Clostermann's LO-D by Airfix Spitfire Mk.IX

[Dpgsbody55]

I actually don't like D Day stripes.  They ruin the appearance of a nice model.  But I have three of Pierre Clostermann's aircraft in my stash and since one of them has these stripes, this seems like a good time to get on with it.  I read The Big Show when I was about 15 or 16, and a few more times since.  My father was in the Royal Engineers during WW2 and he had previously told me of his days camped outside Caen with the Army trying to dislodge the German forces.  He said it was mostly boring, but occassionally not.  In his off duty moments, he and some mates would go on the scrounge for something to bolster the rations and they came across this field with and apparently unattended cow.  So they milked it daily as fresh milk was rare, only to find one day it had already been milked.  Next day, they got up earlier to beat their rivals who, it turned out, was the RAF.  It became a race to see who could get to the cow first until Dad and his mates decided this was ridiculous so they took the cow with them.  It eventually got left with one of the poorer farmers close to the town in Belgium where he seemed to stay for a while.

 

Clostermann relates exactly the same story in The Big Show.  Same place and time, so it's possible I have a slight and distant familial link to this man and subject of this GB.

 

So on to this model. I'm building the Airfix Spitfire Mk.IX for this group build, with a few extras.  I have the Xtradecal 1/24 set for this plane, Airscale's PE set for the cockpit, Eduard Brassin fishtail exhausts and a choice of Eduard steel seat belts or HGW cloth jobs.  I'm not sure which of these two I'll use and I don't get on with HGW's stuff, but this being the size it is, I'll give them one last go.

 

 

I made a small start on it today, but it may be slow going as it's very hot right now and it's hard to work on these things when your glasses are sliding down your face.  The very first thing I did was to glue in the tail wheel area onto the fuselage.  The parts fit quite well, but each has a small gap in different areas.  The left half (upside down one in this pic) fits very well on the vertical join against the fuselage but has a gap that will need a dose of Mr Surfacer 500 beneath the tail plane fillet, whereas the right half fits well against the fillet but has a visible gap against the fuselage.  But it's easily dealt with, again with some Mr Surfacer.  From what I've seen, that about sums up this model.

 

 

Next I added some parts to the cockpit floor so that I can paint this before too much longer.

 

 

I'm also drilling out the lightening holes in the fuselage frames.  You have to with this size model or it will really stand out.

 

 

Next, I started assembling the pilot's seat and adding the first of the Airscale enhancements.  The kit detail was removed before adding the PE parts., and the whole thing needs a little tidy up before paint.

 

 

Lastly, I sprayed some Tamiya AS12 over the insides of the fuselage and cockpit sides and floor.  If it looks a bit strange, that's because it probably dried to fast in the heat.  I hope it will look better once I get the cockpit green sprayed, otherwise it will get done again if we get a cooler day soon.

 

 

 

So that's five steps crossed off the instruction book.  Only two hundred and thirty nine to go .

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[MikeMaben]

        

                    

 

[Furie]

 

Hello Michael and congratulations for the choice of this camouflage (see my signature...).
Do you want to do the Pierre Clostermann Spit with the full B&W stripes around the fuselage (there are no photos of the LOD as far as I know) or the LOD with the B&W stripes on the lower half of the fuselage?

 

 

 

Edited January 14 by Furie

[Furie]

Here we talk about LOD with complete B&W stripes: spitfire - [GB EDUARD] Spitfire Mk IX - "Clostermann" 1/48 - Page 3 (forumactif.com)

 

MJ586 is on FULL stripes from June 5 to July 7, 44, and is flown by Clostermann.
On July 6, 44, Clostermann leaves the 602 and gives his MJ586 to Jacques REMLINGER (as the plane runs better than Jacques').
On July 7, 44, orders are given to remove the invasion stripes visible from the air (upper parts and flanks) on planes based on the continent, to give them a better camo on the ground "in apple fields and and meadows full of cows!"
And so when MJ586 wears 1/2 stripes, it's Jacques REMLINGER' plane!

Edited January 14 by Furie

[Dpgsbody55]

17 hours ago, Furie said:

 

Hello Michael and congratulations for the choice of this camouflage (see my signature...).
Do you want to do the Pierre Clostermann Spit with the full B&W stripes around the fuselage (there are no photos of the LOD as far as I know) or the LOD with the B&W stripes on the lower half of the fuselage?

