1/72 Airfix Spitfire Mk1  

by Nick England

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Here is my Airfix 1/72nd Spitfire Mk1. It’s from the Airfix series 2 range of “snap together” kits, and is built out of the box.

I live in Dubai, where there is only really a selection of Revell, Tamiya and Airfix kits on sale. Revell and Tamiya don’t have a great range out here at all, and Airfix is the only manufacturer that has a decent variety of kits to build. Unfortunately, over 50% of them are 1/72nd, so if I want to build anything to try and get better at modeling, it has to be small! I’m sort of getting used to them now, and I think they look quite cool. Anyway, rant over!

This is actually a really nice kit if you overlook the fact it’s a snap together one. I’m just resuming model making after years away from it, and this was a great little build to practice new techniques (like airbrushing!) on, so it was just fun.

The kit is apparently typical Airfix! Basic grey sprue, raised panel lines, and pretty basic. Nice!

The interior detail is zero, but there is an instrument panel, floor, seat, armour plate and pilot to put in. After painting these and gluing them in, the fuselage was glued together, trapping the propeller, which I wanted to rotate. The wings were then glued on, and I used a bit of filler on the wings and body. The cockpit was masked up, and glued on, and after a final bit of sanding down, I sprayed the whole thing with Citadel White Skull white primer.

Click on images below to see larger images

I airbrushed the undersides first with Xtracrylix RAF Sky, and when that was dry, masked that off, and sprayed Xtracolour Dark Green over everything. When that was dry, I hand-cut some masks from masking tape, followed a general pattern from the manual, stuck ‘em on, sprayed Xtracolour RAF Earth, and voila.

The prop and spinner were brush painted with some Humbrol matt black, and the tips done in Humbrol trainer yellow. The exhausts, wheels and landing gear had all been pre-painted and assembled, and when all the tape was off, were stuck on.

The Xtracolour paint dries to a really nice glossy finish anyway, so I put the kit decals straight on, and when they were set, I glued on the antennae, and sprayed the whole plane with Xtracrylix flat varnish.

When that was all dry, I removed the masking tape from the cockpit, and used some superglue to secure a strand of hair for the antenna wire, and that was it! As it’s such a small kit, I decided against weathering it, and will reserve that for a couple of other 1/48 Spitfire kit projects (again Airfix!) I have in my cupboard.

I think it took a period on and off of around 2 weeks, and I’m happy with it. It won’t win any prizes, but that’s not why I’m building again. It’s just for the fun of it!

I hope you like it as much as I do.

Cheers,

Nick

Photos and text © by Nick England