Hi, this is my
first submission to ARC and only my third or fourth model completed after
returning to the hobby after nearly 30 years (I think my last model as a
teenager was the famous 1/72 Avro Anson from Airfix). Anyway, here
is ICM's Spit which makes a great completed model although the build was
tricky in a couple of places. This kit contains a really nice engine
and the option to pose the cowl open to display it. After many
evenings working on it, fitting the whole engine assembly between the
fuselage halves proved just impossible, so I gave up on it and decided to
keep the front closed. There was some puttying around the wing
roots, and a little along the fuselage halves, otherwise it was a good
fit. The cockpit was brush painted in Humbrol enamels and lead foil
harness and buckles were added; otherwise it's all OOB. Exterior
surfaces were primed with grey car primer (from Halfords in the UK) and
preshading applied. Xtracrylix Dark Earth/Mid-Stone/Azure Blue were then
airbrushed on. A couple of coats of Future/Klear went down before
trying to apply the kit decals which promptly disintegrated. Techmod's
aftermarket set were hurriedly purchased and went on a treat! I used
an oil wash for the panel lines, but it tended to make the blue rather
dirty - still it makes it look a bit more "used". Exhaust
stains was Tamiya "smoke" and weathering along the wing roots
was Humbrol 11 applied with a cocktail stick (I'm never really happy with
this and will try a silver pencil next time).
Click on
images below to see larger images
The aircraft depicted was
flown by Flt Lt Eugeniusz Horbaczewski of the Polish Fighting Team (aka "Skalski's
Circus"), No 145 Sqn, spring 1943 based in Tunisia.
Horbaczewski later served in Italy and southern France where he was
eventually shot down in a dogfight with 60 Fw190s in August 1944. He
was credited with 16 kills + 1 shared + 1 probable (as well as 4 V-1
flying bombs).
Richard
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