Painting the exhaust stacks
Friday, 13th July, 2018
In May 2015 (Can it really be that long ago?) I described how I built the Spitfire’s exhaust stacks. Now, with the model about to be removed from its cradle and turned upright, I have painted the exhausts preparatory to fitting them.
The first stage was to spray the primed castings with Alclad Burnt Iron as a base coat. Then, with a fine nozzle for my Aztek airbrush and using close up photos of the full size stack as a guide, I applied a mottled dust coat of Precision Paints Light Rust, followed by a further dusting of the same shade lightened up with a little white.
Finally I applied some light grey/white pastel with a hint of deep purple here and there. The extreme edges of the circular outlet ports were dry brushed white plus a dash of rust. Importantly, the grey-black interiors of the ports were also weathered with some light grey pastel.
The two back plates onto which the individual exhaust stubs are bolted were also painted burnt iron followed by an overall rust colour.
The observant will notice the four studs (two top and bottom) ornamenting the flanges of each exhaust pot. These were added during the painting sequence. They are 14 BA brass nuts threaded onto the clipped off ends of 14 BA bolts and secured into holes in the flanges with CA glue.
