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I think this is my first time posting in this forum, I'm usually over in the AFV section. Recently though I have suffered with a lack of enthusiasm and have found a number of builds are just stalling, usually at the weathering stage, and so I felt it was time to try something different. I was struggling to come up with ideas when I stumbled upon an old photo of me holding the original Airfix 1/24th scale Spitfire Mk Ia. My dad had built it for me, presumably for a birthday present, and I remember being in awe of it. At that time I was building the type of kits that came in a plastic bag with a header card and could only dream of owning one of those kits that came in massive boxes and sat on the top shelves in the shop. I was aware of the new tool Airfix 1/24th Spitfire Mk.IX and it did look like an impressive kit, but it didn't fit in with my build plans and it's size means I that I haven't got the room to display it, however the more I looked into it the more I found myself getting excited at the prospect of building one myself. So here I am. I have seen a number of builds and reviews of the kit online and I'm pretty sure it must have been featured in this forum a few times, so I will try not to repeat the basic kit assembly but rather show how I have gone about adding any detail and correcting any issues that I find. In fact I wasn't going to do a WIP for this build but I don't really know that much about Spitfires so I'm hoping that the more knowledgeable members of this forum maybe able to help me out if I get stuck. The first stage of the assembly deals with the cockpit and specifically the pilots seat. I scoured the internet for reference photos of both and it soon became clear that in this scale there will be a number of details that I feel will need to be added or kit parts embellished. The kit seat itself is fine, all I added was a seam around the edge of the seatback cover from some stretched sprue. The seatbelts in the kit are plastic and too thick for my liking, they could be thinned but I decided to go with the Airscale Sutton harness. I also bought their cockpit upgrade set which apart from the instrument panel gives you some etched detail parts for the seat support frame and bulkhead. I felt that the armoured plate that sits behind the pilots seat was too thick so using the kit part as a template I made a new one from sheet brass. The seat was painted with a mid tan colour and I tried to represent the look of the composite material used in the original by stippling on some oil paint. I brushed some of the same oil onto the seat back cover to represent worn leather. In the photos it looks more like wood but in reality it looks fine. I have used MRP's WWII RAF - Interior Grey-Green ( MRP-111) for the metal parts. I am really impressed with the look of the Airscale seat belts but I will add a little weathering later on. The cockpit tub sides were assembled and painted as per kit instructions and I added the placards included in the Airscale upgrade set. I have used Mr Color Super Metallic 2 Super Duralumin for the silver areas and a very dark satin gray for the various fittings. I again used the Airscale set to detail the undercarriage control quadrant and the rudder peddles. I discovered too late that the decals on the tanks are incorrect for those particular tanks but felt that as they are barely seen I will live with it. A few of the frames needed to have the lightening holes drilled out and the instrument panel was assembled. Unfortunately I didn't take any decent photos. The cockpit tub was then assembled and then fitted to the port fuselage half. I left out the seat and port tub side for access. In the photo above you can see where I have replaced all of the kit plumbing with brass wire. I have also added some additional plumbing that was missing from the kit. It appears that at one time Airfix were going to add the link rod that goes between the control column and the elevators as there is an attachment point on the control column. For whatever reason they didn't so I made one from some brass tubing and also made a pivoting arm to attach it to. Cables were added to this and to the rudder pedals, I doubt much of this will be seen will be seen with the seat in place. The port cockpit tub side was added to the port fuselage side and a few more details added. I then added the seat and attached the wires to the back of the seat harness. I wasn't sure as to whether the harness should go over or under the roller before passing through the armoured plate but under seemed more logical. Finally after many hours work I closed up the fuselage. There was a little fettling to do around the front of the cockpit area to get it to close up nicely, this mostly involved trimming the bulkhead behind the instrument panel. There is still a small seem to fill but nothing too drastic. There are two moulded lines , arrowed in the photo, that I have seen left on a few builds of this kit. I can't see these in any reference photos so I assume they were just part of the moulding process and so have removed them. I'm actually a little further on than this but don't want to upload it all at once. Sorry about the quality of some of the photos, I have been using my phone for most of them as I hadn't intended to do a WIP. The next part of the build is the wings which I shall hopefully post shortly. Wayne

Some years ago (2014?) I bought the then new Airfix Hawker Typhoon 1B.....it sat in my stash until for no good reason I pulled it out and started. The last 1/24th kit I built was the Grumman Hellcat, a joy to build. The Typhoon build starts with the forward fuselage and cockpit. This is the result.... I posted separately asking about colours, there is certainly room for debate about the interior colours. Assembling the cockpit framing requires great care, the alignment of some parts is not precise and the instructions are not always clear. I test fitted each part a number of times before gluing. Next is the engine, I'm going to have to top cowl open, plus the gun arming panels, but the other parts will be covered. This means a number of engine parts are not used, because there isn't room. Airfix has made the engine almost scale size, so the engine cowl panels would have to be paper thin to fit.... I got hold of a copy of Brett Greens "How to Build" the Airfix 1/24th Typhoon, it is invaluable. Once the engine is in position I can "dirty" the cockpit: these aircraft operated from forward strips in France, which were very dusty, or muddy. The Saber engine was't that oil tight, so oil mist coated the firewall and seeped through the bulkhead, along with exhaust gasses, requiring the pilots to be on oxygen from engine start. Read "The Day of the Typhoon" by John Golley. ISBN 0-85059-758-7. It paints a graphic image of 245 Squadron at B5 Forward air field in France and back at RAF West Hampnett, (better known as Goodwood) where most maintenance was done. The book has some excellent photos, particularly of the interior. More as the build progresses.

Airfix's Stuka is quite an impressive model. It is stuffed full of detail and is a monster! I always liked the Stuka, especially in this scheme. My wife and son got me the model as a birth day present so I decided to build it in the snake scheme. I could not track down any of the decal sheets for these particular markings but Montex came to the rescue with their vinyl mask set. I used a combination of the masks and the kit's decals to achieve the finish. Paints used were Xtra color for the greens and blues, and Tamiya acrylics for the sand. To detail the kit I used Airscale's Stuka instrument panel and their cockpit placards. The only other after market item used were Eduards etched seat belts, the rest is done from plastic stock, wire, sprue, and anything else that came along and was useful! how to take screenshots programs to take screenshots image hosting websites program for screenshots for windows windows 7 screen shot screen shot pc image hosting image hosting sites image upload software screenshot windows image hosting software screenshot utility windows screen shot on pc windows print screen Thanks for looking