Im in with an MPM 1/72 Spitfire PRX1[/img]

Welcome to the GB

Hopefully this is a picture of it.

Hi Tizzy welcome to the GB,looking forward to see your PR Spit develop.

Just trying to get my head around posting pics.

Hooray! I actually posted a piccie.Now to prove it's not a fluke i'll try and show the contents of the kit.

Easy peasy.I've got my smug head on now.Here's what i did last night.

Assembled the cockpit,fixed into the fuselage and brush painted.



Fuselage halfs joined,ready for sanding.



Went together very well for my first experience of a limited run model.Only a bit of filler will be needed.

good start so far Tizzy
Welcome to the GB

Hoooooo yehhhhhh, PR spitty What colour will she be?? Blue or Pink??? Naaaahhh don't tell, keep us all in suspense. Nice one Tizz, keep the updates coming mate. Cheers. jim

Do you think the pink was a defensive colour to protect an unarmed aircraft. 'I see a Spitfire! Hold on...IT'S PINK ?I must be seeing things.Disengage from attack and head back to base for a long lie down.'

AFAIK the color pink is a "gay" color. Perhaps the pilot was trying to 'out' himself ?

They were painted pink because they operated at dawn and dusk. It was an attempt to blend in with the pink skies and clouds associated with these times of day

Yes, but in those days Erwin, gay was just another word for being bright and showy, or plain happy.

So a Pink Spitfire could actually have been gay!

The 60's put pay to that word..

Thay's exactly what I ment.

Thanks for the insight on the real reason for PRU pink.I knew there must be a good reason for such a strange colour sceme.

Anyway time to show this weeks work.

The wings were assembled and fitted.










The fit of the wing fuselage is not great and quite a bit of filling and sanding was needed.

Next i finished kitting out the cockpit with photo etch belts from eduard.I know this seems a strange time to add them but i only just decided to try them.It was my first time with photo etch and it was a fiddle but they look great.





I finally fitted the canopy which was once again a very poor fit and required filling and sanding.This is made worse by the step on the cockpit side being moulded as part of the canopy transparence bit and not moulded as part of the fuselage.



Thats it for this week.Back to the putty and sanding sticks and i'll show you the next installment next week.

Definately looking like a Spit now Tizzy.

I have found a picture of the aircraft i am building on wingspallette.



I'm not sure if the colour is quite right but it gives an idea of what the model should look like if i don't cock it up.

Last time i looked there was a picture of a PRU Spit in my previous post.Some nasty nip must have shot it down because all i see now is a red cross.I'll post it again.Found this picture on wings pallette.

O.k lets show the next installment of the build.This episode is brought to you by' Filler and Sanding stick' productions Ltd.

I painted the insides of the radiator cowls and then glued these into place.They were not a good fit and had to be held in place firmly whilst the glue set.So firmly in fact i heard a load crack as the port wing nearly snapped off
Luckily just the glued seam on the upper wing root had cracked and it just required re-gluing and filling.
I decided to fit one of the 3 choices of underbelly auxilliary fuel tank as this plane would have operated with these a lot.
3 sizes are provided and i went for the smallest.It also covered up the rear of the air filter intake which saved having to waste time filling and sanding a poor fitting part.





Following this i filled and sanded the front of the airfilter intake to blend it into the front fuselage and i filled and sanded around the canopy to make up for the poor fit.
All i have to do now is give the model a wash and it's time to throw some paint at the thing.More on this next time.

Looking good so far.

That looks nice!!!!

Hi everyone.This is the progress in the last 2 weeks.

I finished filling and sanding the fuselage and primed the model.



I painted the prop and wheels.



Next i threw some paint on.





I've got to paint the campaign stripes and then the darkened area where the standard RAF roundels were next.

In my haste to post the pictures of my progress i may have given the impression that everything is going swimmingly with the build.Well it was going swimmingly until i carried the model outside on a calm still evening and a freak gust of wind blew the model of the board and it fell on the floor splitting the seam along the spine and the belly.
After another evening of gluing,sanding and filling it was time to spray take2.This time i tacked the model to the board with Blu Tack.I wont be making that mistake again.

Bad luck with that Tizzy, keep going it is looking top!

It's been a while since i posted any progress reports.The model is now finished.I'll show the in progress pics on this post and then post again with the finished pics.

I painted the white SEAC stripes on the wing



Next i applied the decals.The decals were rubbish.The roundels had white edges which needed careful trimming and some of the stencils silvered despite using microset and microsol.The worst silvering was on the wing walkway stripes.In the end i removed them and drew the stripes on with an artists ink pen.Luckily i had already decided not to use all of the stencils as it can be overkill in this small scale.The tail fin flashes were very unresponsive and would not conform to the panel lines at all.In trying to coax them to conform they broke up.I ordered a set of Platz B type and SEAC markings,used the fin flashes and put the rest in the spares box.
I then applied Pro-modeller wash to pick out the panel lines.Once this was completed i took an HB pencil and drew a circle around the SEAC roundels which was the size of the Btype roundels this aircraft carried when operating out of RAF Benson.I shaded inside the circle and then smeared the pencil graphite with a damp cotton bud.This created the marks left by the removal of the old roundels.I added exhaust staining with black pastel chalk.


I'll show the rest on the next post.

The model is now finished.After the initial weathering i applied a coat of Xtracrylix flat varnish to matt it down and then fitted the under carriage.This proved a problem as the holes for the oleos were in slightly different positions.A lot of messing about was required to get an acceptable result and the fit of the undercarrige doors was terrible.Finally i attached the prop,added some chipping with silver paint and added some dust on the wing base.That's it. Finished. Here are the pics.








All in all this has been a difficult build ,but then it is my first attempt at a limited run model and i have learnt a lot from it.Apart from the last minute problems with the landing gear, i have really enjoyed this build.I hope you enjoy the pics.Feel free to make any comments you want,including critiscm,so long as it's constructive.Now im off for a beer to celebrate the end of the build and Saint's getting a vital point against the Baggies.Cheers

Looks great.Well done job.

Beautiful likkle Spit!

Nice one!! Good to see a Spitfire in a slightly different guise to normal.

Like it lots.

MarkC

lovelly little spit, well done Tizzy