RitcheyRch
02-22-2007, 07:52 AM
Unreal attention to detail.
Below are pictures of a scratch built 1/5th scale Supermarine Spitfire
MK 1 by an English model builder. It's hard to imagine such infinite
detail can be accomplished even with super human devotion and
dexterity. The pictures and accompanying text are by the model maker,
David Glen.
If anyone asked me why I set out to build a Spitfire in one-fifth scale,
and detailed to the last rivet and fastener, I would probably be
hard-pushed for a practical or even sensible answer. Perhaps the closest
I can get is that since a small child I have been awe inspired by R. J.
Mitchell's elliptical winged masterpiece, and that to build a small
replica is the clo! sest I will ever aspire to possession.
The job took me well over eleven years, during which there were times I
very nearly came to giving the project up for lost. The sheer amount of
work involved, countless hours, proved almost too much, were it not for
a serendipitous encounter at my flying club in Cambridge with Dr Michael
Fopp, Director General of the Royal Air Force Museum in England.
Seeing the near complete fuselage, he urged me to go on and finish the
model, promising that he would put it on display. I was flabbergasted,
for when I started I had no inkling that my work would end up in a
position of honour in one of the world's premier aviation museums.
As I write, the case for the model is being prepared, having been
specially commissioned by the museum with a case-maker in Sweden. I have
not yet seen it, but from what I hear, it is enormous!
In one respect the story has gone full! circle, since it was at Hendon
where I started my research in earnest , sourcing Microfilm copies of
many original Supermarine drawings, without which such a detailed build
would not have been possible
The model is skinned with litho plate over a balsa core and has been
left in bare metal at the suggestion of Michael Fopp, so that the
structure is seen to best advantage. The rivets are real and many are
pushed into drilled holes in the skin and underlying balsa, but many
more are actual mechanical fixings. I have no accurate count, but I
suspect that there are at least 19,000!
All interior detail is built from a combination of Supermarine drawings
and workshop manuals, plus countless photographs of my own, many of them
taken opportunistically when I was a volunteer at the Duxford Aviation
Society based at Duxford Airfield, home of the incomparable Imperial War
Museum collection in Cambridgeshire, England. Spitfires, in various
marks are, dare I say, a common feature th! ere!
The degree of detail is probably obsessive: The needles of the dials in
the cockpit actually stand proud of the instrument faces, but you have
to look hard to see it!
Why the flat canopy? Well, the early Mk.Is had them, and I had no means
to blow a bubble hood, so it was convenient. Similarly the covers over
the wheels were another early feature and they saved me a challenging
task of replicating the wheel castings.
The model has its mistakes, but I'll leave the experts to spot them, as
they most certainly will, plus others I don't even know about. I don't
pretend the little Spitfire is perfect, but I do hope it has captured
something of the spirit and incomparable beauty of this magnificent
fighter - perhaps the closest to a union that art and technology have
ever come ! - a killing machine with lines that are almost sublime.
So, with the model now in its magnificent new home, what comes next?
Well, I'm planning a book that will have a lot to say about its genesis
and perhaps just a little about me and those dear to me, including a
long suffering but understanding and supportive wife. And then there's
the Mustang. Yes, a 1/5th scale P-51D is already taking shape in my
workshop.
How long will it take? I've no idea, but what I am sure of is that at my
age
(58) I can't expect to be building many of them!
David Glen
Whaddon, Cambridge
Dec. 06, 2006
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image001-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image002-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image003-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image004-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image005-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image006-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image007-med.jpg
Below are pictures of a scratch built 1/5th scale Supermarine Spitfire
MK 1 by an English model builder. It's hard to imagine such infinite
detail can be accomplished even with super human devotion and
dexterity. The pictures and accompanying text are by the model maker,
David Glen.
If anyone asked me why I set out to build a Spitfire in one-fifth scale,
and detailed to the last rivet and fastener, I would probably be
hard-pushed for a practical or even sensible answer. Perhaps the closest
I can get is that since a small child I have been awe inspired by R. J.
Mitchell's elliptical winged masterpiece, and that to build a small
replica is the clo! sest I will ever aspire to possession.
The job took me well over eleven years, during which there were times I
very nearly came to giving the project up for lost. The sheer amount of
work involved, countless hours, proved almost too much, were it not for
a serendipitous encounter at my flying club in Cambridge with Dr Michael
Fopp, Director General of the Royal Air Force Museum in England.
Seeing the near complete fuselage, he urged me to go on and finish the
model, promising that he would put it on display. I was flabbergasted,
for when I started I had no inkling that my work would end up in a
position of honour in one of the world's premier aviation museums.
As I write, the case for the model is being prepared, having been
specially commissioned by the museum with a case-maker in Sweden. I have
not yet seen it, but from what I hear, it is enormous!
In one respect the story has gone full! circle, since it was at Hendon
where I started my research in earnest , sourcing Microfilm copies of
many original Supermarine drawings, without which such a detailed build
would not have been possible
The model is skinned with litho plate over a balsa core and has been
left in bare metal at the suggestion of Michael Fopp, so that the
structure is seen to best advantage. The rivets are real and many are
pushed into drilled holes in the skin and underlying balsa, but many
more are actual mechanical fixings. I have no accurate count, but I
suspect that there are at least 19,000!
All interior detail is built from a combination of Supermarine drawings
and workshop manuals, plus countless photographs of my own, many of them
taken opportunistically when I was a volunteer at the Duxford Aviation
Society based at Duxford Airfield, home of the incomparable Imperial War
Museum collection in Cambridgeshire, England. Spitfires, in various
marks are, dare I say, a common feature th! ere!
The degree of detail is probably obsessive: The needles of the dials in
the cockpit actually stand proud of the instrument faces, but you have
to look hard to see it!
Why the flat canopy? Well, the early Mk.Is had them, and I had no means
to blow a bubble hood, so it was convenient. Similarly the covers over
the wheels were another early feature and they saved me a challenging
task of replicating the wheel castings.
The model has its mistakes, but I'll leave the experts to spot them, as
they most certainly will, plus others I don't even know about. I don't
pretend the little Spitfire is perfect, but I do hope it has captured
something of the spirit and incomparable beauty of this magnificent
fighter - perhaps the closest to a union that art and technology have
ever come ! - a killing machine with lines that are almost sublime.
So, with the model now in its magnificent new home, what comes next?
Well, I'm planning a book that will have a lot to say about its genesis
and perhaps just a little about me and those dear to me, including a
long suffering but understanding and supportive wife. And then there's
the Mustang. Yes, a 1/5th scale P-51D is already taking shape in my
workshop.
How long will it take? I've no idea, but what I am sure of is that at my
age
(58) I can't expect to be building many of them!
David Glen
Whaddon, Cambridge
Dec. 06, 2006
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image001-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image002-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image003-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image004-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image005-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image006-med.jpg
http://www.hotboatpics.com/pics/data/500/11726image007-med.jpg