1:32 Spitfire Mk.V RAF masks for insignias

RAF roundels on the Spitfire Mk.V without decals

Omask offers these templates for the British markings on a Supermarine Spitfire Mk.V in the large 1:32 scale. Masking off and spraying produces a marking that lies in the same plane as the camouflage and has no border around it. Neither the aircraft nor paints are in the package.

The most numerous Spitfire

The Mk.V version arose as a quick solution: the stronger Merlin 45 engine was built into the airframe of the previous version, and the result became the most numerously produced form of the whole type. It served from 1941 over the Channel, in the desert with a dust filter under the nose and over Malta as well. The Vb form carried two cannons and four machine guns, the Vc form got the universal wing. The year 1941 also brought it a hard lesson, however, in the shape of the Fw 190, an opponent it could not match at altitude.

Masking on curved surfaces

The fuselage of the Spitfire is markedly rounded on the sides, and that is exactly where a decal most often creases or its edge shows through. A template gets around this problem, but it asks for careful pressing down all the way round so that paint does not creep under it. Before removal, check the edge with a fingernail and peel the template off at a shallow angle, not perpendicularly away from the surface.

Who the set is useful for

• builders of British fighters in a large scale
• modelers who want a marking in a shade of their own that is true to the period
• those who finish a model with heavy weathering and sanding of the surfaces
• builders of machines from the fighting over the Channel, Malta and North Africa