Postcards' is; "Open to suggestions"....  .

 

 

Watching and sending positive energy..

 

All best regards

TT

 

[Christer A]

The Tony method is something I've tried in the past with some success, at least enough success to have it in the back of my mind when attaching any upper wing in place on a low-winged aeroplane. Still, it will require some fettling...

[Leonl]

No easy answer there.... but be patient! 

[CedB]

Thanks Keith - sprue soup, that's an idea... except it needs sanding (yuk) and mine's a bit hard and shiny.

Thanks Alex, Tony, Christer and Leon for the support.

 

More pilot moulding. I realised that the second (new) mould is behind the other one so I took off the Lego:

 

Untitled by Ced Bufton, on Flickr

 

and trimmed off the rubber that had leaked through the gaps in the bricks. I realised I hadn't shown the Plasticine removal last time (probably because I was worried about it) but it peels off really easily:

 

 

Nice clean subjects after a bit of excess removal (I did the right-hand bloke's head after this shot):

 

 

Rubber in - another 24 hour wait and I'm 'out to lunch' tomorrow. Oh, the tension!

[giemme]

  and  

 

Ciao

[keefr22]

12 minutes ago, CedB said:

Thanks Keith - sprue soup, that's an idea... except it needs sanding (yuk) and mine's a bit hard and shiny.

 

 

Are there not a couple of fnaar's missing at the end of that sentence Ced...?! 

 

The reason the sprue gloop stuff occured to me was actually because of the amount of sanding that looks to be needed - thought it might help it all blend in better after you'd attacked it with the belt sander....!!

 

Keith

[rob85]

Looking forward to seeing the pilots!

 

the wing join looks a bit of a horror, I say use milliput and a wet finger, maybe the first time you don't have any left over!

 

Rob

[Navy Bird]

Tough luck with that wing joint. When I built this kit, I had the usual short-run fit issues, but nothing like that. I wonder if I got an early copy and the tooling has deteriorated since then? I know you don't like sanding, but I see some in your future.  

 

Cheers,

Bill

[CedB]

Spitfire

Thanks Keith, Rob and Bill. Bill your comment made me think and check for 'old mould' signs and sure enough there were lines and blobs on both fuselage and wings. You can just see the sort of thing I mean here:

 

Untitled by Ced Bufton, on Flickr

 

I've tried to edit that in Flickr's 'Aviary' but it won't save... see the 'burr' on the back of the top wing join? Well it's off now. With a bit more scraping with the Citadel seam tool we have this join:

 

 

Ignore the black blur down the front - it's the Berna clamp. 

I think some PPP will sort that tomorrow.

 

Pilot moulding

Thanks Giorgio.

I couldn't resist splitting mould No 1 and seeing how it went:

 

 

The instructions on the release agent say not to get it on the master 'to avoid loss of detail' so I'd carefully avoided the parts - and had to cut the rubber apart in some places. Lesson learnt; make sure the release agent is all over the rubber! It's hard to see the detail on the mould eh? However, it is easy to see that these holes are not going to be enough to inject some resin with a pipette / syringe:

 

 

so I've carefully widened the openings a bit with tweezers and a scalpel:

 

 

That should be wide enough, but I'm still going to pre-fill the moulds with resin in the holes before closing the halves and injecting some more to, hopefully, avoid missing feet!

[Beard]

You're getting there on the wing roots Ced. I think you might need to shave a bit of the bottom of the top wing, although the dihedral might cure it.

 

As these are fairly early AZ, probably using low-pressure resin moulds, it's not surprising that they are a 'challenge'. One comfort though, at least none of the parts are moulded solid like the spinner on the VBs I had in a Joypack.

 

I'm looking forward to your home-made pilots.

[keefr22]

43 minutes ago, CedB said:

 

 it is easy to see that these holes are not going to be enough to inject some resin with a pipette / syringe:

 

 

 

 

If you have this again Ced, you can always squeeze the mould sides together which will usually enlarge the holes enough to get a syringe in.

 

K

[SmashedGlass]

Ced, as it looks like you're going to have to tackle the wing root issue with brute force methods, I could suggest the following technique from Rato Marczak for restoring the entire filet once you are done eliminating that dread gap (about half-way down the page):

 

Primer Method

 

I used it successfully on a (failed) HobbyLoss MiG-15UTI build years ago.

 

-Erik the H

Edited January 23, 2017 by SmashedGlass
Clarified

[Cookenbacher]

Nice work on the wing join Ced! You'll have it sorted soon.

[CedB]

Thanks Keith - squeeze the mould? Scary! I'll give it a try though, thanks.

Thanks Erik - great link and top tip; those fillets look great don't they?

Thanks Cookie - I used Keith's idea of some sprue soup, although mine had become rather gloopy so I've (now) added some more liquid poly. Needs a bit of sanding but, as Keith says, there'll be more strength there.

 

While the soup was drying I used Joe's tip of strapping down the model and attached the tailplanes, located underneath with BluTak and supported with Lego:

 

Untitled by Ced Bufton, on Flickr

 

Why oh why do they insist on butt-joins? Horrid. One tip - if you're using TET make sure the BluTak is tight to the fuselage or the glue may run underneath and give you some sanding to do (ask me how I know)!

[giemme]

1 minute ago, CedB said:

One tip - if you're using TET make sure the BluTak is tight to the fuselage or the glue may run underneath and give you some sanding to do (ask me how I know)!

I won't ask you, because I know it first hand myself    

 

Great tip about strapping down the model  

 

Ciao