Airfix 1/48 scale
Supermarine Spitfire Mk.XIV
and Noy's Miniatures' Luftwaffe Hangar Interior

by Brett Green

Supermarine Spitfire Mk.XIV

Meng's 1/48 scale F-35A Lightning II is available online from Squadron for USD$59.99

Here is my third finished model for 2020 - the Airfix 1/48 scale Spitfire Mk.XIV. 

The first of these models that I bought suffered from terrible short shots in the cockpit and fuselage rendering it virtually unbuildable. 

I bought a second kit that was intact, but I had a bit of a bad taste of my mouth from the earlier purchase and did not start it despite this being my favourite Spitfire variant.

However, when Exito Decals recently released their Spitfire XIV sheet with these markings, I could resist no longer!

The kit plastic is very soft, which is a blessing and a curse. It does make it easier to shim and wrestle where necessary.

Fit was good for the most part but the saddle in front of the windscreen was shocking. Trimming, stretching and filling was required to get it to fit. 

I’d heard of people having fit troubles at the wing root so I glued the upper wing halves to the fuselage before adding the lower wing. Fit was perfect using this method (thanks Tom Cleaver).

I also had to do a bit of squeezing and trimming to get the cockpit between the fuselage halves although, to be fair, I did not follow the instructions for this assembly.

I used most of Barracuda Studios’ resin Spitfire Mk.VIII cockpit snapshot upgrade, which really adds to the front office.

I also used SAC's white metal undercarriage that made it much easier to fine tune the height, rake and splay of the legs.

The Exito decals behaved perfectly. Colours look great and the instructions are brilliant. The only issue is that the yellow spiral appears to be reversed. I found out after I had finished the propeller assembly and I could not bring myself to strip it back and start again!

I’ll be writing this one up in detail for Issue 109 (oh, I missed an opportunity there, didn’t I) of Military Illustrated Modeller.

Purchased by the author (in fact, bought TWO of them).

Model, Images and Text Copyright © 2020 by Brett Green
Page Created 18 February, 2020
Last Updated 19 February, 2020

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