1/48 Airfix Spitfire Mk.I

Gallery Article by Mike Regan on Nov 28 2017

 

      

Background - early days.
Reginald Mitchell was not happy with the new name given to his new Supermarine Type 300, serialled K5054 - in fact he called it a "bloody silly name". The Air Ministry had decided on what was after all, a faintly derogatory name for a quick-tempered woman; Spitfire. It could have been worse; the name "Shrew" was seriously considered at one point. ("Supermarine Shrew"...... nope.) 

The Type 300 was a response to the failure of the Supermarine Type 224, also called the Supermarine F7/30 after the official specification that the aircraft was designed to. If ever an aircraft embodied the old saying that "A camel is a horse designed by a committee" this was it. 

The Type 224 (it was never named) with it's corrugated metal skin, inverted gull-wing, spatted undercarriage and open cockpit resembled a cut price, single-seat Stuka more than it did a new day fighter for the rapidly expanding RAF of the 1930s. Mitchell knew the thing was a non-starter and at his prompting Supermarine went back to it's parent company Vickers to seek permission to build a private-venture prototype which emerged as the Supermarine Type 300...... and the rest, as the expression goes, is history. 

Spitfires first entered service with No.19(F) Squadron in August 1938. The first aircraft, K9789, arrived on the squadron on the 4th of August 1938. The squadron was to fly Spitfires of various marks until January 1944, when it converted on to Mustang Mk.IIIs and later Mustang Mk.IVs.

In spite of the type's iconic status, the early Spitfires weren't really that wonderful..... the Merlin II under the cowling turned a Weybridge fixed-pitch two blade wooden propeller and the main undercarriage had to be hand-pumped up and down. That Merlin was also prone to overheating, so once fired up, the aircraft had to be airborne quick-smart. The flat canopy hood restricted vision and pilots complained of banging their heads on it. There was no armour anywhere on the aircraft and no IFF equipment - something that contributed to the infamous "Battle of Barking Creek" when a chain of breakdowns in radar and miscommunication led Spitfires of 74 Sqn to attack Hurricanes from 56 Sqn on the morning of 6th September 1939; two Hurricanes were shot down with one pilot killed.

Improvements started to come pretty soon after the Spitfire entered service; a new domed canopy started to replace the original flat canopy and from the 78th production machine onwards the Weybridge wooden propeller gave way to a de Havilland three-blade, two-pitch prop which helped reduce the take-off run by something like a hundred yards and also gave a modest boost to both the top speed and service ceiling. This prop was in turn supplemented by a three-blade constant speed unit not long before the Battle of Britain commenced. 

Armour protection for the airframe and pilot also came along; a 3mm light alloy skin was fitted over the fuel tank immediately ahead of the windscreen - this in turn was fitted with a laminated armoured glass panel. Armour for the pilot seat and an armoured head-rest was also introduced. 

Not so visible was the use of 100 octane petrol from the spring of 1940 - this replaced the 87 octane fuel previously used and enabled a major increase in supercharger boost and much higher speeds at emergency power settings. 

Other improvements included the fitting of IFF (Identification; Friend or Foe) equipment in the rear fuselage - this saw the fitting of "cheese-cutter" IFF aerial wires running from each horizontal tailplane to the fuselage The introduction and use of "two-step" rudder pedals enabled pilots better cope with G-forces. 

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By the outbreak of World War 2, some 306 Spitfires had been built and delivered to the RAF, although less than 200 were in actual squadron service; some were with test establishments such as Farnborough and Boscombe Down, others were being held by Maintenance Units pending distribution to squadrons and others had been wrecked and written-off in crashes. The Hurricane, which was a simpler aircraft to build (and repair) would outnumber Spitfires in squadron service until after the Battle of Britain - and it should also be remembered that Supermarine was a small company, specialising in the construction of flying boats and seaplanes, and not capable on it's own of mass-producing aircraft. 

At the outbreak of the war, all Spitfire squadrons were based in the U.K. - Hurricanes had been sent to France with the B.E.F., but the Spitfires stayed home. Barking Creek aside, the first "genuine" combats involving Spifires came in October 1939 when they started to intercept German bombers and mine-laying aircraft off the British coast; the first major operation for Spitfire units was covering Operation Dynamo, the evacuation of British and Allied troops from the beaches of Dunkirk in June 1940. 

From June-July 1940 onwards, the Luftwaffe turned it's attention to Great Britain and with the start of the Battle of Britain, the legend that is the Spitfire would begin...... 

The kit
Some years ago, Airfix released a Spitfire Mk.I kit. This was the product of "Old Airfix" where accountants ruled and mediocre kits made to a budget were produced, often to the groans of frustrated modellers hoping for something better. 

This is not that kit. 

In 2015, Airfix released a brand-new tool kit of the Spifire Mk.I - it bears about as much resemblance to the older kit as an orange does to a banana. Very much the product of "New Airfix" it features sharply rendered (if a little deep) panel lines, a nicely detailed cockpit and poseable ailerons and elevators. The parts breakdown means that an early two-blade prop Spitfire can be built, or a classic Spitire Mk.Ia from the Battle of Britain can be built. Markings cover both options, as well as one from Training Command with a disturbingly bright lemon-yellow nose. The kit decals are excellent, with good registration and colour - the red/blue of the roundels is in the correct dull wartime shades and the squadron codes are the correct Medium Sea Grey colour. One can also build a Spitfire Mk.IIa straight from the box as the tear-drop bulge for the Kauffman starter is included in the kit. 