 

 

 

 

17 hours ago, Furie said:

Here we talk about LOD with complete B&W stripes: spitfire - [GB EDUARD] Spitfire Mk IX - "Clostermann" 1/48 - Page 3 (forumactif.com)

 

MJ586 is on FULL stripes from June 5 to July 7, 44, and is flown by Clostermann.
On July 6, 44, Clostermann leaves the 602 and gives his MJ586 to Jacques REMLINGER (as the plane runs better than Jacques').
On July 7, 44, orders are given to remove the invasion stripes visible from the air (upper parts and flanks) on planes based on the continent, to give them a better camo on the ground "in apple fields and and meadows full of cows!"
And so when MJ586 wears 1/2 stripes, it's Jacques REMLINGER' plane!

 

Thank you for that information, Furie.  Very much appreciated.  From this, I'll be doing it with the full invasion stripes as I definitely want to build it as Clostermann flew it.  This would suggest that it won't have the Sky band as that would have been over painted with the last white band of the invasion stripes.  The next question is was the serial number also overpainted?  I suspect that it was, but would be happy to be proven wrong.

 

One other thing I'm happy with from seeing these pictures is that I now know that I need to use the tail plane and elevators with the later type with the extended balance area.

 

It's interesting to see the difference in the way that the invasion stripes were applied.  LO-C has these painted further forward than LO-D, so it shows just how fast these were applied.  Thanks again for posting.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

 

PS.  It's still too hot to spend much time at the workbench, so not a lot done.  I have, however, made a new armour plate for the seat back from brass as this will better match the etch piece for the head armour in the Airscale set.  The kit piece is plastic and although thin and with chamfered edges (and ejector pin marks) so would look silly if I used the etch head armour piece.

 

Apparently it's supposed to be cooler on Wednesday, so perhaps some painting will get done then and I can properly start to move on this build.

[DugyB]

On 1/13/2024 at 5:31 PM, Dpgsbody55 said:

it's very hot right now and it's hard to work on these things when your glasses are sliding down your face

Have you guys not discovered this wonderful invention called Air Conditioning yet over there … ….

or even a fan ….. ok, I’ll shut up … 

Edited January 15 by DugyB

[MikeMaben]

Maybe some help Mike ...

 

 

hth

[Dpgsbody55]

22 hours ago, DugyB said:

Have you guys not discovered this wonderful invention called Air Conditioning yet over there … ….

or even a fan ….. ok, I’ll shut up … 

 

My house is airconditioned by way of evaporative AC, but I've had to shut off the aircon to the two back bedrooms where my son has his guitars stored.  He makes them himself but presently lives in New Zealand so dear old Dad is storing them and they get warped in high humidity and I understand what he puts into them.  One of these rooms is where I do my modelling work  and at present it's 41 degrees C here now and unusually humid too which means the evap system is not so effective.  Cooler change coming tomorrow, so the weather gods promise us, so I'm just tinkering with this putting bits together ready for paint.  Did the engine cradle last night which meant starting on the engine itself.

 

West of the NSW and SA borders and south of the tropics, evaporative AC works well except on rare occassions as it's much less humid than the east cost and doesn't justify the cost of refrigerated AC.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[DugyB]

8 minutes ago, Dpgsbody55 said:

 

My house is airconditioned by way of evaporative AC, but I've had to shut off the aircon to the two back bedrooms where my son has his guitars stored.  He makes them himself but presently lives in New Zealand so dear old Dad is storing them and they get warped in high humidity and I understand what he puts into them.  One of these rooms is where I do my modelling work  and at present it's 41 degrees C here now and unusually humid too which means the evap system is not so effective.  Cooler change coming tomorrow, so the weather gods promise us, so I'm just tinkering with this putting bits together ready for paint.  Did the engine cradle last night which meant starting on the engine itself.

 

West of the NSW and SA borders and south of the tropics, evaporative AC works well except on rare occassions as it's much less humid than the east cost and doesn't justify the cost of refrigerated AC.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

I remember those days well too, I lived in the Blue Mountains and our AC didn’t, couldn’t reach the back rooms, made for interesting times building and airbrushing….. throw in a cat to two also ….  But back to the Spit now 

Edited January 16 by DugyB

[LSP_Kevin]

If your evaporative AC has a "fan only" mode, just use that when humidity would otherwise make it untenable. Crank the fan speed up a notch or two higher than you normally would. We've found it can be quite effective on humid days when used this way.

 

Kev

[Dpgsbody55]

On 1/16/2024 at 5:00 PM, LSP_Kevin said:

If your evaporative AC has a "fan only" mode, just use that when humidity would otherwise make it untenable. Crank the fan speed up a notch or two higher than you normally would. We've found it can be quite effective on humid days when used this way.

