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Spitfire Mk 1 616 sqdn Jul/Aug 1940


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OK then, it's going to be the deflection armour for the fuel tank between the windscreen and top engine cowling. I made a template out of heavy duty printing paper,then transferred it to the thinnest piece of Plasticard I had, and I will thin it a little more before I put it in place. The cutout is for the external windscreen armour and tha hole for the filler cap, which I have on the Tamiya sprue.

Cheers

John

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OK then, it's going to be the deflection armour for the fuel tank between the windscreen and top engine cowling. I made a template out of heavy duty printing paper,then transferred it to the thinnest piece of Plasticard I had, and I will thin it a little more before I put it in place. The cutout is for the external windscreen armour and tha hole for the filler cap, which I have on the Tamiya sprue.

Cheers

John

Didn't even know they were fitted with these! I learn more and more every day.

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I gather from a post by Edgar ( and I'm not about to argue with him ) that they were fitted around early July 1940 so I will probably add it, but if I simply wrap it over the existing panel the front edge will be higher than the rear of the cowling which will be incorrect, so It will require some fiddling and filing. I won't fit it ( or not ) yet anyway because I am waiting for some beading tools to arrive so that I can rivet it, which will be a lot easier to do when it's flat.

Cheers

John

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I changed my mind about not fitting the 'armour' because I have the perfect opportunity not to rush it next week as I will have very little time in my man cave.

I started by putting Dymo tape on the rear of the upper cowling so that I could create a step for the panel to sit in. I carefully sanded the upper nose to get more of a rounded section because I think the kit nose is too flat on top behind the cowling, I kept checking from below and when it became translucent I stopped. From the photos I have seen, the extra, panel seems to be level with the cowling at the top but proud at the sides and bottom, so that is what I'll aim for. The plan is to sneak down to my man cave every couple of days and stick down some more after using my hair dryer method to make it a little more pliable.

I have also started masking the panels which I don't want to build up with primer, and as you can see I have had to shade the masking tape with pencil because the raised lines are very faint, and are easily hidden under the tape.

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The next job will be to scribe the cowling panels and check with my references wether I need to remove any of the lumps on the cowlings, I know that the raised piece behind the slot for the exhausts will have to go, it represents the pipe which collected hot air from the exhaust and fed it to the gun compartments for heating and was not installed on this mark.

That's all for now.

Feel free to comment

cheers

John

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Thanks guys I'm glad you're enjoying it, I have to say it's a bit of a love/hate relationship for me. I'm hoping to get a little more done this morning as SWMBO has taken out visitor to a market, but I'm also waiting for a phone call to go and collect some horse food, so we'll see.

Bye for now

John

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I did manage to get a few things done last week. The fuel tank deflection armour is now in place, although I did manage to create a few wrinkles in the thin Plasticard when applying liquid cement, but nothing that a little Tamiya putty could not fix. I have removed the pipe representations behind the exhaust slot and started scribed the engine cowling panels which I have highlighted with a black pen for the photographs. The next step was to be making the cowling fasteners, as my beading tools arrived a few days ago, but the plastic is incredibly hard and I could make little impression in it, so now I plan to impress them into the primer.


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I have also scribed the fin and around the rear fuselage and fitted the tailplanes, which are level despite the look on the head on photo, I often do this before attaching the wings as I think it helps to get the dihedral equal on both sides. I will add the elevators later as I don't want to cover the delicate fabric effect with Halfords acrylic primer.


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I have adjusted the wing to fuselage fit to my satisfaction and hope to join everything up sometime before next weekend after I have put some layers of primer on the fuselage.


That's all for now, thanks for looking and feel free to comment.



cheers



John



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Hi Nigel, thanks for that. If you look at Basilisk's current Hurricane build ( sorry can't do links on my iPad ) on page 2 you will see a photo of his beading tools, they are like short steel knitting needles which are concave at the pointy end and impress a circle into the plastic.You can buy them as a set or individually, as I already had a couple of tools and the handle from the MDC rivet making kit, I just bought another eight in assorted sizes. I got mine from www.cousinsuk.com Have a look they are very useful, especially for larger scales.

Cheers

John

PS. I was hoping to get a coat of primer on the fuselage today but the weather's turned wet and cold, so perhaps not.

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Hi John. Good to see more progress. Shame the weather has turned and you can't get the primer on. I was desperately hoping I'd get my Spitfires to a stage where I could get some Humbrol spray can matt varnish on, while the weather was nice, but I'm too slow!! Still got a bit to do before I can spray them and I don't think the weather is going to be suitable next weekend either.

You'll have to get onto some of the smaller bits like I've been doing recently.

Kind regards,

Stix

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Hi Stix, our weather is due to improve by the weekend. I was hoping to have the wings on by then but I want to do the ' layering ' on the fuselage first to avoid either building up the primer on the wings or having to mask them. As you say, I'll find some smaller parts to keep me occupied until then, like attaching the radiator and oil cooler, there's always something.

