Entry Dated November 20, 2008 - Building the Spitfire

1/48 for me is not the scale to be doing WWII aircraft. 1/32 would probably be the better scale for WWII aircraft. I've noticed one thing, that my eyes aren't as good as they used to be. And come to think of it, I'll probably need a decent sized table to do scribing on. If I can make a table that goes in the hallway linen closet with enough area for me to actually work on, I think I could manage it. But I'm not too certain of that. And the other frustrating thing is that there isn't really any place to put any of my paints except in the plastic set of drawers that I have. I guess I'm going to have to go to Home Depot or Revy at some point and get them to cut a piece of shelf board so that I can have a decent sized desk in there on which I can actually do something. I got models to build.

As with most Monogram kits, the Spitfire has raised panel lines, as usual. And unfortunately those have to be rescribed (a procedure of scribing beside the raised panel lines and then sanding down the raised panel lines) because you want panel lines that are not raised but can take the wash when you're weathering the aircraft. During the course of learning how to scribe panel lines, I have learned one immutable fact, it's a pain-in-the ass.

The fuselage (still on it's sprue) (close-in so you can see the "raised panel lines")



The wing (there may be some repairs that I'm going to have to do to that wing due to the fact that sometimes scribers do slip)



What I'm using to rescribe the panel lines.



Scribing takes a while to do, but as one gets more experienced in doing it, the process gets quicker.

I also am still working on my MiG 29 Fulcrum, but unfortunately, that's been kind of stopped due to the fact that I have to get a moisture trap for my air compressor and that may take me a little while to track down. Plus I need to clear a space in the storage to put my compressor and fix the door so that I can lock the door to the storage room when I'm not airbrushing.