Israeli Spitfires – 66th anniversary
Israel's first Spitfire ד-130 took to the air on July 23, 1948. The test flight conducted by former WWII South African Air Force Spitfire pilot, the late Boris Senior, initiated Israel's love affair with the Spitfire which began 66 year ago. Most of Israel's Spitfires were retired from service prior to the October 1956 Suez War, some ending up as kid's toys in Kibbutz playgrounds and others in airworthy condition over the skies of Europe. One Spitfire, known as
"Ezer's Black Spitfire" was retained in Israel, thrilling on lookers during pilot's acceptance ceremonies and holiday IAF museum openings.
Last year's release of new tooled 1/72 Spitfire Mk.9e kits by AZmodels and Sword models of the Czech Republic, inspired me to build eight Israeli Spitfires that saw service between 1948 and 1956. The text below provides colors notes used to paint my Israeli Spitfires.
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Weissman's Black Spitfire no.57 - current 2013 version:
Sword Models 1/72 Spitfire Mk.9e provides optional fish tail and round exhausts. The round exhausts were used to depict the current vintage Black Spitfire. "Ezer's Black Spitfire" is strictly a show plane and as such it lacks the bumps atop the wings and shell ejector openings on the bottom of the wings. The Sword kit has the upper wing
bumps as an option, so it's easy to just leave them out. The short gun stubs were made of round plastic rod.
Note blade antenna at bottom of
fuselage and whip antenna just aft of upper fuselage mast.
Red used is Ferrari
Red, Humbrol 220. The airplane's overall color is Humbrol no.21 gloss black,
with a layer of Future Gloss applied on top. Cockpit and over wing walkways are
f.s.36370 (close to f.s.36375 but without the blue hue to it). Blue used for
Star of David roundels is f.s.15102, and was found in an
F-16 decal sheet.
Yoav Efrati
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