The antique BoB Revell Spitfire Mk.I

[thierry laurent]

Hi guys,

 

Thanks to the good picture in the Hayes book, I scratchbuilt the starting handle and its support.

 

Here's the handle:

 

 

Here's the support system:

 

 

And finally the handle in the supports:

 

 

Another problem is solved. I doubt this will be really visible but as some items were left in raw metal, a bright spot will hopefully be visible!

[thierry laurent]

Hi guys,

 

This is not easy but I'm doing my best to keep the pace of progress as I'm on holidays! This will very probably change in August, so I'm doing my best to build as many things as possible in the meanwhile.

 

Here's one of the things I really hate scratchbuilding: bumps! And this even worse when you must do at least two identical ones. For more than two identical parts, I'm making a mold but for two, generally, I'm rather building each one manually as the time to prepare and do the casting is quite long for a single copy.

 

The ones you are seeing here are located close to each wing root. I sculpted both ones from a strip of plastic and saying this is time-consuming is an understatement as those damned parts are really tiny...

 

 

I still have to recreate all the nose ones but I think I will rather copy the ones from an Hasegawa or the recent Revell kit!

[thierry laurent]

I also ended the landing gear doors.

 

The kit ones were quite bad and asked for a lot of work for various reasons:

 

1. The perimeter shape is incorrect and does not correspond correctly to the holes in the wings.

2. The internal details are fantasy ones and the large tabs to glue the LG leg on the door are simply horrendous whereas the recess to correctly locate the leg is missing.

3. The doors have a constant and too important thickness (more particularly in their lower section)

4. The doors should have a step on their internal face (between the door external sheet and the structure linked to the LG leg)

5. The quite visible round covers on the external face of the doors are missing

6. They are a little bit too short.

 

Ouch...

 

It is useless to say correcting all the points is asking for some time. I would have been very glad to use aftermaket ones!

 

In spite of the fact the external face has quite nice rivets, I reduced the diameter of the round area a little bit before covering it with a very thin sheet of plastic for two reasons. First, I needed to find a way to recreate the missing step and second, such rivets are not really visible on the full scale door. The only really visible feature is the four disks covering the screws securing the leg on the door.

 

This picture shows the new external side:

 

 

I used a grainer tool to mark the four round covers.

 

This view shows the internal side. You can see that I had to lengthen a little bit the door to restore a more accurate end. I also filed a channel intended to receive the rear of the leg and added rivet lines close to the edges and along the leg location.

 

 

The lower section needs some judicious sanding. As I already explained the thickness of the original part is constant whereas the full scale one was thinner close to the lower edge. This is quite visible from the front of the plane. So, this should be replicated.

 

 

And this final view shows it from the other side.

 

 

Again, the doors are far from perfect but I think they replicate better the look of the full scale ones.

 

I'm happy to consider that point of the tweak list to be finalized!

 

Now the main problem is to find the best way to add the LG leg. I'm afraid I will have to glue them in the wells BEFORE adding the wells to the wings. I hate that way as it is quite risky because the probability to get wrong angles is far from nil. However, I'm not that sure I will be able to find a workaround. Wait and see...

 

 

[Captain Boogaloo]

Hello Thierry,

Great stuff!! If it helps, I could probably sort out some templates from one of the (as yet !) Unaltered Revell Mk1a models in my stash with regard to the angles required - providing of course you are happy with the original sit / angle of the legs  in the working undercarriage! Just let me know; happy to help.

Blue Skies!

Captain Boogaloo

[thierry laurent]

Thanks very much for the offer but I still have at least another box of the same kit somewhere. Moreover, I will not trust Revell because of the movable nature of the legs and the fact the kit depicted very different marks whereas they had not the same LG leg angles (e.g. Spitfire Mk.I and Seafire). So, I will rather work from pictures.

 

Today, I did my best to go through some of the remaining items of my list.

 

Here's the mast. I added the fixing screw heads. I used the smallest diameter of my grainer tool and the thinnest plastic card I had (from a vacformed tray). I glued them and sanded them on both sides as they were barely visible on the mast. However, I really wanted adding them as this will give some visual interest to the area.

 

[thierry laurent]

I also allocated time to end what I really dislike: the infamous nose bumps!

 

I assessed various options as I did not want to reproduce the exercise of the wing small bumps. And as I was looking in another Spitfire kit box full of aftermarket sets, I found an old resin one (probably from Airwaves) intended to convert the wings of later marks into various types (including the E one). If the guns were OK, most of the bumps of the set were quite crude. So, this set stayed in the box. However, I realized today I could quite easily modify the smallest ones to get the most of the early nose bumps!

 

This picture is showing the original wing bumps and the nose ones I obtained.

 

 

And this one is showing all the nose bumps.

 

 

On the left, you can see the two bumps as well as the small intake located close to them, on the nose starboard side. The intake was also done from a section of the wing resin bumps. On the right, I put the two port bumps as well as the small intake located under the exhausts. This one was made out of a Contrail thin plastic tube.

