Airfix Spitfire F Mk.22 - Part II

It seems that I've managed to delete some pictures prematurely, so this time around it's a fast forward directly to the finished kit. However, there really isn't all that much more to tell about the building/painting process. Once I discovered that the Alclad2 experiment wouldn't work out, it was (as mentioned in previous post) time to move to Plan B, which consisted of a spray can with Testor's buffable aluminum metalizer. The choice was logical, as both Alclad2 and Testor are lacquers and I didn't expect for them to react negatively to each other. Two coats of Testor laquer seemed sufficient and I left it at that, although in retrospect a third pass would have been advisable.

Once the model was painted, I fitted all the small parts and the kit was ready for decals and 'post-processing'. Just for the fun of it, I bored out exhaust pipes with 0.3mm drill - whether it improved the kit is doubtable, but it was a bit of a challenge and I'm glad I tried it.

Decals were applied after 48 hours of drying time - as I was not previously familiar with Testor's lacquers, I preferred to be safe than sorry. Decals (of excellent quality as in all recent Airfix releases) were applied straight on the painted surface. As always, I used Microsol and Microset to soften the decals; I'm glad to report that they did not cause visible reaction with the lacquer. As a final step, I outlined the panel lines with a mix of burned orche and black oil paint heavily diluted with white spirits. The cleanup that followed did cause some discoloration on aluminum surfaces, but that was to be expected and can be regarded as part of the weathering process.

As for the weathering... well, I admit that I am a bit of a chicken when it comes to excessive weathering and metallic finish, so I was very sparse. I tried applying some black pigment in an attempt to depict sooth around the exhaust pipes, but I didn't like it and washed most of it away. I put some burned orche pigmet pigment on the wing roots and liked it a bit more. However, with harsh artificial lighting used during yesterday's ad hoc photo shoot, the effect of the pigments is barely noticable.

Overall, a very enjoyable kit and another Airfix offering I could recommend to the beginning modellers. The fact is that I liked it so much that I picked up another kit, which I intend to do with the other 'out of the box' color scheme.