Spitfire MkXXI Interior Construction

Well it has been awhile since I have been able to post. Between getting ready for and running the booth at Adepticon and playing catch up with Armorcast orders, I haven't had the time to post anything new.
I have been pecking away at the Spitfire. The photo-etch for the interior has been a beast to say the least. I had to remove the vertical control surfaces and the molded in interior detail to accept the new Eduard pieces. Then I needed to laminate the new air frame structure that are photo-etch components to the body halves.
I also was able to finally troubleshoot and figure out what was wrong with my airbrush set. I thought it was something wrong with the Badger compressor or the water trap since I would get a lot of water blown through the brush. The problem child was the hose. The hose appeared to be in excellent shape, but it had dry rotted from the inside out and must have allowed ambient humid air into the line or shrank and caused pinched areas in the hose causing moisture build up.I got another newer hose out of the box of airbrush parts I inherited from my friend Dave of Warpath Studio who passed last year and everything worked out great without any water spatter.

Right side of the fuselage with Eduard photo-etched airframe in place and painted Tamiya interior green

I then used Vallejo gray primer through my Badger 155 airbrush for the base coat. Then I used Tamiya XF-71 Interior Green for the interior color and thinned it with rubbing alcohol. The mixture of alcohol paint went fine but I used Createx airbrush cleaner between the primer and base color. It did an excellent job of cleaning out the primer but left an oily residue in the airbrush that effected the green paint. I had to strip the paint off and shoot it again. So I found out I needed to run water in the brush to clean out the cleaner. The cleaner has a glycerol base that kept the paint from drying and left it glossy. After cleaning it up with a tooth brush and some lava soap and then the Tamiya paint went on without a problem. Lava soap has a fine pumice grit that roughs up the surface very nice without leaving any heavy scratches.

Viewing the left side of the fuselage the glossy film is from the Createx cleaner that I did not  remove from the airbrush. The paint remained tacky for over 15 minutes before I realized what I did wrong and corrected it.

I followed up with a wash of the new Vallejo 76-512 Dark Green Model Wash to bring out the details and then highlighted with Tamiya XF-21 Sky. I edged the top sides of the airframe and layered glazes of Tamiya Sky into the panels to bring out the detail and add some visual interest.

I flowed Vallejo76-512 Dark Green Model Wash around the airframe to create depth.

I highlighted the edges of the airframe and the inner panels with Tamiya XF-21 Sky

I also forgot to mention that during the priming stage I built up sub section number five which is floor structure and framework for the seat. Needless to say I primed one side and then flipped it over and it was not secured enough on my loop of tape and the air pressure sent the part flying across the the workshop onto a gray concrete floor with a fiddly gray 3/4" long part. I am surprised with myself, I didn't throw the model across the room, I didn't pack it away. I figured out really quick how to fix it. I will discuss that in detail in my next entry and add some of my viewpoints on handling photo-etched parts. So I have been pushing myself out of my comfort zone. I am building an airplane and I really do not know much about the subject, I am using photo-etch parts that are soft copper, not stainless steel, I forced myself to get the airbrush out and fix the water problem in the line and I didn't shelve the model after the loss of a major interior component.