ICM 1/48 Spitfire Mk.IX 'Beer Delivery'

[BP85]

4 hours ago, Nikolay Polyakov said:

Hello and welcome @BP85

P.S. Sorry for photo-bombing your thread 😶

Hi @Nikolay Polyakov-hello back and thanks for the tip. I think I'll give that a go next time. And feel free to photo bomb anytime!

 

@Troy Smith, thanks again. I took the line to be poor moulding like is the case for most pieces. A bit too late to fix now but will remember for next time. Thanks also for the advice with the 190 - I think that's going to be my next build 

[Troy Smith]

9 minutes ago, BP85 said:

A bit too late to fix now but will remember for next time.

it's an engraved line, not raised as in the kit, as the photo shows.

Try rescribing, hint, get a thick magazine or a paperback book, put a needle or blade in the pages at the right height, mount the spinner firmly, say 2 sided tape, and then probably easier using moving the book with needle round the spinner, rescribe the line, if that makes sense?

 

[BP85]

Today's update. I decided to take the advice and spend some real time on the cockpit.

 

Made my first attempt at seat belts by cutting a thin strip of normal masking tape (not Tamiya yellow) and folding back on itself stick side to sticky side. Following that I cut the approximate lengths needed and sprayed Tamiya dark yellow:

 

 

And sprayed:

 

Next some buckle/adjuster bits with some wire. This was fiddly as hell and took about an hour on it's own, hope it will be worth it in the end. 

 

Test fitting suggests they are a little too wide

 

 

Next everything gets an oil wash with some heavily thinned Windsor and Newton burnt umber

 

 

 

 

That's all for this morning. Once everything has dried I will attach the harness ans close her up. 

 

Thank you for all the kind comments and advice so far. Sharing the progress makes the build much more enjoyable. 

 

 

 

 

 

[Kitchen Modeller]

Brilliant work on the seat belts! I can't even get my head around working at that level of fiddleness. Definitely worth the effort though, especially if you're going with an open cockpit. 

[BP85]

1 hour ago, Kitchen Modeller said:

Brilliant work on the seat belts! I can't even get my head around working at that level of fiddleness. Definitely worth the effort though, especially if you're going with an open cockpit. 

In a previous life one experiment involved attaching quarter millimetre glass prisms to the end of fiber optic cables - I guess my old fellowship is finally paying off! 

[BP85]

Hi all. A little bit of progress made today so I thought I would share an update. Started with attaching the seat belts with super glue and over all feel pretty pleased with how it turned out. Definitely worth the effort. 

 

With the cockpit done and seat belts attached it was time to bring the fuselage halves together. The fit is pretty grim and made more difficult with the fact that there are no locating pins at all and the halves have to be fitted by eye/feel. I have found pulling masking tape tight across joins gives me better results that pegs/clamps which I sometimes find can distort the shape. 

 

As I'm going for open cannon bays, at least for the time being depending on how they turn out. The cannons were sprayed Tamiya dark iron and the bays dull aluminium which looks a bit too shiny for me at the moment, I'm hoping a bit of oil wash will help to soften it. 

 

I had real trouble with the wing sections and bringing the fuselage to meet them. Lots of scraping and filing was required to get the rear of the wing section to mate with the fuselage and still the join is horrible and stepped. The wing roots as feared with the dry fit test last week do not meet the fuselage leaving significant gaps. The wing tips didn't fit without some pretty major filing of the locator strip.

 

All in all though she's starting to look like a Spit and I'm enjoying this build even though nothing is as straight forward as it should be. I think the challenge is adding to the enjoyment. As my first non-Airfix build I am noticing a big difference in quality but I do like the level of detail in this ICM kit. 

 

Hope all are well and that these posts aren't boring anybody too much. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[rob Lyttle]

Bored..... With a Spitfire's progress?

On this forum??

I don't think so!

And an interior like this...

Some will be taking notes, BP.

 

Great stuff so far!

 

You're right.... A perfect kit would be a bit of a bore, really

[BP85]

Hello and Happy New Year, all and apologies in advance for the long post. 

 

@rob Lyttle- thank you for the kind words. 

 

Naturally, Christmas meant not a lot of time to progress with the Spitfire but I finally managed to put some time in yesterday and the day before. 

 

As seen previously the fit is pretty non-fitting. I don't know if this is my mistake or in part the kit itself. But more on that later. 

 

 

As a distraction from all the gaps I thought I would get onto the most distinctive feature of this kit - the all important beer bombs since we certainly don't want the boys going thirsty after the invasion. 

 

The beer bombs come in two configurations; with or without a drag-reducing nose cone. I am going for the version without the nose cones as I think this gives a more distinctive beer barrel look. There is also an option for what appears to be a drop tank which will be added to the spares box. The barrel parts themselves look nicely tooled and detailed; I'm guessing that this has something to do with them being newer parts. 

 

 

The barrel bits went together nicely and will only require minor sanding before painting. 

 

 

Next I went on to paint the propeller and spinner. Paints used are Tamiya Sky, Flat Black and Flat Yellow. Once all was dry I drybrushed the leading edges and spinner with Humbrol Aluminium though it feels like I may have overdone it somewhat. I may tone down the wear later on. 