 

Kev

 

That doesn't work here.  The typical summer weather pattern sees us enduring long hot days with very hot easterly winds blowing in off the desert.  If we're lucky and there's no trough down the west coast, we'll get a late sea breeze (the Femantle Doctor)  All that would happen is the house gets full of very hot dry air.  I'll shut up now and not add to the heat!!

 

Perth and suburbs follow the coast.  It's 150k's north to south, but only about 30k's west to east, and our eastern suburbs never get that sea breeze.

 

Back to the Spitfire now.  We have paint!!!

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

Edited January 18 by Dpgsbody55

[Dpgsbody55]

Over the last few hot and sticky days, I've spent a little time each day at the bench pushing my glasses back up my sweaty face and gluing as many parts together as possible to make paint easier,  and also making an armour piece for the pilot's seat.  The Airscale set has an etch head armour plate, but no seat armour which I think would look strange.  Here's the kit part, and the bit I made.

 

 

This is the kit part in place, but not glued.

 

 

A little thick.  Here's my part slid into place, but again not glued as nothing is painted.  I know which part I'd rather use, but I'll paint both in case of any problem with my bit.

 

 

I've also been gluing etch pieces onto a number of parts prior to paint.  Here's the instrument panel with the Airscale flange around the inside of the opening for the pilot's feet as an example.  I've also removed some of the stock detail and will replace this with wire.  I used many bits of tape to hold this in place and it got a proper clean up before I painted it last night.

 

 

Since the engine bearer is painted in the same colour as the cockpit, I thought I'd build that assembly.  The instructions suggest you build the engine block to act as a jig.  Basically, you glue the block and sump together then start assembling the cradle.  I also put the camshaft drive in place as well.

 

 

This started me thinking about building up the engine as I couldn't do much else, which is why you can also see the cylinder heads assembled too.  There are other parts also assembled into a collection of sub assemblies, like the inlet manifold which is three pieces (right side of sprue, left of the carbie picture).

 

 

Once this had dried, I started making some more of the engine.  I've seen a video suggesting the fit of the inlet manifold is poor if you follow the instructions, so I glued the right cylinder head in place and glued the manifold to the left head and taped the two together for proper fit an alignment.  This also means I can get paint into every spot in the engine's V.  One small issue encountered when gluing the right head to the block was that the right cam drive rod at the back of the engine was a little too long stopping proper fit of the head.  So I filed down the place on  the head where the two parts meet and drilled out the hole a little more to get it all to fit.  The left side seems OK.

 

 

Once dried, I rattle can sprayed the hard to get to bits. 

 

 

This means that all the hard to get to parts are painted and I can think about assembly, although I'm more concerned about getting to grips with the cockpit and fuselage.  I have also filed off some of the detail from the engine, as I plan to replace this with wire for the oil pipes etc and while it's apart, drilling holes to receive those pipes will be easier.

 

So as I mentioned, a cooler and less humid change came in late yesterday, so I got out the airbrush and painted everything I think I need to in the green cockpit colour.  You can see lots of parts sprayed here

 

 

 

So now it's on to the cockpit proper, starting with the instrument panel and detailing the pilot's seat starting with painting it brick red.  Hopefully I'll have something more interesting to show next time.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[Dpgsbody55]

At last I have something to show, or so it feels.  The pilot's seat is now complete, as is the instrument panel which in itself took a while.

 

Firstly the seat.  I did in fact use my brass piece for the armour plate, but it needed a bit more adjusting before it fit as I want.  Here it is assembled but not yet glued in place.  I've gone with the Eduard etch seat belts as I once again had "issues" with the HGW belts.  I am extremely envious of those who get them to look good.   The voltage regulator has since been put in place, after these pics were taken.

 

 

 

In a first for me, I've tried to make the cockpit look a bit worn and dirty as this plane operated in a dusty environment.  I've used a Mig dusty wash, then dry brushed most of it off.  I'm not sure about it, and final judgement will be made after the fuselage is together.  This is the cockpit floor and the right side after some of the detail parts have been added.  The rest of the cockpit has been similarly treated.  I have also drilled out the lightening holes in the frame just behind the red handle.

 

 

Next up is the instrument panel.  Firstly I removed the cables molded into the left side of the IP frame and replaced them with 0.3mm wire, painted brass.  Once set in place, I used wine bottle lead to make the retaining straps.  The instrument panel itself is my first attempt at putting an Airscale detail set together.  It does look far better than this picture shows, but there were a couple of parts which had me questioning how much talent I don't have for this hobby .  It's a very involved set with etch parts layered on etch parts, lots of CA to glue your fingers together, but the final result is the best IP that I've yet made for a Spitfire.  My one big issue with it is that a couple of the decals needed a couple of applications of Mr Mark Setter as I was building it up.  Handling it during construction seems to have an adverse effect on those decals.  But they're all there now and since It's now glued in place, perhaps they'll survive too.  Airscale also provide the fuel cock just right of the compass, which is one of the details left out in the kit.

