Painting your Spitfire MkIX

You will find indepth images enabling you to accurately paint your Warbirds Spitfire in the manual. You will need acrylic aerosols of white primer, grey primer, and matt black, Halfords [the UK car store] acrylic primers are excellent for this purpose. These types of paint go on very dry and are reasonably durable in their own right.

The white primer is for all of the underside and the invasion stripes. When dry, mask off the invasion stripe areas using low tack masking tape and then grey primer the remainder of the upper surfaces. The grey primer covers really well and should be used as the primer for the areas that will ultimately be green or grey.

We used Humbrol enamels for the remaining colours:

Green - Dark Green 116
Grey upper surfaces - Ocean Grey 106
Grey under surfaces - Medium Sea Grey 165

Although the cans are very small, the colour is very accurate, and it does mean that should you need to touch up your plane in the future, colours will match. We would expect to use two tins of each colour if airbrushing, suitably diluted.

Now carefully pull the masking off of the invasion stripe area and using two inch masking tape mask and spray on the black stripes with the remaining aerosol. Once the main colours are dry, lightly rub off any dust with a sheet of plain paper.

The final step is to apply the decals, we produce a set specifically for this kit, and are available to purchase separately from our online shop.

If you want to take the painting to the next level and paint on the RAF roundels and squadron codes, we have found the following Humbrol colours achieve a good result over a white primer:

Roundel red - Insignia red 153 matt
Roundel blue - Blue 104 matt
Roundel yellow - Insignia yellow 154 matt
White - White 34 matt

If you are seeking a more realistic battle weary finish, please take the time to read through our section on weathering your model, its a rewarding experience and can really bring your model to life.

Finally, fuel proof the whole plane using Aerokote by Deluxe 2000 Satin finish


Hints & tips General

1. Thinning the enamel using cellulose thinners will cover more area with less weight. Consistency of creamy milk is ideal if airbrushing.

2. You will find that one drip of liquid soap in a saucer will provide a good lubricant to the surface while you position each decal.

3. Although a satin finish is what we want, gloss fuel proofer is the most resistant, which we use in very vulnerable areas. Be warned, some dedicated fuel proofers can curl up the edges of decals!

4. Paint adds unwanted weight - always use the minimum amount possible