1/48 Spitfire FR. MK.XIVe

[pourquoi61]

God how I hate "Shiny Things", I avoid them like I avoid politicians. As in life we all have to bite the bullet at some time, so here goes. I have spent the afternoon doing this model in-between cutting the grass and cooking the tea (savoury mince carrots and potatoes).
So this is it.

It looks like a quick kit to build with enough detail for out of the box.


This kit includes a good range of schemes.

The kit is well moulded with no flash and good panel lines.


The cockpit seat, stick and frame are built and glued in situ and sprayed along with lower wing interior. I used Mr Hobby H422 (RLM82 Light Green) as I had no cockpit interior colour.

I will not be showing machine gun covers off, so they are glued shut.

Little bits are painted and glued in place.

Instrument panel is painted black and dry brushed with silver.


Fuselage halves are then glued together and clamped to dry. I slipped on the wing section as a "dry fit" NICE.

[Willem]

Good luck with your build mate. Made a version of this kit last year, fits nicely together.

[pourquoi61]

So far so good,many thanks.

[Richp1969]

I have never built an academy model before. I have seen them though. Looks like it is a decent kit. The workmanship looks top notch mate.


Sincerely,
Richard

[Vleugelmoer]

I like how the instrument panel can out. If the same level of detail is on the rest of the kit also we have a winner for out of box detail alright. Good work done so far hope the rest of the kit comes together as nicely as it has up til now. Judging by the titel of the tread I presume you are going to attempt a NMF on this kit??

As always happy modeling and keep sticking styrene.

Paul

[pourquoi61]

I have never built an academy model before. I have seen them though. Looks like it is a decent kit. The workmanship looks top notch mate.


Sincerely,
Richard

Thanks Richard, I think Academy kits are good out of the box but some people may find them a little bit basic. Here is an Academy MiG-21 I did OOTB.

[pourquoi61]

I like how the instrument panel can out. If the same level of detail is on the rest of the kit also we have a winner for out of box detail alright. Good work done so far hope the rest of the kit comes together as nicely as it has up til now. Judging by the titel of the tread I presume you are going to attempt a NMF on this kit??

As always happy modeling and keep sticking styrene.

Paul

Thank you Paul, I think the kit is good but basic, my worry is the NMF. In my opinion a NMF can be bland unless done to a very high standard, the likes of which I can not attain.

[Vleugelmoer]

The key to a realistic NMF on a model is to use different tones of paint for specific parts and panels. After drying you could apply a buffing to the surface or giving it the once over with something like true metal to make it really pop.

As always happy modeling and keep sticking styrene.

Paul

[pourquoi61]

Cheers Paul, I will have to keep my eyes open for that. What I plan to do is paint the model white, then paint some of the panels black. Then spray silver over the top and then pick out other panels in a different silver.

Michael.

[pourquoi61]

Ok, so with the wings, exhaust manifold and tail-planes glued on I painted the radiator covers Citadel Ironbreaker. Next I completed the radiator fairings and stuck them to the wings.




I placed some foaming over the cockpit and covered the camera lenses with Airfix Maskol before priming the aircraft with Halfords White Automotive Paint.




Sprayed the other parts black to get some colour contrast.

[pourquoi61]

After the white primer had dried overnight I started to mask a few panels to spray black for contrast when the NMF paint goes on. The masking took me over 1.5 hours.

I then sprayed the panels Tamiya XF-1 Flat Black.


Voila! I hope that the high contrast primer will give a high contrast top coat.


Top coat next.

[pourquoi61]

I sprayed Tamiya X-11 Chrome Silver.


I was not happy with the result, the contrast was weak and the silver flaky
So I re-masked the dark panels and mixed chrome silver and matte black. Then sprayed again.





Still not happy I masked more panels and mixed the remaining chrome and black paint with Tamiya XF-53 Neutral Grey. These I sprayed.

[Avgas]

Good looking build so far. Sadly Tamiya metallics give a terrible finish if you spray them, probably one of the worst ones out there. The flakes are far too big.

[pourquoi61]

Thanks for that information, I didn't expect Tamiya metallics to be so bad for spraying, I thought they'd be as good as the rest of their stuff.

[Avgas]

So did I until I sprayed a 1/48 Lightning with XF-16 Aluminium and ruined it!

[pourquoi61]

One big lesson learned. Like it or not ( which I do not ) it is on with the build.

[pourquoi61]

Looks like the end is in sight. I now added the main wheel legs and tail wheel. The wheels were painted, built and put on the model.


The spinner was also assembled and painted Citadel Ice Blue.

I removed the Maskol from the camera lens covers and foam out of the cockpit.

The canopy was masked and sprayed black, then given a coat of Tamiya Chrome Silver.


Once the masking had been removed I glued it to the model with clear fix, it was then given a light brush of Johnsons Klear. That just left a couple of bits to put on and decals. Just in case I forgot to mention I have given the model two coats of Tamiya clear to seal it.

[mperegrinefalcon]

That shiny Spit looks great!!! Great work on the finish, even if the paint wasn't ideal.

I like to use Alclad 2, and will continue using it even though people seem to really like the Vellejo metal paints. I love it, and don't mind the stench (I use a respirator when airbrushing). But the paints are delicate, so if I had masked them like you did (after it was sprayed base colour aluminum), it would have pulled off some of the paint. That technique of priming with white and masking an area to paint black is a great idea to vary the colour!!!! I like it because it's not as in your face as spraying it a different colour like you did. I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I think the different color panels are too dark. That's just my opinion, on it. If that was what I had, I would try to tone it down with some filters.

Over all, the finish looks great, and I can't wait to see the finished product!!!! Hope you don't take my constructive critism the wrong way