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| Laramie’s Monogram Spitfire Mk. IX is far removed from the original kit. The old kit got the full treatment - a new cockpit, new panel lines and several shape corrections. |
Last year, I built a Monogram 1:48 Spitfire Mk. IX for the club’s “Monogram Mastery” contest. I did that one straight out of the box and enjoyed it. At the same time, I had a second Monogram Spit IX available and decided to see what I could do to produce a proverbial “silk purse from a sow’s ear” project. Without resorting to expensive aftermarket resin and photoetch parts, could the ancient kit be made to look enough like its inspiration that those seeing it would have a hard time believing its source?
I began by sanding off all raised panel lines and rivets (lots of rivets) and then rescribing them. This was probably the most tedious part of the project, causing periodic profanities and grumbling as the scriber went awry or stop lines were overrun. Oh well, out with the superglue, sand and scribe again. I used the Verlinden version of scribing templates for the hatches and doors, inspection ports and the like. Dymo label tape was used for the longer panel line runs and was particularly effective over curves and the top and bottom of the fuselage lines.
The cockpit was fully detailed starting with a Tamiya Spitfire Vb interior left over from and earlier project that used a Cooper Details resin interior. The Tamiya parts are sound but basic. I dressed up the instrument panel, seat and added the curved floor to the cockpit frame. Thinning the sidewalls and adding seat belts detailed the seat. I made the belts from thin Evergreen strip-stock, drilling out the adjustment grommets and adding buckles. Further detail included the harness run through the pilot’s armor plate and attachment to an interior frame back in the fuselage.
I added the structural members on fuselage sides along with various boxes, switches and controls to busy up the office. Other details included the oxygen tank and mask feed hose, compressed air tanks for the gun charging system and a complete rear frame including many drilled out lightening holes. I cut out the pilot’s door and had intended to replace it with the spare from the Tamiya kit, but as that was thicker that I liked, I scratch built the door from sheet styrene and stretched sprue, giving a more scale like appearance. The completed cockpit was glued to the right fuselage and then the left fuselage half was joined.
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| The cockpit was detailed with dressed up Tamiya parts and strip-stock. The door was scratch built with sheet styrene and streched sprue for a more scale appearance. |
One of the major shape errors of the kit is in the nose shape. The rocker cover panel and cowling is just too narrow and rounded. After removing the molded on exhaust stacks I added strips of styrene and superglue, then sanded, filled, sanded, filled repeatedly until a satisfactory shape appeared. I added Dzus fasteners around the cowl panels by drilling shallow holes with a tiny drill bit. Exhausts were sourced from an Airfix Seafire Mk III.
The under-wing radiator housings were completely see-through. I roughed in the radiators and then faced them with corrugated strips cut from the ends of aspirin packets. Once painted and dry brushed they looked great. I closed the wing above the radiators to preclude the old see-through effect up into the wing. Following completion of this step the upper wings were cemented to the lower.
I built up the area at the rear of the wings with sheet plastic and superglue to provide enough material to allow me to carve out the signature under-wing gull shape that is missing on this and so many other Spitfire kits. Once blended and polished, the panel lines were added.
The wheel wells were boxed in with strip styrene and roof details added. The raised portion for the legs to rest in was made from u-channel stock.
When I began the conversion, I was looking through the sources I had at hand and found that in most schemes that caught my interest the carburetor intake was of the later long type. The kit came with the early short intake. What to do? I had the long Vokes filter left over from the Tamiya Mk Vb that had donated the basic cockpit. Starting with the sawn off lower portion as a base I built up the intake with strip plastic, superglue and later putty. Again, sand, fill, sand, fill, check reference, fill, sand until done.
I reshaped the elevators to the later type by filling the original separation line and scribing the larger balance in. I added trim tab actuators to the top of each elevator. The elevators were separated and installed in a drooped position as seen in most Spitfire photos. The rudder actuator was improved by removing the molded web between the fuselage and control horn, replacing it with a short piece of brass rod.
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| Laramie used corrugated strips from the ends of aspirin packets to fill in the hollow radiators. The wheel wells were boxed in and the rear of wings were reshaped to the distincive under-wing gull shape. |
The kit propeller is bad and good. The spinner is an undersized two-part assembly with blades attached to one part. The shape is poor and the seam very hard to eliminate, however the blades are pretty good. Keeping with my initial goal of building this beast without recourse to any aftermarket parts, I scrounged a spinner from an Airfix Seafire Mk III. I added shafts to the base of the kit blades, then filled and sanded them until a smooth blend was achieved and they looked like Rotol prop blades. A little work with a drill and they mated up nicely with the spinner.
I found a spare set of Airfix Spitfire landing gears in the spares box and made up sockets to fit them into the wheel wells. A bit of test fitting and adjustments resulted in positive fit and alignment. I secured the sockets in place and prepared for final details and painting.
The model was painted in gray as a primer, seams checked, correction made and then it went to the paint shop.
I had gotten hold of Paul Ludwig’s two volumes on American Spitfire Camouflage and Markings by Ventura Books, and a whole new world of color schemes was opened. I found a set of Superscale decals based on the books that had a Mk IX from the 309th FS flown by Lt. Robert Connor in Italy in February 1944. The aircraft was the same version as I had built and had some interesting markings. The fuselage star was the version with red surround from August thru September 1943 but the wing stars had the blue surround dating from October 1943.
Red wing stripes and spinner with a nice piece of Porky Pig nose art completed the package.
The topsides were painted in Model Master enamels: Ocean Gray and Dark Green shot freehand, with Tamiya spray lacquer Medium Sea Gray on the bottom. After masking was removed any touch-ups done, I let it dry for a couple of days. Wing tip bands preparatory to decaling and weathering.
I used markings from Superscale sheet 48-840 for Connor’s aircraft WZ * RR, “PORKY II.” The decals matched the Ventura references and went on perfectly. A light coat of future sealed the decals and then the model was weathered using artist oils to pick out panel lines and the prominent oil staining on the belly.
Exhaust stains and powder residue tracks aft of the gun ports were applied using highly thinned Tamiya paints, a mix of gray, black and brown. Individual details were picked out using a pin wash of artist oils.
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| Decals for WZRR - Porky II, flown by Lt. Robert Conor for the 309th FS over Italy in February 1944, were provided by Superscale. The two-toned uppers are soft edged Ocean Grey and Dark Green. |
I used a prismacolor silver pencil to add paint chips and scuffing. I did that in several layers for the large area on the port wing root that took a lot of abuse from pilot and ground crew during operations. I applied silver, over sprayed with flat coat and then silver again after the paint dried. That built up a subtle scuffed metal appearance that is much nicer that a too bright silver.
I used Poly Scale Flat Coat over the whole model to finish the build.
I probably spent as much time on the model as I would have spent on two Shermans but the opened mouth looks and incredulous “Monogram?!? No way!” comments are great payments for the time and effort.
Laramie Wright started building models in 1964 and joined SVSM in 1995. His interests include 1/48 scale aircraft and 1/35 scale armor, especially Sherman tanks.