 

 

As soon as this was finished, I glued it in place.  I found that the panel needed a little adjustment to get it to sit in the channels molded into the sides and floor, so that took a little fiddling and I test fitted it into the fuselage halves to make sure they closed up properly, which they now do.  Here's the IP in place on the floor, with the right side also glued in place.

 

 

 

From here, I'll be working firstly on the undercarriage selector then the rudder pedals and maybe the control column.  The latter is another part which is missing a prominent detail in the form of the elevator actuator rod that goes under the pilot's seat.  Strange that the ancient Airfix Spitfire MkI has it, but this one doesn't. I see more brass sheet in my future, albeit a small piece.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[Dpgsbody55]

Some more cockpit work to show.  The right side of the cockpit tub is complete now and I've started on the left side.  That part next time.

 

The first job was to get the undercarriage lever with it's attached pipes installed.  These go into the floor under the rudder pedals so must go in first.  I used more of the Airscale etch parts which need decals applied over each.  This time I had no trouble with those decals but they needed a good dose of Markfit to get them to settle down over the raised parts of the etch.

 

 

Thankfully, it's fairly easy to get into place.  I put the bottom end in first, then manoeuvered the top section into place.  There's a keyhole shaped mounting hole for this, so you'd struggle to get it wrong.

 

 

Rudder pedals next and these also got some Airscale embellishments.  Once glued into place, I dragged a flat knife blade over them to get that used look.

 

 

Rudder pedals now in place.

 

 

I turned my attention now to the control column, which is missing the link to the elevator pivot on the back of the frame that holds the pilot's seat.  The kit is also missing that pivot.  The missing link (no jokes here, please.... ) was made using a length of 1.2mm rod,  and was attached to the control column using two strips of brass that were attached to either side of the rod, painted, then attached to the control column itself.  That part has a raised piece cast in that pokes through the cables on the column, so the brass was shoved in there and glued to the raised piece.  It's almost like the kit was meant to have this piece, but the accountants said no.  Then a pivot was cut from sheet plastic and glued in place on the back of the pilot's seat frame.  It is triangular in shape, and two holes were drilled through it to attach elevator cables made from 0.4mm wire.  The same size wire was also attached to the rudder rudder pedal rods underneath the pilot's seat.  'Scuse me if this sounds a bit gibberish, but I've just had another covid jab today and I'm starting to get some side effects, so thinking straight I'm not.  Hopefully the picture explains better that me.

 

 

I did a bit of test fitting to get the right length to the elevator so that it contacts the pivot.  This is a bit of a pfaff as it needs to be wiggled into place with a little resistance as it passes through the rudder pedal retaining bracket.  Once this was sorted, I glued the control column into place then glued the pilot's seat into place, after passing the wires though the frame.

 

 

Wires were then attached to the pivot at the back of the seat frame and the two fuselage frames behind this were each set in place, together with the top supporting brackets on each.  I would have liked to drill the rear cross brace between the middle and rear fuselage frames which is also the radio aerial mast step, but as I started drilling, the piece broke.  Repair was easy, but it was disappointing not to add that improvement, especially considering all the other parts I've drilled out.  In each step adding fuselage frames, I've taped the left cockpit side in place to help with setting these parts in place properly, and also mounted the whole lot into the fuselage halves to ensure that I can properly join these together when that time comes.  It would be very easy to glue in a part or assembly wrongly aligned, then find that I couldn't close up the fuselage.  Once this was dry, I put the now assembled Eduard steel top seat belts in place, and painted the bare steel underside as I think that might be on display too.  Here's a couple of pictures showing progress to date.

 

 

 

Once I set this assembly into the fuselage, I'll create something to anchor and tension those cables.  They're overly long at the moment, but that will give me plenty to attach them too.  They look a mess right now, but it shouldn't be a problem sorting and anchoring them.  I have started on the right side, with the oxygen bottles assembled, painted, decal'd and set in place.  It shouldn't be too long before finishing the rest of that side then I can glue it in place on the right fuselage half and finish the remaining cockpit details.  Then I can sort out those cables and glue the fuselage halves together.

 

Next time .

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[BradG]

Great progress mate.