 

 

Next job was to fit the radiators. The grills were sprayed flat black and then drybrushed with aluminium again. These fit okay, however, the same cannot be said for the covers. The radiator covers were badly warped and lots of sanding and manipulation was required to get them to fit in the locating grooves, even after this the gaps/ridges were pretty bad (I forgot to take a picture of this pre-filling). 

 

 

I decided to give Miliput a go instead of Humbrol filler which I have used a couple of times before. First up I masked ahead of filling to limit contagion. 

 

 

It was interesting working with the Miliput (Standard Yellow/Grey) , I found it quite stiff and not the easiest to manipulate but this may have been down to how I mixed the two sticks. 

 

Filler applied:

 

 

 

 

 

 

After sanding down the finish is a bit mixed. I think the join between the fuselage halves and the underside of the wing is as good as it will get and I'm quite pleased with the leading edge wing root/fuselage filling. It is less obvious in real life but the pictures show that the join between the fuselage halves needs some serious work so that's probably going to be this weekend's job. I think will will go for the Humbrol filler for the fuselage seams as I find this easier to work with for finer filling. Seems like a lot of work but I don't want to rush this part as I think it will be really worth it in the end. 

 

 

 

 

 

So far I'm loving this build and thank you to those of you that have taken the time to follow and comment. It is a challenging kit and it is really pushing my beginner skills but seems like you can get great results if you put the effort in and don't give up when the kit is fighting you. 

 

 

 

[Biggles87]

I admire your perseverance. It is a challenging kit, but as you say it will be worth it in the end.

 

John

[BP85]

Minor update. Today is my first day back at work but when I work from home I work in the cabin, which also doubles up as my modelling den, so naturally I couldn't resist. Got the Humbrol filler out and went to work on the seams. I think I will leave it to dry overnight before sanding down. Would be nice to be in a position to get some primer on it tomorrow. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BP85]

After sanding down it looks like the Humbrol filler has done a good job. I'm pretty pleased with the joins between the two fuselage sections now and the tidied up wing roots. Tomorrow's job will be a bit more fine sanding and rescribing panel lines filled in by filler and depending on the outside temperature tomorrow will hopefully get her primed up to see if any more filling/sanding is required. 

 

Can't decide whether to go for the usual grey primer or to blackbase. I've seen quite a few uses of both but can't quite decide which way to go for this one yet. 

 

 

 

[rob Lyttle]

Great progress- joints are looking good.

This could be a bit of a distraction to the work schedule....

[Kitchen Modeller]

Looking good - I'd advise putting some tester paint on some of the seams to make sure they're 100% flush before moving on - also might be good to dry fit the canopy now to make sure you'll get a good join there - something I always forget to do and live to regret! I'm a mere novice myself but you seem to be doing everything right! 

[BP85]

Hi All and happy new year. 

 

Back to the Beer Delivery after getting sidetracked with my Hunter. Not a great return 😕

 

I have got the cockpit masked and fitted but when I came to rescribing the panel lines at the wing roots I seem to have pulled out pretty much all the filler. I have primed with Humbrol grey rattle can primer as my black one ran out after covering one wing. Not at all happy with the result. I think I will re-fill and rescribe and re-prime. The cannon Bay covers are only there to keep paint out as the intention is to have them open. 

 

 

 

[BP85]

Had a bit of a go in my lunch break since I'm working from home again. Wasn't at all happy with the wing root joins in the previous post so I have tried to sand them down further. The port wing root doesn't so much have a gap as a step so I tried to file and sand this away. 

 

 

After re-priming one side (can ran out before I could do everywhere I noticed that the panel lines had started to fill in, not that they were deep anyway. 

 

 

Next, a moment of madness ensued. I thought I would attempt to rescribe the panel lines with my newly arrived Tamiya scriber. However, this didn't go too well. None of the lines I have done have come out straight and they look like they have pretty much wrecked it:

 

 

Is there a good way to get straight panel lines on a curved surface? Not entirely sure how to go on from here. I could sand them down and have no panel lines or I could attempt to smarten them up and risk making them worse or deeper. Or I guess I could leave them as is. Not sure really. Would like to rescue it one way or another after all the work on the engine and the cockpit. 

 

On a positive note I have painted the wheels (Tamiya Rubber Black and Humbrol Aluminium). The other sets are for my 1/72 Hunter and Spitfires:

 

 

Ben. 

 

 

 

 

[clive_t]

I've been there, done that - it's one of those things that sort of looks easy, but then when you actual get to trying it, it defies all common sense! I have been told by several people to get some of that Dymo tape (for making punched sticky labels), peeling the backing off a short length of it and sticking it to the surface adjacent to where you wish to scribe. Then follow the edge of the tape with your panel line scriber, gently but firmly, keeping the motion as even as possible - as opposed to jerky which is how I invariably ended up doing it. Oh, and a ton of practice would be useful too!

 

Good luck anyway!

