Hasegawa's 1/48 scale
Supermarine Spitfire Vb

by Jordi Farre

Tamiya's 1/48 scale Spitfire Vb is available online from Squadron.com

Here is my Aboukir-equipped Spitfire Vb/Trop in 1/48 scale.This is the old Hasegawa kit.

The model depicted is a field-converted FR Spitfire and belonged to the South African AF 40 Squadron and was based at Gabes, North Africa, during April 1943.

In August I posted some pictures of this model to the Mediterranean Wings topic on HyperScale's Theme Pics Forum.

The only addition to the model is True Details resin cockpit set plus a few copper wires here and there. The harness has been also converted to a Sutton type with lead foil cut to shape.

Construction was a little on the tough side because of a slightly warped fuselage and a very poor wing to fuselage join, I also required the aid of cellophane tape to persuade the wings to achieve the correct dihedral.

Before gluing the fuselage halves I drilled the hole for the oblique camera and once the painting process was over I covered it with pre-painted spare decal cut to shape. At first I wanted to show the camera lens but due to a lack of conclusive information I decided to simply follow the known
pictures of the aircraft where the hole of the camera can be seen covered with fabric.

My Spitfire has been painted using Gunze Sangyo acrylic colors for the upper surfaces and with an old Aeromaster enamel Azure blue color for the undersurfaces.

Weathering was achieved mainly with oils and a very light mist of Tamiya's highly diluted buff color. Light chipping was added with a silver ink pen and a sharpened, normal graphite pencil for the lighter Mid-Stone and Azure blue areas to add contrast.

Decals were sourced from an out of productionAeromaster sheet called Spitfire Mk. V Collection Pt. II, 48-122.

An Squadron clear sliding canopy was also fitted to the model.

Marabu enamel satin varnish was used as a final touch and the aerial has been made from Nylon invisible thread.

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Model, Images and Text Copyright © 2008 by Jordi Farre
Page Created 6 October, 2008
Last Updated 6 October, 2008

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