Airfix Spitfire MKIIa in 1:72 Scale

This post describes my build of the Airfix Spitfire MKIIa (Al Deere) provided in the Airfix ‘Battle Of Britain Memorial Flight’ gift set. This Spitfire model is based on the one flown by New Zealand pilot Alan Christopher Deere during WWII.

I started the build by removing the cockpit and the 2 fuselage parts from the sprue. After cleaning them up I assembled the cockpit which went together with no issues. I used Tamyia Extra Thin which is a far cry from the thick cement glue I used in the 1970’s.

Once I had assembled these parts I primed the cockpit tub and fuselage sides with Vallejo grey primer. This was a departure from my first model, where I primed everything all at once while it was still attached to the sprue. I’ve seen that done several times on YouTube videos, but I felt that it actually complicated things for me.

Next I painted the cockpit and visible areas of the fuselage. I had to mix my own color from the paints supplied in the Vallejo set I’d purchased earlier. Most of the paints supplied with the Airfix gift set were unusable, so I had to mix the colors myself.

Once this had all dried I then added a gloss clear coat (Vallejo) and waited for that to cure. After the gloss coat had cured I added a wash made from heavily diluted Vallejo paints. I know this wasn’t ideal, but I was restricted by what I could afford to get at the time.

I moved on and closed the fuselage up fixing any joint issues using Vallejo plastic putty. There wasn’t too much work to be done and was very pleased with the result. Once I had sanded the down the joints I proceeded to add the wings and tail section. It all went together without any issues.

The Airfix Spitfire was beginning to look like an aircraft now. Once assembled I primed it with the Vallejo primer and let it all dry.

I allowed the final primer coats to dry and cure then moved on to adding color. This is where the Spitfire begins to look like the actual aircraft. As you can see, there is a lot of detail on these more modern toolings. I was really pleased to see all the panel lines. Before painting I added all the ancillary parts required and then mixed a color I thought resembled photographs of the real Spitfire. I was pretty pleased with the result.

I moved on to the top of the Spitfire. This was an area that I was pretty nervous of dealing with. I had never painted a camouflage pattern before, especially with an airbrush and I must admit that the Gaahlari GTS-06 kit made this a lot easier. Once I removed the masking tape after applying the final color, I was really pleased. Getting this paint scheme under my belt gave me confidence for my next build. Once again, I had to mix the colors myself using reference photographs of the real Spitfire.

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