David Leigh-Smith - A mental condition waiting to happen!

Thanks, Michel. In actual fact Charlie B 'should' be in the port side chair of the cockpit, if this were another site I'd probably have been denounced as the modeling equivalent of the village i***t and put in the stocks. But Herr Stigler accompanied the Fort for some time and I'm guessing there was a lot of activity in the front of that old bird. Artistic license.

Artistic license it is... and it looks great David. I agree with Michel...

Build it the way you want and remember, damn the torpedoes man !

Only a true village i***t would decide to build eight Spitfires at once... an increase from the original Five...

Today was a very mixed day at the 'office'. Bad news first; yet another setback on the 109. In lieu of having no operational airbrush, I thought I'd spray (canister) some acrylic matt varnish on the underside of the Gustav in the hope of weathering the little BF and this happened...

I think it reacted to something that was on my hands (thinner, water, etc) already. So, back to the drawing board with that.

I attached one wing to the Fort (having dry fitted both, the port wing is a terrible fit so glued it on and sanded and puttied my way through a couple of PBS documentaries). The starboard wing fits like a dream, so I'll attach it after painting.

I used Morne's (@mornem) idea to simulate cracked glass. Heated a needle over a candle (much to the emusement of my wife who thought I'd finally given up sniffing glue and graduated to grown up drugs) and gently draw it across the plastic. Looks great (as usual my photos don't do this justice).

Attached the rudder; or at least what is left of it. I made a skeleton of ribs and covered then with lead wine cork sealer stuff (I don't know what the hell its called) - it looks good with trailing 'doped' fabric.

So for the first time I can pose these two iconic birds together and see some semblance of what I'm aiming for.

[pic 3]

For the moment it's Friday again (I'm not back at work 'til next Wednesday) and it's just me, Dolfo, some Elvis Juice (yep, sounds weird but tastes wonderful), and the bench. Happy trails, all.

1 additional image. Click to enlarge.

Anthony, you are part of the tribe. There's a reason it's called 'social scale modeling' - it's just as important to hear from you as see your work. Thanks for dropping in, friend.

The 109 sprung a leak for sure. Wish I knew what it was that did it, it's a hell of an effective paint stripper.

Aleks, this is the varnish (Humbrol) and it usually sprays on beautifully, has an excellent finish, and is great to weather on. I did have various things I was working on at the time that could have interacted with it - as I say usually this product is fantastic.

The socks? Well, they are Harry Potter themed and belong to my daughter (well, they used to...ha).