Some more work invested but still no major changes 🙂 !

Both kits got a satin clear-coat preparing them for weathering (I'll probably go for a rather matte final finish later on)...

...and the huge radiators are finally on as well! I have no idea why I waited with them but at least it made it easier to mask and paint the wheel wells!

Regards

Magnus

Nice addition Magnus. I'm looking forward to seeing them on the Spits.

Been away skiing for a week and then some other things to catch up with but tonight I'm finally back at the workbench. Or rather, I am running back and forth between "the Sty" and the kitchen, combining baking bread with modelling.

Black and white bands around the wings as well, easier to paint than to mess about with decals...

...fully masked...

...and painted white...

...tomorrow I'll continue with the black edges!

Regards

Magnus

Bernie! You do know your Spitfires! You're (almost 🙂 ) exactly right, No 80 sqn Kai Tak during the Korean War and No 73 sqn at Malta. I've yet to do a Gladiator with that arrow. By the way, No 80 traded their Tempests for Spit 24s. A Spit 24 is always a Spit 24 but I would NEVER EVER trade a Tempest for something else 🙂 !

Got up early this morning (nothing like the smell of freshly baked bread to wake me up 🙂 ) and managed to do a further bit of work before the rest of the family woke up!

Masking the white stripe, as you can see I use strips of tape to aid centering...

...a bit of bonus masking to avoid overspray...

...if you look at the wing root area you see why I did that full masking, I got quite a bit of white overspray the other night...

...that I'll take care of using polishing pads tonight.

Lover surfaces. I don't know if the buzz numbers were over-painted, Xtradecal's instructions show them like this but I don't find them very trustworthy nowadays...

Regards

Magnus

Bernie! The Eduard Spits are seriously nice kits, if they weren't to release them in 1/72 soon I just might had been dragged over the 48-line once more 🙂 !

Even if the photos don't show much, at least SOME work has been done. I ended up stuck in a serious bout of weathering phobia on these but I think I have managed to get out of it at least with the Mk 24, the weathering on the 22 has yet to be started.

Let's start on the subject of spares... To start with, I managed to do a cross-over when painting the spinners: the Airfix one was inadvertently painted for the Xtrakit Spit and the Xtrakit one for the Airfix. No bonus points for that manoeuvre...

After trying to assemble them (and then I even (OK, sort of, obviously...) dryfitted them before painting) I ended up with a beautifully assembled Airfix prop (for the 73 sqn Xtrakit machine) and an Xtrakit prop that refused to submit to no matter how much violence I used on it. Looking at them, I also realised that there are huge shape differences.

Without making any deeper analysis I came to the conclusion that I didn't like the look of the Xtrakit prop (even if the Airfix one looks a bit skinny) so after some thinking I decided that I'll buy another Airfix kit just to get the prop. After all, it doesn't cost a fortune and the rest of it can be used in any of my almost 15 Ventura Spitfire kits that are in the yet-to-be-built pile... So now I finally have two acceptably good-looking props for my Spits!

The Spit itself after som further weathering (washes and some pastels to break up the rather monochrome camo)...

...and a matte coat that as an added bonus gave me a bunch of white specks that I'll have to get rid of somehow. A stiff brush will probably do the trick!

I'm off for Easter now, will bring some modelling with me but that's a ground-bound thing on wheels in 35-scale (yes, I occasionally dabble in that as well...).

Regards

Magnus

Friends! Thanks for keeping me company and your support during this build! I'm finally (almost) there! I've tried to spend my modelling time at the workbench lately, that's the reason for the updates being a bit thin on the ground.

Xtrakit Spitfire 22:

Airfix Spitfire 24:

And both of them together:

The differences between the kits look a lot more disturbing in the photos than they do in real life!

For those of you who have followed this thread it is probably clear that I am not very fond of the Xtrakit (or its Special Hobby reincarnations). The Xtrakit Spit looks "fat and swollen" over the nose while the Airfix kit might be a bit on the skinny side. I used Falcon canopies on both and the project ended up with me buying a second Airfix kit just to use the prop for the Xtrakit Spit (a bit counter intuitive really since I probably should have resorted to build the whole second Airfix kit and scrapped the Xtrakit but I was born stubborn 🙂 !) The canopy- and prop modifications even out the most immediate visual references, combined with the camo that effectively breaks up the appearance - if I had done them in high speed silver I think the differences would have been a lot more apparent!

I also ran into more trouble than necessary caused by my own laziness (check the instructions so you don't have to break off and re-glue the covers for instance) and bad research (British camo isn't a mystery, I can find it in at least ten books right behind my back). I only wish that the guy who did the artwork for Xtradecal had done it to start with...

Ps. Regarding that "(almost)" in the first section: I'll need to add pitots and some more fuel and oil spillage before taking them to the next show. On the other hand, the Mk 24 won it's class at last weekend's Modellexpo 08-Open so I must have done something right at least :)!

Regards

Magnus

Great work!

Very nice Magnus,you've managed to make the Xtrakit 22 look almost good.

The Airfix 22 is the gold standard in late Griffon Spits,nothing else comes even close,I've built three,one converted to an F.R 47,one as an F.46 and one as an XVIII,I will build one as a 22 one of these days.

AFAIK,it's only inaccuracy is it's prop,it's the same diameter as an XIX's,it should be bigger in diameter.

The Xtrakit,well,the wing planform is off,the fuselage too short,the spinner is too long to compensate for the short fuselage,the cockpit is too wide...as you say,put it against the Airfix 22 and the short comings are glaringly obvious .