Spitfires over Burma and the Pacific

[Col.]

Looks great Giorgio and getting close to finished 

[trickyrich]

she looks great Giorgio. A thing to remember with a lot of these Spitfires and P-40's as well was that they were sometimes waxed or polished to help improve their "performance". So there finish was often semi-gloss or almost glossy in appearance and in some cases it gave the pain a quite dark appearance. I found a great article about this sometime back bad now can't find it, if I do I'll post it for you to read, it's quite interesting.

[Giorgio N]

Thanks folks !

Rich , I have read several accounts of wax used to improve performances and also stories of how certain commands discouraged the practice. IIRC P-47s in ETO often had waxed surfaces. In any case, if you can find the article, it will be a very interesting read.

I don't know if aircraft in SEA were polished, I have vague memories of the RAF not being too keen on this for a number of reasons but again any theatre command may have behaved differently. Spitfires in this theatre don't seem too glossy, guess that the South East Asia weather conditions would have made the paint pretty flat very soon.

 

Little to add regarding the model: I have now glued the landing gear in place and waiting for the paint on the main wheels to dry. Eduard gives resin wheels and tailwheels, the wheels are nice but IMHO the hub could have been better defined. Anyway I'm using these as the rest of the detail is very good. The tailwheel on the other hand is really nice. No point in posting more pictures as they would just show the model with a few more bits in place...

 

A word on the main landing gear: 3 different types of legs are included in the sprues to cover all variants used on the VIII and IX: no links, rear links and forward links.The instructions clearly state which type to use for each subject and the links are included as PE parts for both options. This is again a sign of the kind of attention to detail that Eduard put in this kit. The PE links are very nice, the plastic ones not much but they are quite small parts afterall.

Edited December 28, 2018 by Giorgio N

[Giorgio N]

The plan was simple: finish the model by Saturday evening to be able to take decent pictures in natural light on Sunday morning. And as all plans it failed contact with reality...

The last couple of days have been a true modeller's nightmare ! All started when yesterday morning at some point I heard something cracking under my right foot... it was the Spitfire canopy ! Brilliant ! First I have the windscreen of the A-20 breaking, then a few days later for some reason the Spit canopy falls on the ground and I step on it. Fantastic !

Fortunately I had started one of the overtrees and planned to finish this one with a closed canopy, so I robbed from this box an open canopy (Eduard gives different parts for open and closed canopies. So prime the canopy frames, paint them and attach the PE handle. Good.

Then the propeller and spinner started giving me problems... plenty of problems ! Eduard gives the prop as a single part and I don't like this. Yes, I like separate blades  because they allow me to glue the spinner and backplate together and sort any step between these parts without the blades in the way. It took me ages to sort the spinner as this and the backplate never fit correctly. In the end I realised that I had sanded too much of the backplate and now this didn't match the fuselage correctly. Aarrrghhhh....

Out comes a prop assembly from another box and then everything seems fine. Until this morning when for some reason the white paint from the spinner flakes off. Weird ! I maks the blades and try to paint the spinner... I've used all the white paints I normally use without any problem, yet today none of these worked. One pooled, the other didn't cover, another one never seemed to cure... at some point I stripped the whole assembly of paint, losing the stencils in the process and tried to repaint from zero. Again, no success-

Some 30 minutes ago I resorted to some white paint in a spray can, that seems to be working fine. Of course now I have to paint the blades in black with yellow tips... Hope to be able to complete this before I have to go out for dinner.

In the meantime I have glued most parts in place. I decided to use the Quickboost exhausts (that, I checked, are meant for the Hasegawa kit). Fit of these wasn't bad fortunately. I sprayed some exhaust soot on the fuselage, nothing major as Mk.VIIIs in theatre seem to have been kept pretty clean (or maybe the pictures were taken on freshly repainted aircraft...). These exhausts are very nice, as said before I feel that such a good kit deserves resin exhausts

Here's how the model is at the moment... pictures taken in crappy artificial light, so much for the plan

 

 

Edited December 30, 2018 by Giorgio N

[Giorgio N]

Oh well, the propeller is not great but at least it's done... I used yellow decal strips to reproduce the tips and these didn't really work too well. Maybe one day I'll replace them with properly painted tips but if I want to post pictures in the gallery before the end of the GB I have to live with them. So it is that I declare my Spitfire completed !

 

As the last few days have been characterised by constant accidents, today had to be a pain til the very end, so the camera battery decided to die just when I started taking pictures of the completed model so I resorted to plan C : using the camera of my mobile phone. As a consequence the pictures aren't very good but I hope that at least they will show what the model is like. I have to say that even with the ugly propeller tips, I like this model a lot !

Anyway, here they are, a few pictures taken with a crappy mobile under crappy lighting. Oh well, actually they don't look too bad...

 

I will comment on the kit and the build experience later, in any case let me say that this is a fantastic kit and I feel that I managed to build a decent model out of it. I am disappointed for not having completed the Australian Spitfire in time (just managed to paint the cockpit on that one) but I'm glad to have finished this one. l always felt that the men of the "forgotten army" that fought in South East Asia, men that had to fight a deadly enemy in awful conditions and yet are very often forgotten by most, these men deserve to be celebrated in the same way as those who fought in better known campaigns. In a sense I see this model as a small, humble tribute to those men.

