Spitfire Mk. XIV
RAF No. 610 Sqn. "County of Chester" DW-D

Here's my rendition of the much-maligned Academy 1/72 Spitfire Mk. XIV kit - DW-D from No. 610 Squadron "County of Chester in Summer 1944, flown by CO Sqn/Ldr Richard Newbury who shot down 9 V-1 flying bombs.

I admit that I'm not that knowledgeable about the Spitfire, particularly the Griffin-engined marks but much has been written about the accuracy issues Academy kit.

It's a strange mixed bag of very fine engraved panel lines, excellent cockpit detail, incorrect overall shape, grosly incorrect underwing radiators, thick and incorrect decals. Given my lack of in-depth knowledge on the subject, I decided to go easy on this one and not try to correct the geometry errors but build it mostly out of the box with minor improvements.

I added a glass reflector gunsight from clear plastic card and "padded" the seatbelt decals with masking tape. This didn't turn out as good as I hoped but it's still better than flat decal seatbelts on the seat. The tires are finely detailed and weighted out of the sprue but the attachment pins to the undercarriage legs are misaligned, causing the flat area to sit at an angle against the ground. I had to reshape them using several layers of CA glue and a lot of sanding to get them aligned.

DW-D bore a standard RAF camo of Ocean Grey and Dark Green upper surfaces over Medium Sea Grey lower surfaces, with identification code, fuselage band and spinner in Sky. I had a small jar of Humbrol acrylic Medium Sea Grey from an old Airfix starter set but the other colours are my own mixes of Mr. Hobby acrylics.

Initially, I used the decals for the DW-D code but as the Academy decals were way too dark for RAF Sky, and somewhat transparent, I had to mix a new batch of my custom Sky color and paint over them with a brush, then coat with varnish again. Definitely was a nerve shattering experience as I repainted it on the evening before taking the model to an expo last week.

The yellow bands on the propeller tips should be smaller but I decided to leave it be. Weathered with a custom oil wash and oil pains, silver pen and silver acrylic paint for chipping around service panels. The real plane looks to have stayed out in the open as the camo is somewhat faded but it was not heavily weather so I tried to keep dirt limited. Top coated with a 1-to-3 mix of Mr. Color acrylic gloss and matt varnish.