 

 

[BP85]

Update to the previous post. The re-scribing isn't actually a disaster after all. After sanding them down a bit they don't actually look too bad. I think I will very carefully do this all over as the out of box panel lines are pretty insignificant. 

 

 

Ben

15 minutes ago, clive_t said:

I've been there, done that - it's one of those things that sort of looks easy, but then when you actual get to trying it, it defies all common sense! I have been told by several people to get some of that Dymo tape (for making punched sticky labels), peeling the backing off a short length of it and sticking it to the surface adjacent to where you wish to scribe. Then follow the edge of the tape with your panel line scriber, gently but firmly, keeping the motion as even as possible - as opposed to jerky which is how I invariably ended up doing it. Oh, and a ton of practice would be useful too!

 

Good luck anyway!

 

 

Thanks for the tip, Clive. I'll be sure to give that a go going forwards. 

 

Ben. 

[rob Lyttle]

Yeah, Dymo tape is the recommended solution for this, @BP85.

But like you say, it's looking OK, so I hope you're cracking on with it.

Now, older kits with raised panel lines..... Remember those??

... that starts to get interesting

[BP85]

On 19/01/2019 at 19:22, rob Lyttle said:

Yeah, Dymo tape is the recommended solution for this, @BP85.

But like you say, it's looking OK, so I hope you're cracking on with it.

Now, older kits with raised panel lines..... Remember those??

... that starts to get interesting

Thanks, Rob. I will be cracking on with it, hopefully will have an update post by this weekend depending on work. I do remember raised panel lines, I have a few older kits in my stash with them but they're stories for another day!

[BP85]

Hi All, 

 

Some new weapons for my fight against this kit arrived today. Seen a lot about PPP and I can't say that I am disappointed. Far easier to apply than the Humbrol stuff and easier than Miliput for the small gaps. I also got some Ultimate Primer as I'm not too keen on using the rattle cans and would like to prime from my airbrush. 

 

I have given the problematic wing roots a filling and smoothed it over to ease the sanding process. I have also filled in the starboard Wing panel lines that I butchered last week with the scriber. These will have to be rescribed at some point and I'm really not looking forward to that. I'm going to leave the PPP a good day or so to cure so that it hopefully doesn't all fall out when it comes to sanding and re-scribing. Hopefully then I will be able to get the primer on her this weekend. 

 

 

Thanks for dropping in. 

 

Ben

[BP85]

Hi All, 

 

After leaving the PPP to cure for a day I gave the wing surfaces a sanding and reapplied PPP where I had missed. After leaving again to cure overnight and after procuring some Dymo tape I went back to work on re-scribing the panel lines. 

 

 

 

Much happier with the straightness of the lines although I have probably gone a bit deep. Will hopefully reduce the depth with a bit of sanding. 

 

 

Definitely not a perfect or even a probably good job but it will have to do for now to avoid this becoming a Sisyphean task. 

 

 

Next on with some black Ultimate Primer. Sprayed at 20psi straight out of the bottle. First time using it and I have to say that I am quite impressed. 

 

 

 

 

And now for drying, will probably leave it overnight to cure on my bespoke drying rack. Camouflage tomorrow. 

 

 

Definitely got my mojo back for this build. Thank you for all the tips and encouragement. 

 

Ben

 

 

 

 

[clive_t]

Nice work. I had the same issue with the depth of the scored lines. Mine looked like I'd been digging a trench! All down to experience, I guess - you'll know next time, and even as you have it now the primer will have at least partly filled them in!

[BP85]

Thanks @clive_t. I'm going to give them a little sand to try andake them a little shallower but not much after that. One or two glue marks and some poor first time Miliput work means I will be puttying, sanding and filling tomorrow so apologies for the lack of any camouflage tomorrow! 

 

 

 

Ben 

Edited January 26, 2019 by BP85

[Vladan Dugaric]

You may want to remove the aluminium dry brushing from the propeller, as Spitfire Mk.IX had a wooden Rotol propeller, which would not show bare metal from wear.

[Troy Smith]

On 04/01/2019 at 10:26, BP85 said:

Next I went on to paint the propeller and spinner. Paints used are Tamiya Sky, Flat Black and Flat Yellow. Once all was dry I drybrushed the leading edges and spinner with Humbrol Aluminium though it feels like I may have overdone it somewhat. I may tone down the wear later on. 

 

 

 

2 hours ago, Vladan Dugaric said:

You may want to remove the aluminium dry brushing from the propeller, as Spitfire Mk.IX had a wooden Rotol propeller, which would not show bare metal from wear.

 

Rotol was a compressed wood composite, but the leading edges were brass sheathing.

 

The brass sheathing on the leading edge this can be seen here as the paint has chipped

 Here's a useful image of some blades,showing both the wood construction and the brass leading edge sheaths.

see

 

  Yellow tips were 4 inch (1/12th inch in 1/48th) BTW

Spitfire maintenance by Etienne du Plessis, on Flickr

 

The paint did chip off the brass

Spitfire by Etienne du Plessis, on Flickr

 

and this gives a good idea how prominent panel lines are (ie not much)

this is a selection of WW2 era colour Spitfire shots,  which are superb for showing they actually looked...

 

HTH