FT Spitfire [UPDATE]

Hi there, this will be a small update on the FT spitfire I build some time ago. It flew great and looks the, it only needed some paint. With that excuse I bought an airbrush and some paint. The airbrush in question is a very cheap generic dual action airbrush. Paints are normal oil based paint, thinned out using white spirit. 

The plane started out like this.

The plane just after its maiden flight nice and white

Although this was never going to be a scale model, it was always in my mind to get close to the livery of the Spitfires that served over my country. After some research I found that due to the type of land here, the hues are different from those of the Spitfires flown in the UK. It was a mix of some sort of grey blue with brown colours. The colours were mixed and I got to work. The base coat is a slightly blueish grey which covers the hole plane. 

plane painted in the base colour

Next came the brown camouflage scheme on top of the grey to do this I used masking tape, using a good blade , line were cut along the tape in random wave patterns. Using these pieces the areas where masked off. 

Masking up

Using the airbrush the outline of the brown areas was first done and then filled in with colour. A small tip which I should have done was to first dirty up the masking tape by sticking it to my clothes which reduces its stickiness, thus not pulling away any paint as it was being removed. The result were quite good though. 

After removing the masking tape

The last thing was to paint some insignia, some RAF roundels and tail markings. 

Finished for now and drying 

As it stand now the plane needs only a canopy, pilot and a red spinner. It will not fly before its ready, you never know what could happen in flight and at I want a picture of the completed aircraft before it loses to gravity some day.

Few things I learnt from this. 

• Mask areas properly otherwise you will have over spray on the unmasked areas. 
• Prepare all stencils beforehand
• If you are mixing any paint , mix a lot of it, you never know how much you need to used before. 
• When using an airbrush start spraying on a scrap piece and ten onto the area.

Until then.

Happy Flying.