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1:24 Airfix Spitfire Mk. IXc..or is it E?- June 5th 1944

Craigyboy
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CANicoll

CANicoll

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Craig, Just found your build and all I can say is your work, and the explanations, are amazing.  In a different thread Ernie mentioned creating a part of the site for tips and workarounds we come up with.  Your entire build needs to go there for permanent reference.  I'm really enjoying reading it over my morning coffee!

I thought Peter closed up the Airscale shop?  I'm delighted to hear different.  I met Peter several times at Telford and he's such a good bloke.  

Chris

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Craigyboy

Craigyboy

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1 hour ago, CANicoll said:

Craig, Just found your build and all I can say is your work, and the explanations, are amazing.  In a different thread Ernie mentioned creating a part of the site for tips and workarounds we come up with.  Your entire build needs to go there for permanent reference.  I'm really enjoying reading it over my morning coffee!

I thought Peter closed up the Airscale shop?  I'm delighted to hear different.  I met Peter several times at Telford and he's such a good bloke.  

Chris

Thanks Chris, it's really nice to get positive comments from people. Peter is still going strong. I don't know what I'd do if he quit. It does take some work to make his upgrades shine but by God they do! So much better in my opinion than the Yahu and Eduard ready painted stuff although it's easier.

If you want workarounds have a look at my HK 1/32 Lancaster, I don't think there's any straight building in there. It nearly killed me.🤣

 

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Craigyboy

Craigyboy

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41 minutes ago, harv said:

Wow, thanks ! I did check his site and he does have the IP for it. This will a great help to me when I get around to it !....harv 

It's a great upgrade. Just be careful of your rockets and guns config. It affects how the rocket panel config will be

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Craigyboy

Craigyboy

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I hate fabric seat belts. There, I've said it, the therapy is working. I hate making them but keep fitting them because nothing else looks remotely lifelike. But every time I make a set I invariably end up a gibbering wreck on the floor. So I'm quietly skipping over the making and just say "here's one I made earlier"

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I've had a good look around and the font of all things Spitfire, the late Edgar Brooks, said that 1944 onwards the Y strap for the Sutton harness could go through the slot in the seat but not before then. That's good enough for me. It's easier and the straps aren't really long enough if you go up and over the seat back.
As for the lap strap attachment points, again early war they were halfway along the seat but over time, were moved further back until....

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A couple of little fillets of silver painted plastic card and we're done. I did find a little problem with running the fitting and straps theough the slot in the head armour if your're using the Airscale upgrade. It's just wide enough for the coupling but it's tight. It gets harder if you use too thick a diameter rod for the roller bar the harness passes over. Possible with a little jiggling but please be aware if it applies to your build. BTW, this pic shows the great detail again of Airscales' upgrade this time the head armour

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I'll be doing the attachment points behind the seat tomorrow along with the release mechanism the Spitfire used but which isn't present on the kit. To be fair to Airfix, not much is visible behind the seat unless you're daft like me and open up the radio hatch. They do put the part of the release mechanism that sits on the starboard sill on but, as I say, I'll cover that on the next post.

Lastly today, something else that's pretty vital on an aircraft but always seems to get missed off, namely the brakes. Airfix do a lovely control column with a separate brake handle that's beautifully detailed...but no brake cable running from it. The brake cable runs from the handle down the back of the column then terminating in a small black box forward of the column that transfers it to the pneumatic system. Here it is in a real aircraft (the column is missing but the black box is here and the brass turnbuckle to the right of it is the cable that goes up to the top of the column

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So I found a little PE box that was spare from a B-17 build popped it on and ran a cable in fine black wire from the brake handle to the box

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That's about it for now except for a couple of close ups of the lovely Airscale IP which I can't get enough of TBH as well as the cladding on Frame 11 which holds the seat and the cladding to the seat sides, it all enhances what's already a lovely kit

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Thanks for looking

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Craigyboy

Craigyboy

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2 hours ago, Peterpools said:

Craig

Just catching up and simply blown away as always. Your attention to detail is amazing and I'm right with Chris about Ernie's suggestion on tagging tips and techniques, as your build id overflowing with them.  

Thanks Peter. Much appreciated as always. I'd tag 'em if I knew how. Worked in IT for 20 years, I should be able to🤣

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Craigyboy

Craigyboy

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Phew! bench time has been scarce lately. I was dragged on a trip to Burgh Island Hotel in Devon by the missus as it's a mecca for Agatha Christie fans and who did I find among the list of other distinguished guests who've stayed there in the past? None other than R.J. Mitchell who has a room named after him (I was gutted we weren't in it).

But back to finishing off this cockpit.

Running all the wires for the rudder (x4); the elevators (x4); and the Sutton harness (x2) has been a nightmare I won't bore you with, but they're done now so in the following pics please don't wonder what the entrail like appendages coming from the back of the assembly are, they'll all be joined up later (God knows how yet but they will be)

First up then before I could seal the cockpit up by fitting the port sidewall, the seat needed fitting permanently and the control rod from the stick to the elevator cables needed fitting

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Along with this, I glued the harness straps in their final positions except for the right shoulder harness which will be trailing over the starboard sidewall when it's all fitted into place.

 

While the voltage regulator behind the pilot's seat is there, there's no cable from it to the 12V output jack and then onto the battery so that went in also. It's a bit tricky as the cable has to pass behind  the air bottles meaning I couldn't fit those until last thing.

I've also fitted the oxygen pipe at this point and if you look to the right of it you'll see I've painted the harness cable release silver and added a tiny lever to actuate it. 

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The fuel primer pump below the IP was just a flat knob on the model so I cut it off and mounted it on little "stilts" to make it more realistic

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Next up was the harness wires. These run through two fairleads which keep them either side of the aerial mast and then they terminate aft. None of the rear bit can be seen so I'll just terminate them at a convenient point. The actual arrangement is like this:

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So, at last the port sidewall could go on and the air bottles fitted. There's simply not enough space when they're in to do an accurate interpretation of the connections from the bottles to the air filter and onwards so I've just done something to liven that area up a little instead of there being no air pipes to supply air to the hydraulics

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So next, I can get the monocoque installed in the rest of the fuselage then I can get going with securing all the control cables.

Thanks for looking as always

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