Construction starts with the cockpit and this is well-detailed straight out of the box. The modeller will have to decide from the get-go which version of Spittie he or she wants to build as there are differences in the parts for the cockpit to cater for an early Mk.I or a later BoB Mk.I - the early Spitfire will have the hand-pump for the undercarriage fitted to the right-hand side wall, and the parts for the seat armour and armoured head-rest are not used. Most of the 'pit is painted in the usual RAF interior grey-green, although the area behind the pilot seat frame is in aluminium. I used the instrument panel decal for the er, instrument panel and with a bit of persuasion from some decal softener, it settled down nicely. A seat harness was fashioned from lead foil. 

The wings come next, and again, differences have to be allowed for in construction; two different oil coolers are provided. Two small spars are provided; these set the dihedral of the wing and also are the locating points for the undercarriage swing arms. And here lies the only real weakness with this kit..... 

For some reason, the good folks at Airfix decided to break each undercarriage strut into two parts; the main strut itself and a separate part for the swing arm. This latter is attached to lie between each spar and must be installed before closing up each wing. Overall the fit is perfectly fine - but it is a weak point that will have to be taken account of. The same "fault" (if you will) is in their new-tool Spitfire Mk.Vb kit as well. 

The fit of the completed wings to the fuselage is OK, but some filler and cleanup is required. Once this was done, attention turned to the tailplane. This is very similar in construction to the Seafire F.17 which I built last year and I had visions of encountering the same fit problems here as I did with the Seafire - having to trim the tailplane connecting rod to fit. I was very pleased to discover that this was not required; the elevators fitted into place perfectly with no fuss, followed by the rudder. 

Final construction prior to a visit to the paint shop now went ahead; as I was building the early Spitfire Mk,I, the Weybridge propeller was assembled; this is a two-piece affair that cleans up very nicely and looks the business - it compares very well with the Ultracast resin prop I'd bought some time back for that "older" Airfix kit.... The early Spitfires also had a different, simpler aerial mast - effectively a tube which the aerial wire passed down as opposed to the more familiar tapered mast with the tension roller for the aerial. The former was fitted, but didn't last too long; after snapping off the darn thing twice, I replaced it with some stainless steel wire. The early un-armoured windscreen was fitted and blended into place. 

Time for some paint..... 
Spitfires originally left the factory finished in the Temperate Land Scheme of Dark Earth and Dark Green over aluminium lacquer undersides. The camouflage pattern could either be the "A" pattern (for serials ending with odd numbers) of the mirror-image "B" pattern (even numbers). At some point, the undersides started to be painted in split black and white, or black/white/aluminium to act as a quick ID for over-zealous anti-aircraft gunners - similar patterns could be seen on Hurricanes, Gladiators, Furies, Blenheims etc. The familiar underside colour "Sky" (a very pale green) was introduced in 1940. 

"My" Spitfire WZ-H of No.19(F) Squadron was finished in the "A" pattern with split black/white undersides and the ailerons and elevators (and wheel wells) left in the original aluminium. Blue/Red "B-Type" roundels are on the fuselage and upper wings - no fin flash is present and the standard medium sea grey codes are used. Interestingly the painting guide for this option states that the period is August 1938, but there is a photo in the Spitfire Aces book noted below of WZ-H lined up in a squadron inspection parade dated May 1939. 

I used Xtracolour enamels for the topside dark earth/dark green and a mix of Tamiya and Humbrol enamels for the black/white/aluminium undersides. The undersides were done first; white, then black, then aluminium. Then that lot (once thouroughly dry!) was masked off and the brown and green went on. I used Tamiya tape, a sharp knife and more than a few "technical modelling terms" (you know the ones....) to get that nice hard-edged pattern. 

Once all that was done and dry, the decals went on. These new-generation Airfix decals are a treat to use; as mentioned, they have great colour and registration and are nice and thin as well. They respond well to Micro-Set and Micro-Sol solutions and settle down nicely. 

Airfix provide extra stencils for the the black/white painted wing undersides - and also note that more often than not, these were simply painted over and not reinstated when the wings were repainted; I added them anyway for a bit of extra interest. 

Final construction was the fitting of the main undercarriage legs and their covers. Once again, that weak spot comes into play. I found that if I simply attached the struts to their respective swing arms, the wheels would be splayed outwards. I resolved this by inserting a tiny wedge of scrap Evergreen plastic card into each joint to ensure that the wheels would be parallel with the line of flight. I subsequently snapped one of the u/c struts off when decalling - CA glue to the rescue. And, of course the now black-painted Weybridge propeller was fitted into place. 

Despite that naff undercarriage construction, I'm very, very pleased with this little critter - it's a honey of a kit to build, and I'm really keen on building a Spitfire Mk.I in the original configuration complete with flat canopy and huge red/white/blue/yellow "Type A1" roundels. I can scrounge the markings and flat canopy from that older Spitfire kit and cross-kit them with this lovely new-tool kit. 

The level of detail throughout the kit is excellent; it really doesn't need more than a decent Sutton Harness for the pilot seat and perhaps a p/e instrument panel if so desired - I happen to think that the kit instrument panel decal looks fine. 

With this kit, we now have excellent renditions in 1/48th scale of Spitfires Mk.I, Mk.Vb, Mk.VIII, Mk.IX, Mk.XVI, PR.XIX and (when you can find 'em) Spitfires F.22/24. Now Messrs Airfix/Hornby - how's about a decent kit of a Spitfire Mk.XIV - something long overdue in this scale! 

References; 

  • Spitfire Mark I/II Aces 1939-41 Dr. Alfred Price © 1996 Osrey Publishing 

  • Fighter Squadrons of the R.A.F. And their Aircraft John Rawlings (Revised & Updated) 
    ©1993 Crecy Books Ltd.

Mike Regan

Photos and text © by Mike Regan