Spitfire Mk IX Diary, page 5
Blisters and cam-lock fasteners
Saturday, 28th January, 2017
The onset of winter has temporarily curtailed operations on the airframe, since the model is now too big for my heated workshop and I do...
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Friday, 13th January, 2017
I have described how, when building the wooden wing cores, I neglected to provide for the flaps – an oversight that required some tricky remedial...
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Monday, 7th November, 2016
The Spitfire’s wing tip (which is detachable in the full sized machine) has two skin parts plus a narrow fore-aft reinforcing strip per side, and...
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Sunday, 6th November, 2016
Before proceeding to skin the wing tips, I needed to provide for the navigation lights and their distinctive frog-eye fairings.
It took just a few minutes...
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Sunday, 6th November, 2016
Compared with the fuselage, the Spitfire’s wings are straightforward to cover over with litho plate. Across most of their undersides they are very nearly flat...
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Friday, 4th November, 2016
I like to think that wherever the eye is free to probe my models embody a high level of accuracy and detail. Any compromises in...
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Thursday, 3rd November, 2016
By the end of August 2016 I faced a landmark decision: After three years and six months of work, it was time to fit the...
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Wednesday, 2nd November, 2016
PHOTO 1: This informative picture shows all the key windscreen parts erected temporarily in position and how the overall shape is controlled by the front...
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Saturday, 29th October, 2016
The Spitfire’s windscreen proved a near insuperable challenge. Even before cutting the first metal, I spent weeks pondering the route to take, like a climber...
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Friday, 28th October, 2016
The pilot's hatch exemplifies how I occasionally use styrene in combination with metal to achieve a desired effect, in this case the top-hat and Z-section...
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Stories 41 to 50 of 125
Archive
- The sliding canopy frame
- Vac-forming the canopy
- Sliding canopy – the vac-form tool
- Installing the pilot's seat
- The pilot's seat completed
- Painting the rudder and elevators
- Empennage fixtures and fittings
- Rib stringing and taping
- Failed fabric
- 'Printed' pilot's seat
- Compass graphics assemblage
- Custom laser-cut rib tapes
- Empennage: The final details
- Warpaint: The squadron crest
- Warpaint: The 601 Sqn livery
- The Spitfire's tyres
- Machining the main landing wheels
- Fitting the exhaust stacks
- Leading edge wing root fillets
- Assembling the airscrew
- Skinning and fitting the ailerons
- Painting the exhaust stacks
- Undercarriage doors
- Rad cores and farings installed
- The radiator fairing doors
- Navigation lights installed
- A milestone – the wings completed!
- Return to action – the pitot tube
- Radiator fairings resumed
- Wing undersurfaces: Rad 'ramps'
- Wing undersurfaces: Riveting
- Wing undersurfaces: Gun covers
- Wing undersurfaces: Leading edge
- Top wing skin complete
- Some expert help
- Glaring error rectified
- Wing root fillets (upperside)
- Wing root fillets (underside)
- Wheel bay blisters
- Cannon blisters
- Blisters and cam-lock fasteners
- Finishing the flaps
- The wing tip skin
- Frog-eye nav light fairings
- Leading edge wing skin
- The gear strut channels
- Time to fit the wings
- The windscreen - Part 2
- The windscreen - Part 1
- The pilot's door
- Forgotten flaps – a remeidial task
- Lining and detailing the wheel wells
- The Spitfire's armament
- Horizontal stabiliser fillets
- Cladding the fin
- Cladding the stern section
- Installing the empennage
- Stabiliser Skin
- A second near disaster
- Cladding the fuselage
- Fuel tank cover
- The Spitfire's side cowls
- Top cowl and a major setback
- Belly skin and ident light
- An experiment in panel beating
- Finishing the Vokes air intake
- Installing the upper sidewalls
- Assembling the instrument faces
- Grapics for instrument faces
- Fitting out the instrument panel
- Fitting out the stbd upper sidewall
- Fitting out the port upper sidewall
- The chassis selector control
- The throttle quadrant
- Control column - Part 2
- Control column - Part 1
- Near disaster! A cautionary tale
- Fuse boxes and air filter control
- Magnetic compass and tray
- The instrument panel
- Upper cockpit walls
- Switch boxes and buttons
- Exhaust stack
- Oleo strut - Part 3
- Oleo strut - Part 2
- Oleo strut - Part 1
- The Spitfire's spinner
- Fitting out the port sidewall
- Filling gaps in the fuselage shell
- The seat support structure
- Head armour and volt regulator
- Fuel tank jettison controls
- The IFF switch assembly
- Oxygen and carbon dioxide
- Windscreen de-icing system
- Pneumatics 2: some ancillaries
- The rudder pedals
- The devil in the detail
- Rudder and elevator cables
- Pneumatic system 1: Air tanks
- Radiator fairings
- Empennage 2: The rudder
- Empennage 1: The elevators
- Casting the Vokes filter fairing
- Installing the nose section
- 'Sculpting' the wing root fairings
- Oleo strut supports
- Installing the wing centre section
- Wooden wing 2: underside
- Unexpected setback
- Wooden wing 1: topside
- Tail wheel and yoke
- Tail Strut
- An unsought interlude
- The built-up cockpit
- Plumbing preliminaries
- First internal skin panels
- Nose and fuselage balsa blocking
- Heel boards and rudder bars
- The visible fuselage frames
- Engineering or 'sleight of hand'?
- Fire bulkhead - first finished detail
- First cuts
- The planning stage
- Introduction
