Spiteful F.15; has anyone tried to make a contra-prop work

[The Wooksta!]

That Spiteful is appallingly bad, accuracy wise.  Radiators are too deep, the wing is too far forward and may be too slim chordwise and the undecarriage barely resembles the real thing.

Top marks for getting the contraprop to work tho.

[kitnut617]

As Lee says, there are some accuracy issues.

For one the spinner is totally wrong (although it might be a good Martin Baker MB5 spinner), here's a comparison with the Airfix spinner



Then there's these curious curves to the rocker cover fairings;




which I promptly filed off and used the Airfix fairings instead;





On top of all that I think the whole fuselage is to thin looking from the top, but I'm not going to do anything about that.  To get the Heritage spinner to fit nicely I had to add a sliver of card in the fuselage halves joint to space it out so there was a smooth transition from the spinner to the fuselage.  I did do a comparison with the Airfix Spitfire F.22/24, the overall length is about the same and the tail planes are very close to the Airfix kit, canopy although very thick plastic, is fairly close to the Spitfire one although they are slightly different in the RW.

I've not looked at the radiators but will now, the wheels just don't look like what you see in photos (which seem to be the small diameter Spitfire wheels), but Lee's comment about the wing I'd have to say needs another look, photos and 3-View drawings of the Spiteful seem to show it where Trumpeter has it.  I'm going to take my 1/72 3-View and get it copied to 1/48 scale before I make any more comments on that though.

[andrewj]

Nice work on the contra-prop, as for the accuracy issues, I had a thread on Britmodeller which adresses some of the issues ,but not all.

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=234917340&hl=%2Btrumpeter+%2Bspiteful

Andrew

[kitnut617]

Thanks everyone for your comments ---

Andrew, I'll have a look at the wing position again later after I get my 3-View scaled up.

[Jay-Jay]

Thanks for sharing your tips about RC mechanical parts, it is just brilliant !!
If you allow me, I will include this in my current project drawings.
Hope to be able to post my idea to share with you what my "wiffy infected" brain expected me to do 
BRGDS
Jay-Jay

[kitnut617]

Nice work on the contra-prop, as for the accuracy issues, I had a thread on Britmodeller which adresses some of the issues ,but not all.

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=234917340&hl=%2Btrumpeter+%2Bspiteful

Andrew

Having studied the 3-View I have, I think you're about right where the wing should be.  If it's ok with you I'll follow along with what you've done on mine.

But I'm really curious about something.  You went to all that great work on the wing (which isn't an obvious thing) but then used the kit spinner and prop (both of which are completely wrong in shape and very obvious) and also not do anything about the rocker cover fairings (something else that's quite obvious).  

[andrewj]

I have modified the rocker covers in my build, blended them in to the cowling at the rear, to match photos of the real thing. Not really convinced the spinner is that far out as they do seem to look "pointier" than Spitfire spinners.

Andrew

[kitnut617]

The front end is exactly like a Spitfire Andrew, it's mounted identically, the spinner and the cowling is all the same except where it slopes up to the windscreen.

In fact the Spiteful fuselage is a Spitfire fuselage except for the raised top decking.  The tails are interchangable too.  In Alfred Price's book Spitfire, there's a whole chapter on the Spiteful, even shows a photo of the second prototype with a Spitfire Mk.XIV tail fitted.

Something I've noted while doing my comparisons with the Trumpeter Spiteful and Airfix Spitfire. For my plan to make my second Spiteful into a Mk.F.16, I'm going to use the extended air intake from the FR.47 kit, trial fitting it to the Spiteful is matches up almost exactly from the back of the spinner to the rear end of where the regular air intake is positioned, so I think when I try to move the wing I'll leave the center part where the air intake attaches to, right where it is.

[Captain Canada]

Neat stuff ! Are you making the working prop to add realism as you fly it around the house ?

[andrewj]

The front end is exactly like a Spitfire Andrew, it's mounted identically, the spinner and the cowling is all the same except where it slopes up to the windscreen.

In fact the Spiteful fuselage is a Spitfire fuselage except for the raised top decking.  The tails are interchangable too.  In Alfred Price's book Spitfire, there's a whole chapter on the Spiteful, even shows a photo of the second prototype with a Spitfire Mk.XIV tail fitted.

Something I've noted while doing my comparisons with the Trumpeter Spiteful and Airfix Spitfire. For my plan to make my second Spiteful into a Mk.F.16, I'm going to use the extended air intake from the FR.47 kit, trial fitting it to the Spiteful is matches up almost exactly from the back of the spinner to the rear end of where the regular air intake is positioned, so I think when I try to move the wing I'll leave the center part where the air intake attaches to, right where it is.

This is a common fallacy, but the Spiteful fuselage is not the same as a Spitfire, the whole structure is different . The cowling bulges blend into the rear of the cowlings on the Spiteful ,they do not on the Griffon spitfire , the cowling lines are also different. The only Spiteful with a Spitfire fuselage was NN660, which used a modified Spitfire XIV fuselage. The Spiteful tail and the Spitfire 22/24 tail were not interchangeable, Supermarine records refer to the Mk 22 tail as "the large {Spiteful type } empennage" not Spiteful tail.
Here are a couple of photos of RB518 which clearly show the cowling differences and the different fuselage from that of a Spitfire.



Andrew

[kitnut617]

Neat stuff ! Are you making the working prop to add realism as you fly it around the house ?

Do we do that Todd ---- 

[sandiego89]

Kitnut thank you for taking the time to explain and show the work on the gears- I really appreciate it. 

[kitnut617]

No worries S89, nothing really invented and anyone could have done it.  All you have to do is look at any differential on a vehicle.

[kitnut617]

This is a common fallacy, but the Spiteful fuselage is not the same as a Spitfire, the whole structure is different . The cowling bulges blend into the rear of the cowlings on the Spiteful ,they do not on the Griffon spitfire , the cowling lines are also different. The only Spiteful with a Spitfire fuselage was NN660, which used a modified Spitfire XIV fuselage. The Spiteful tail and the Spitfire 22/24 tail were not interchangeable, Supermarine records refer to the Mk 22 tail as "the large {Spiteful type } empennage" not Spiteful tail.
Andrew

This is a common statement that gets trucked out all the time and has done so since the war, a much overused misconception and doesn't address what really got changed.  I think it was more for 'mis-information' than for anything else (it was war time remember)

You're quite right that NN660 just had the wing attached to a Mk.XIV fuselage but it didn't stop there.  NN664 was built with a Mk.XIV tail and as this was during the war, they would have just pull something off the shelf (which they clearly did).  The fuselage was the first of the modified Spitfire fuselages which had a different former shape to the top to each one where the transition starts at about the fuselage mid point and in my view it was a converted Mk.XIV fuselage and not a converted bubble top type.  The lower half is Spitfire.  But don't take my word for it, you have the models, check it for yourself.

[Daryl J.]

Are the diameters of the Airfix and Trumpeter spinner the same?    I'm toying with the idea of putting the newly available Spitfire Mk.22 resin spinner and prop from Roy on the Spiteful.
Thanks.