All the best.

John

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While waiting for some weather more suited to spraying I have taken up Stix's suggestion and started on some of the small parts and sub assemblies.


I had originally planned to use the Barracuda five spoke wheels but they would need quite a lot of modification to the inner hubs to fit the kit undercarriage legs and I think I've done enough of that already so will use the kit wheels which are not too bad actually. The only thing I wasn't happy about was the depth of the holes between the spokes, Revell have moulded the outer halves with the spokes which when fitted to the inner halves leaves quite deep holes so I backed the outer halves with plasticard to reduce the depth, sorry I didn't take a photo before I cemented them together.


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Because this is a hybrid kit and includes Revell and Hasegawa sprues there are no less than four spinners and backplates, De Havilland and Rotol for Mk I/II, the longer pointed Rotol spinner for the Mk Vb and a four bladed version, presumably for the Mk VI which was developed from the Hasegawa Mk V. The propeller blades marked as De Havilland on the instructions, look to be just about right to me, but are shown as fitting onto the domed Rotol spinner, curious! The blades have small recesses in the roots which are presumably intended to fit into the blade supports on the backplate but if you do this the blades end up in the feathered position so I have filled them with some split Contrail tube so that I can fit them at a more representative pitch.


Propeller blades cemented to prop boss ( no clean`up as they won't be visible ) and given a coat of AS12 Bare Metal Silver as an undercoat over which to apply Tamiya semi`gloss black then chip the leading edges. The round object in the photo, above the prop boss fits onto the end of the propeller shaft to allow the blades to turn.


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I am going to use the kit exhausts, which are probably not as finely detailed as the Quickboost examples, but have the correct apertures one round and two D shaped each and when cleaned up will be good enough for me.


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This is as far as I have got with my attempt at lapped panels on the rear fuselage mainly because I do not have more any Halfords grey primer left, one can ran out, which I was expecting and the other (still about 1/2 full ) splattered once then stopped! A friend who is in the UK at the moment will bring some back for me but does not return until the 24th which will be too late.


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I feel that I have reached a crossroad with this build, I realise that I will not have enough time left to do all I wanted with it, like the raised rivets on the rear fuselage, and meet the GB deadline so I cannot decide how to continue. Do I just stick it together and paint it to try and meet the deadline, or withdraw it and take my time to try to achieve what I set out to do.


Help! All suggestions gratefully received (even rude ones )



Thanks for looking


Cheers



John

Edited by Biggles87
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Looking good John, good job! :)

After all the effort you've put into this I would finish it to your usual high standard and 'blow the deadline' (fnaar fnaar).

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Hi John,

I agree with CedB. After all the hard work to date it would be a shame to just 'throw the rest together'. I (personally) would prefer to watch this go together at the same high standard and enjoy the results of such a challenging build :)

That said, it's your call in the end ;)

Cheers

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Hi John. Good progress again. The prop is looking good so far. I agree with Ced and Nigel - better to finish it as you intended rather than rushing to finish. Up to you - just my two cents worth.

Hope you have a good evening.

Kind regards,

Stix

Edited by PlaStix
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Hi guys, thanks for the comments you have just confirmed my thoughts. Mrs Biggles want to take me to Bordeaux for the weekend in a couple of weeks ( there are two proper model shops there! ) and it would be churlish to refuse, so I'll take some time off from this and continue when I return.

Thanks for your support.

John

PS have you used your Gyro-cut yet Ced?

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Good man John - enjoy the trip and we'll enjoy the rest of the build in your own time :)

I haven't used the Gyro-cut in anger, yet, but I have tried it out on paper and on some film for some yet-to-be-used Spitfire templates. Really impressed. The only (small) problem I encountered was shadow from my desk lamp but that's all my fault and easily rectified. Nice tool :)

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Hi guys, thanks for the comments you have just confirmed my thoughts. Mrs Biggles want to take me to Bordeaux for the weekend in a couple of weeks ( there are two proper model shops there! ) and it would be churlish to refuse, so I'll take some time off from this and continue when I return.

Thanks for your support.

John

PS have you used your Gyro-cut yet Ced?

Brilliant!! :)

Have a nice holiday. Looking forward to the continuation of the build when you get back

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Thanks Nigel, in fact I've discovered that there are at least three model shops in Bordeaux plus lots of nice wine, so a good time should be had by all.

Cheers

John

Wine and model shops!! Any room in your car for one more?? :pray:

:D

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well, I'm obviously not going to make the deadline so unfortunately will withdraw from this GB.

I will resume work on the build soon as I now have fresh supplies of Halfords primer and my new Gyro cut for the camouflage masks, but in the meantime I intend to spend some time finishing some of the part built kits that have been sitting in a box since we arrived In France.

Thanks for all the support and advice.

Cheers John

PS. As the GB is about to end, do I have to transfer this to an ordinary WIP or will it happen automatically?

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