 

 

 

 

(The pictures above are not great and the colours are not really like that... the other pictures are much better)

 

 

 

 

Thanks again to all who followed this thread ! And of course thanks to the hosts for making this GB possible. Now I only have to finish the Australian Spitfire... and you know what ? I may buy another couple of these kits !

 

 

 

[Giorgio N]

And I discovered that there was some dirt on the model in the pictures... model now cleaned and more pictures taken, visible in the gallery

[Beard]

The end result is very nice Giorgio, there's something about the Tropical Land Scheme that I really like, perhaps it's just that Spitfires look best with Dark Green/ Dark Earth uppersurfaces.

The Eduard Spirfire is a lovely kit, if a little over-complex in its breakdown, I've got four MkIX oversees waiting for the D-day 70th Anniversary Group Build and well as sundry VIIIs and XVIs.

[Bedders]

It's beautiful Giorgio. Really enjoyed following this and it must be one of the prettiest Spitfire paint schemes of all. Bravissimo e complimenti!

 

Justin

[Greg Law]

Very nice Giorgio. I to like this scheme and you have done it justice.

I totally understand the dirt issue. So many unseen things show up in photos that I just don't see when I'm looking at it. 

Just like the ragged edge of my white wing bands. I tried fixing it with a mask and it still didn't clean it up. Mind you I think I like it now. Gives the plane a used look.

[modelling minion]

Very nice work Giorgio, a lovely scheme and you have done it justice.

Funny how some models put up a serious fight and usually near then end when you are running out of time! Well done on completing her despite the issues.

[trickyrich]

well done Giorgio, you made it through to the end with a model by the sounds of it that didn't! Think you put your feet up and have a well deserved rest....with a glass or 2 of your favourite!

 

despite all your troubles she's a fine looking model, and really nicely finished as well.

 

Hopefully though the build was enjoyable, and as usual it's always a real pleasure to have you along for a GB and to see you skills in action. 

[Grandboof]

A very nice Spit Giorgio Good to see it finished 

Martin H

[Giorgio N]

And as promised, here are a few more pictures of the completed model, now without dirt and with a somewhat better light.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Giorgio N]

18 hours ago, Beard said:

The end result is very nice Giorgio, there's something about the Tropical Land Scheme that I really like, perhaps it's just that Spitfires look best with Dark Green/ Dark Earth uppersurfaces.

The Eduard Spirfire is a lovely kit, if a little over-complex in its breakdown, I've got four MkIX oversees waiting for the D-day 70th Anniversary Group Build and well as sundry VIIIs and XVIs.

 

Thanks ! This is indeed a good looking scheme, IMHO even more in SEAC markings than it is with the more common ETO roundels.

The Eduard kit is a bit too over-engineered but I found it pretty easy to build. Tolerances are tight though and even a slight trace of paint can give some problems.

 

17 hours ago, Bedders said:

It's beautiful Giorgio. Really enjoyed following this and it must be one of the prettiest Spitfire paint schemes of all. Bravissimo e complimenti!

 

Justin

 

Thanks Justin ! It is a scheme that I like a lot, I have planned another couple of SEAC Spitfires, I only have to sort the decals, as the Modeldecal roundels I have are not the right size

 

17 hours ago, Greg Law said:

Very nice Giorgio. I to like this scheme and you have done it justice.

I totally understand the dirt issue. So many unseen things show up in photos that I just don't see when I'm looking at it. 

Just like the ragged edge of my white wing bands. I tried fixing it with a mask and it still didn't clean it up. Mind you I think I like it now. Gives the plane a used look.

 

Thanks Greg ! That's the problem so often with pictures, they show stuff that we didn't notice... fortunately for me it was just a bit of wool from a jumper, easy to brush off the model but I've had experiences similar to yours... like the day I discovered that I had a slanted white band on a Macchi...

 

16 hours ago, modelling minion said:

Very nice work Giorgio, a lovely scheme and you have done it justice.

Funny how some models put up a serious fight and usually near then end when you are running out of time! Well done on completing her despite the issues.

 

Thanks ! I keep saying that I have to finish my models before the deadline, so that in case things go wrong I have time to sort them. Still, I keep ending on the very last day... 😄

 

14 hours ago, trickyrich said:

well done Giorgio, you made it through to the end with a model by the sounds of it that didn't! Think you put your feet up and have a well deserved rest....with a glass or 2 of your favourite!

 

despite all your troubles she's a fine looking model, and really nicely finished as well.

 

Hopefully though the build was enjoyable, and as usual it's always a real pleasure to have you along for a GB and to see you skills in action. 

 

 

Thanks Rich, it was a pleasure to be part of this GB ! Looking forward to the next GB on the War in the Pacific !

The build was actually very enjoyable, the more I build the Eduard Spitfire the more I like this kit. There are a couple small things I don't like and I feel that Eduard could have done these differently, like the propeller, the exhausts and the way the guns are glued to the wings, but really when it comes to 1/72 Spitfires there's nothing that comes close in terms of accuracy, detail and engineering. Any "negative" comment I may address at this kit is just one little detail that would have made it even better than it is. Guess that the presence of another 10 in the stash shows how much I like it

[Greg Law]

That's almost funny. For some reason I kept on looking at it as a 1/48 scale. Goes to prove how go your build is.