Spitfire PR.IG Interior Completed

Things have been busy at work, and I haven't made as much progress on the Spitfire as I was expecting. I've made the decision to not worry about the deadline for the ISM group build, which ends September 30th. My job is all about deadlines especially before a code deployment to production, which I've been dealing with this week. I don't need deadlines in my hobby. This will get done when it gets done. I also learned this week that Advil is a pretty decent muscle relaxer.

I finished the cockpit last week so here it is. Happy Friday.

Primed with AK Gray Primer. Gray or grey? GrAy if you're American, grEy if you're English.

Interior was painted with Model Master Acryl RAF Interior Green.

I decided not to use the armor plating PE on the structure behind the seat. I figured they would have removed it to make the aircraft lighter and faster as well as more fuel efficient. Although the Spitfire PR.IG was armed, the pilots were given strict orders not to engage in a fight. A lot of the photo reconnaissance aircraft were field modified, so documentation on the exact build outs are spotty at best.

I picked out some stuff with semi-gloss black and aircraft interior black and some random red and yellow on some bits.

The instrument panel didn't quit come out the way I envisioned but the splash of color really made things standout.

After the seat was primed, it was sprayed with Tamiya's Hull Red from a lacquer can.

After a couple days of curing, I started painting with the hairy stick. The back of the seat got some flat black, with a little highlight of lightened black for some wear.

I worked my way up to painting the belts. I used Tamiya's Buff color. It's really horrible brush painting Tamiya acrylic, but it wasn't too bad once I thinned it and added Flow-Aid to retard the drying.

The belts in the seat.

Next I painted the grommets and the latches with silver, a very delicate operation.

When everything was cured, I gloss coated it with Alclad's Aqua Gloss.

I tried using a wash of black and raw umber oil paint.

I assembled the wings while I waited. Or maybe I just taped them together and glued them later. I don't know. Here's a picture of the wings.

After I gave the oil a couple of days to dry, I coated it with Ultra Matte varnish.

The instrument panel after a flat coat.

I used the Aqua Gloss on a very fine applicator to dab it in the instruments to give the appearance of glass.

The kit seat had a way of mounting with a tab that inserts into the floor, but the resin seat doesn't come with that option. I used some strip styrene stacked and glued together, then sanded down to give me a mounting point.

Glued into place.

The outside got a quick bit of paint just to make sure it wasn't white. Not that you could see it, but why not give it a little attention?

Mounted the seat with some cyanoacrylate glue. "Super glue", but not super glue, another brand.

The yoke.

The instrument panel.

The finished interior. It's a bit interesting how grayish it turned. Oh well, you probably won't see most of it anyway when it's closed up.

That's it for this week. Maybe you'll get an update in about a week?

I also came across this while I was typing and well, it's just amazing. I lasted 24 minutes.  https://youtu.be/qfHMytOUq6Y

Stay classy.

Thing Two's 1/72 P-51D Mustang Part 2

The ever exciting continuation of Thing Two's snap-together Mustang build.

We're going to attack the wings this time around. Get it? Attack wings.....hahaha. At least I found it funny.

Snipping the wings off the sprues. There seems to be a lot of snipping with this build. Well, when a model consists of just  snips and snaps, that's what you get.

Putting the wings together. I also glued these as you could have guessed.

I really don't know what this part is.

Assembling the fuel tanks.

Putting the fuel tanks under the wings....with some.....you guessed it, glue. They're still a bit wobbly because there really isn't much in the way of connecting tissue to glue.

You know what's coming.

It almost looks like an official plane now! Official enough for bi-plane and jet standards. Because bi-plane cockpits were open and jets don't have propellers, but I'm sure you would have figured that out.

That's it for this time. Apu says, "Please come again."

Spitfire PR.IG Part One

Hello, it's me again. Yes, who else would it be?

I've got something old but completely new. I'm going to be building a Spitfire PR.IG. This Spitfire was an armed photo reconnaissance variant with an oblique camera mounted in the side of the fuselage and two cameras mounted underneath. It still retained all eight guns, but pilots were told to avoid combat whenever possible and were chewed out even if they were successful in a lethal encounter. I will be using Tamiya's Spitfire Mk I kit for the base and adding resin after market parts for the conversion.

I'm building this Spitfire dedicated to my beautiful wife for all she does for us. She loves the elegance of the Spitfire as well as the PR.IG's paint scheme. I thought it would be a good tribute build, as well as keep me out of trouble while she and the progeny are visiting the relatives for the next few weeks. Hello Thing One and Thing Two!

If you've never built this kit just on its own, you should.

Tada. Parts.

Here are the resin parts I will be using. I decided that I will only be using the Airwaves parts on the left. I received the resin kits free of charge from a friendly Spitfire enthusiast at the local modelling club. Thanks Mr. D!

Some reference material on the PR.IG, also provided by Mr. D (inside the entire book of reference material on loan). I'll get it back to you Mr. D, I promise!

I was looking forward to beginning the build as it will be a part of a special interest group (SIG) build on International Scale Modeller forum. I had to wait for July 1 to begin and I have to be done and post photos by September 30. Finally, a SIG that corresponded with what I wanted to build, when I wanted to build it! Here is half of the fuselage before cutting out the door.

The door successfully extracted with an X-acto blade.

I used dial calipers to identify the center the best I could. I had to look up how to read dial calipers on YouTube as I haven't read dial calipers since high school, when I took a drafting course. Calipers are my new favorite tool for measuring everything now.

I indented the plastic in the center with an X-acto blade so the pin vise wouldn't slide to the right when I started drilling.

Here is the first challenge I ran into. The hole was still very small and if I made it any larger, the fuel tank would be in the way.

Time for some cuttin'.

No one will see the back end of the fuel tank anyway. Well, I guess you and the Internets now.

The second problem was that I used the largest pin vise bit I had and the hole was still pretty small. I was taking a risk, but I really didn't want to buy and wait for bigger pin vise bits. I tested this method on a piece of scrap before doing this. What I learned was, the bit has to be going fast and go from the outside to the inside.

Here is the final hole. I didn't want to risk making it bigger.

Dry fit on the tank and the camera.

I have more clearance now for the hole and camera.

I guess I should mention, you should wear a dust mask before cutting and sanding resin. The explanation I heard is that the dust particles are like microscopic shards in your lungs.

Here are the underside cameras. A chunk of the wing needs to be cut off. I was watching the movie John Wick for the second time while I was doing this. The best action film I've seen in a while.

Part of the fuselage underneath also needed to be cut away.

I made some initial cuts with the razor saw.

Test fit of the wings and fuselage.

Resin test fit.

I have gaps in some areas that will require attention.

Here is the underside part of the wings I trimmed off and used as a test piece for the power drill method. I'm testing Kristal Klear in the same diameter hole to see if it will fill the hole.

Kristal Clear will dry clear as you can see. Within an hour the thinner application is already curing. The thick application at the top, took about six hours and it was a bit cloudy.

Here is where it sits.

Well, not really. I have a bit more done on it, but you'll just have to wait and see! The parts I needed to begin the interior arrived this week and I have begun assembling and modifying the interior. Thanks for visiting. Another update will be coming shortly, as well as a Zero update.