 

Useless to say I'm happy I just have to glue them!

 

The tweak list that was made of close to seventy points is now going down to nine items! I'm closer to the end of the modifications and corrections.

[thierry laurent]

Regarding the aerial mast, I forgot adding that it is required to sand the edges as the part is not streamlined as the full-scale one. This is really required as the part will obviously be very visible!

[thierry laurent]

Hi again,

 

It was quite difficult to assess what would be visible on the tank face. So, I finally decided to add the most obvious features. There is one connection going to the upper tank as well as two rows of rivets.

 

To be fully accurate, I should have used rivet decals with a longer pitch. However, I cheated deliberately as I wanted the rivet lines to be visible thanks to a black wash when the tank will be painted. As the part will be in the shadow and painted with a rust red, this is a way to see something!

 

 

With regard to the fuel hose, you can barely see it. As it was painted a sand color, it is only visible on the left of the compass. The full scale hose was corrugated but as it will be barely visible I did not go mad about such a detail. For the connection system, I used a combination of a punched disk, a modified Top Studio connector (resin car accessory) and a Contrail tube.

 

Now, I think the last visible internal component to recreate is the canopy ejection system. And finally, I will probably go back to the seat lever as I do not really like the one from the kit in spite of the fact this will not be very visible...

 

 

[chrish]

Meticulous detailing!

[Troy Molitor]

Looking forward to seeing these tiny details all attached.  This is looking impressive seeing these details come together.  

[Pete Roberts]

Doing a wonderful job Thierry!  

 

You have convinced me to choose something else for this GB - I want to incorporate this sort of detail too but would never get it done in time! I'll perhaps do a WIP later.

 

Looking forward to your next installment.  

[MikeMaben]

 

Moving along sharply Mr. L 

[thierry laurent]

Thanks guys.

 

As I already wrote, I'm struggling to end as many parts as possible before the end of my holidays!

 

The following pictures show another important step. If the kit has some exquisite engraved features, it also has the toyish "movable parts" function that was typical on many Sixties plane models.

 

Here, this means that if all movable surfaces are fortunately separate, they have huge horrendous hinges that have unfortunately no relationship with the actual ones. There is no way to leave that on a model. Fortunately, this is not that difficult to solve.

 

The first step is simply to remove the huge hinges. Then fill the huge slots intended to receive them. The challenge here is to avoid damaging the surface as the fabric or riveted sheet surfaces were nicely reproduced by Revell. Then, it is just a matter of adding new "in scale" hinges for the ailerons, elevators and rudder. Note it is also required to add some plastic sheet here and there as the slots between the movable surfaces and the airframe are generally too large!

 

The stabs without the hinges and with a round recess filed to receive the corrected elevators:

 

 

The corrected elevators:

 

 

The ailerons:

 

 

The rudder:

 

 

The hole I drilled is intended to receive a new rudder actuator arm.

 

And finally all the tail movable parts with the small tabs added to simulate the more accurate hinges:

 

 

Another major problem is now close to be solved as I just have to make that small rudder arm.

[thierry laurent]

Hi again,

 

Unfortunately I did not have a lot ot time to allocate to the Spitfire today. However, I still added some additional details. I already mentioned the missing reinforced corners on the radiator faces. Note it is useless adding them on the rear face as the ducts would be hiding them. However, this is different on the front.

 

This was the last item to add in that area.

 

 

I also worked on the canopy ejection system. The Barracuda part is very nice but is lacking two elements: the handle and the ball. I already added the handle. I made it with some thin copper wire and a bent section of fine Albion aluminium tube. I used a very shap pointed tool rather than a drill to make the two small holes in the wings of the resin part. I was a little bit nervous as I was afraid of breaking the resin wings but fortunately the resin was souple enough.

 

 

I just have to add the ball on the rear side. However, I'm still wondering where I will find a small ball with a diameter slightly under the millimeter...? Any idea?

[Wackyracer]

10 minutes ago, thierry laurent said:

Hi again,

 

Unfortunately I did not have a lot ot time to allocate to the Spitfire today. However, I still added some additional details. I already mentioned the missing reinforced corners on the radiator faces. Note it is useless adding them on the rear face as the ducts would be hiding them. However, this is different on the front.

 

This was the last item to add in that area.

 

 

I also worked on the canopy ejection system. The Barracuda part is very nice but is lacking two elements: the handle and the ball. I already added the handle. I made it with some thin copper wire and a bent section of fine Albion aluminium tube. I used a very shap pointed tool rather than a drill to make the two small holes in the wings of the resin part. I was a little bit nervous as I was afraid of breaking the resin wings but fortunately the resin was souple enough.

 

 

I just have to add the ball on the rear side. However, I'm still wondering where I will find a small ball with a diameter slightly under the millimeter...? Any idea?

 

Fishing shot? I'm sure I have some tiny lead shot that was almost impossible to squeeze on the line back in the day.