Tamiya Spitfire FR IX- PRU pink (Finished)

[Iain]

Cracking progress!! 

 

Iain

[Guest Peterpools]

Carl

Terrific start on your Spit. Having just finished my second tamiya Spit, all I can say is: awesome kit and looking forward to following our progress.

Keep 'em coming

Peter

[geedubelyer]

Great to see your progress Carl.

 

Looking at what you've accomplished in such a short space of time has got me itching to start my GB project.

I shall be avidly following your build and watching for pointers.

 

Good job.

Edited January 15, 2016 by geedubelyer

[BloorwestSiR]

Thanks everyone! I actually feel that I'm moving a bit slowly on this for some reason.

 

Maru, I haven't seen that video before so thanks for posting it.

 

A small update for now. I've added all the panels to the upper and lower wings.

 

 

I also painted the coolant pipes using metallic brown.

 

[geedubelyer]

That's a great colour on those pipes Carl. It looks very metallic. What did you use please?

 

Cheers.

[BloorwestSiR]

That's a great colour on those pipes Carl. It looks very metallic. What did you use please?

 

Cheers.

Thanks Guy, I used Tamiya Metallic Brown X-34. The instructions for the IX tell you to use cockpit green but that's incorrect.

 

I decided that it might be easier to paint the wheel bays first prior to installing them in the lower wing. I sprayed them in Medium Sea Grey and aluminium.

 

 

Since I had the grey loaded in the airbrush, I painted the wheel bays in the other pair of wings I had previously assembled. I also airbrushed the white for the D-Day stripes on the lower wing.

 

Edited January 19, 2016 by BloorwestSiR

[BloorwestSiR]

Next I installed the wheel bays. I used the clamps to get a tight fit to the lower wing.

 

 

 

Then, I added the upper wings. I glued the leading edge first and then once that had set up, I glued the trailing edge.

 

[geedubelyer]

Thanks Carl. It looks superb.

 

I have seen those pipes painted green in one or two reference photos which was a surprise but I don't know if it was on a Mk. IX.

Tamiya also call out the green in the Mk XVI instructions too. More digging is required I feel.

The contrast between the metallic brown and the green engine mounting struts always looks good though. I suspect that is the path I will follow when it gets to that stage.

 

Neat work on the wings. It often makes me smile how quickly these warbirds come together once the cockpit is built. A big contrast from a complex modern jet. No wonder they are so popular.

 

Keep it up.

 

Cheers.

[Phartycr0c]

Thats great progress there Carl.

 

With seeing the builds of so many of the Tamiya Spitfires in one place Im half tempted to have a go at one at some stage in the future. 

 

I am really looking forward to seeing this build completed in such a different colour scheme. 

 

Keep it up. 

[BloorwestSiR]

Thanks Carl. It looks superb.

 

I have seen those pipes painted green in one or two reference photos which was a surprise but I don't know if it was on a Mk. IX.

Tamiya also call out the green in the Mk XVI instructions too. More digging is required I feel.

The contrast between the metallic brown and the green engine mounting struts always looks good though. I suspect that is the path I will follow when it gets to that stage.

 

Neat work on the wings. It often makes me smile how quickly these warbirds come together once the cockpit is built. A big contrast from a complex modern jet. No wonder they are so popular.

 

Keep it up.

 

Cheers.

Thanks Guy! I agree that the contrast between the green engine bearers and the metallic cooling pipes looks good.

 

I actually haven't really started on the cockpit yet. As usual, I'm sure of building out of order.

[BloorwestSiR]

Thanks PhartyCr0c and Maru!

 

I finally spent a bit more time at the workbench and added the cannon and MG inserts to the leading edge.

 

 

As usual, a bit of Mr Surfacer500 is required.

 

 

I decided to fill in the rivets on the upper surface of the wing up to the spar. For those, I used Mr Surfacer1200.

 

[BloorwestSiR]

I then added the wingtips and landing flaps.

 

 

Next were the cannon barrels. I used ones from Aber as they were in the stash.

 

 

 

Back to the engine bearers, I added the piping and then the engine itself.

 

 

 

 

 

So now to start work on the cockpit...

[mozart]

Great progress there Carl, I find it interesting to see your order of fitting together many of your sub-assemblies.

Max

[geedubelyer]

That looks superb Carl. Good job.

 

I'm trying to decide whether metal cannon are necessary? Those that you've chosen look excellent so the answer is probably "yes".

 

Keep at it. I'm eager to see the cockpit.

 

Cheers.

[BloorwestSiR]

Thanks everyone. I had a bit of a break from working on the kit but I've made some progress. 

 

A big thank you to Peter Pools who very generously sent me a spare sprue of the cockpit parts. I had mucked my original set up in an attempt to make them fit the Revell 22/24 kit. The original plan to replace it with an Aires cockpit set didn't work after it turned out to be too short due to resin shrinkage plus requiring a number of the original kit parts. So thanks again Peter.

 

Onto the pics. For some reason, I had a couple sets of the Eduard PE belts even though I'm not a fan of them (probably because they were on sale or something...) so I used those. Some how I managed to not have the painted surface peel off on me like it usually does. I left off a couple of the really tiny bits after they sacrificed themselves to the carpet monster 

 

 

After assembling the rest of the seat, I attached it to the frame and the lower cockpit floor. I then attached the shoulder harness accordingly.

 

 

I then followed the instructions and assembled the IP, for which the pics have now disappeared from my laptop...

 

So back with more shortly.

 

Carl