1/32 Hasegawa Spitfire MkVb Trop

Gallery Article by Olivier Barles on Nov 21 2011

 

Spitfire MkVb Trop, Free French Force, Tunisia Spring 1943

This time, here are a few pictures of my "old" Hasegawa Spit Vb "Trop" in 1/32 scale.

I think I bought that box 20 years ago or so and this is only recently that I found it again and decided to build it in the markings of an "used" Spitfire passed on by the RAF to the Free French Air Force over Northern Africa in 1943. 

 

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Despite its age, the kit looks pretty accurate and is very easy to assemble, contrary to the Me 109 E-4/7 of the same brand that had been released on the market only a few years before the Spitfire and that needs a "very significant" amount of work to make out something looking more or less correct (another future presentation subject for ARC?) ;-)

Besides being very careful in the assembling process and in the painting of this Spit - with I hope a realistic weathered look, the only "true work" I did was to make correct wheel wells as those of the kit are definitely not deep enough!

To come back to the "finishing phase", I tried  to work by combining used painting and reasonable weathering that could have been caused by color erasing due to the sand winds.  I guess the result is not that bad.

Truth is that whatever color a Spitfire is painted with, she's always a beautiful machine!

And a big "Merci" to the ARC Team for animating this nice website for us to share our passion...

Olivier Barles

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Photos and text © by Olivier Barles