Spitfire Mk IX Diary, page 8
Fitting out the stbd upper sidewall
Saturday, 22nd August, 2015
One of the realities that the large-scale aero modeller quickly comes to terms with is that for almost every installation in the cockpit there is...
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Fitting out the port upper sidewall
Friday, 21st August, 2015
When building my first Spitfire I fitted out the upper cockpit sidewalls in situ; this time I decided to complete all detailed work and painting...
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Thursday, 20th August, 2015
The undercarriage or chassis selector quadrant is neither an easy item to interpret nor to model. Even with GA drawings and good photographs, the shapes...
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Thursday, 20th August, 2015
I used Supermarine drawings for the engine control quadrant, backed by illustrations in the Mk V Manual and the superb photographs in Paul Montforton’s book,...
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Sunday, 21st June, 2015
With the spade grip assembly complete, the next task is the column itself, beginning with the forked housing at the top. It is sometimes easier...
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Tuesday, 9th June, 2015
The finished control column represents a week’s work. I built it from the top down, starting with the wedge-shaped pivoting neck that carries the spade...
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Near disaster! A cautionary tale
Monday, 8th June, 2015
When in 2013 I installed the labyrinthine structure in belly of the fuselage I made provision for future attachment of the control column in the...
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Fuse boxes and air filter control
Saturday, 6th June, 2015
To my embarrassment I have only now discovered that I omitted to post a diary entry written back in September 2014. So on the basis...
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Saturday, 6th June, 2015
Since early spring I have been finding reasons to avoid the really focussed work that remains to do inside the cockpit; but if I am...
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Friday, 5th June, 2015
Cutting out the instrument panel is a straightforward task, prompted at this stage in order to verify the accuracy of its fit against the upper...
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Stories 71 to 80 of 125
Archive
- The sliding canopy frame
- Vac-forming the canopy
- Sliding canopy – the vac-form tool
- Installing the pilot's seat
- The pilot's seat completed
- Painting the rudder and elevators
- Empennage fixtures and fittings
- Rib stringing and taping
- Failed fabric
- 'Printed' pilot's seat
- Compass graphics assemblage
- Custom laser-cut rib tapes
- Empennage: The final details
- Warpaint: The squadron crest
- Warpaint: The 601 Sqn livery
- The Spitfire's tyres
- Machining the main landing wheels
- Fitting the exhaust stacks
- Leading edge wing root fillets
- Assembling the airscrew
- Skinning and fitting the ailerons
- Painting the exhaust stacks
- Undercarriage doors
- Rad cores and farings installed
- The radiator fairing doors
- Navigation lights installed
- A milestone – the wings completed!
- Return to action – the pitot tube
- Radiator fairings resumed
- Wing undersurfaces: Rad 'ramps'
- Wing undersurfaces: Riveting
- Wing undersurfaces: Gun covers
- Wing undersurfaces: Leading edge
- Top wing skin complete
- Some expert help
- Glaring error rectified
- Wing root fillets (upperside)
- Wing root fillets (underside)
- Wheel bay blisters
- Cannon blisters
- Blisters and cam-lock fasteners
- Finishing the flaps
- The wing tip skin
- Frog-eye nav light fairings
- Leading edge wing skin
- The gear strut channels
- Time to fit the wings
- The windscreen - Part 2
- The windscreen - Part 1
- The pilot's door
- Forgotten flaps – a remeidial task
- Lining and detailing the wheel wells
- The Spitfire's armament
- Horizontal stabiliser fillets
- Cladding the fin
- Cladding the stern section
- Installing the empennage
- Stabiliser Skin
- A second near disaster
- Cladding the fuselage
- Fuel tank cover
- The Spitfire's side cowls
- Top cowl and a major setback
- Belly skin and ident light
- An experiment in panel beating
- Finishing the Vokes air intake
- Installing the upper sidewalls
- Assembling the instrument faces
- Grapics for instrument faces
- Fitting out the instrument panel
- Fitting out the stbd upper sidewall
- Fitting out the port upper sidewall
- The chassis selector control
- The throttle quadrant
- Control column - Part 2
- Control column - Part 1
- Near disaster! A cautionary tale
- Fuse boxes and air filter control
- Magnetic compass and tray
- The instrument panel
- Upper cockpit walls
- Switch boxes and buttons
- Exhaust stack
- Oleo strut - Part 3
- Oleo strut - Part 2
- Oleo strut - Part 1
- The Spitfire's spinner
- Fitting out the port sidewall
- Filling gaps in the fuselage shell
- The seat support structure
- Head armour and volt regulator
- Fuel tank jettison controls
- The IFF switch assembly
- Oxygen and carbon dioxide
- Windscreen de-icing system
- Pneumatics 2: some ancillaries
- The rudder pedals
- The devil in the detail
- Rudder and elevator cables
- Pneumatic system 1: Air tanks
- Radiator fairings
- Empennage 2: The rudder
- Empennage 1: The elevators
- Casting the Vokes filter fairing
- Installing the nose section
- 'Sculpting' the wing root fairings
- Oleo strut supports
- Installing the wing centre section
- Wooden wing 2: underside
- Unexpected setback
- Wooden wing 1: topside
- Tail wheel and yoke
- Tail Strut
- An unsought interlude
- The built-up cockpit
- Plumbing preliminaries
- First internal skin panels
- Nose and fuselage balsa blocking
- Heel boards and rudder bars
- The visible fuselage frames
- Engineering or 'sleight of hand'?
- Fire bulkhead - first finished detail
- First cuts
- The planning stage
- Introduction
