Mr. Toobey is turning out to be a fine aviation artist, although I understand this is not his speciality, and it's pleasing to see quality art on Airfix boxes again. Inside the box we have 134 parts on two sprues of medium grey plastic and a separately bagged sprue containing the transparent parts. The box is stuffed with parts and the larger size is not a marketing ploy to justify the £3 or so more this will cost you than the Spitfire Mk.XII.
The smaller of the two grey sprues holds the newly tooled fuselage and cockpit parts amongst other bits and pieces.
The larger of the two contains not one but two sets of wings; one folded, one extended. This is a very welcome move by Airfix and will please many people. It is very mildly disappointing to note that the extended wing parts have inherited the slightly soft and wide detail on the undersides from the Mk.XII kit. This is the Mk.XII's Achilles heel but Mr. Surfacer or Tippex will work wonders on those lines. The newly tooled folded wing parts have detail that is much finer and crisper than anything Airfix have done in the 15 years that have passed since the release of the Seafire FR.46/ 47 kits.
The wingfolds themselves are exceptional and should look the business with careful painting.
This detail carries over to the folding wingtips as well. This is good stuff.
Two tailhooks are provided, one extended and one retracted. Again, these are well detailed and crisp.
The correct broad chord prop is provided. It's good to see that parts are not being recycled on the basis of being near enough; it would have been easy to just include the Spitfire XII prop instead of tooling a new one.
Control surfaces are separate and the flaps have good detail on their inner faces. Two sets are provided for flaps up and flaps down options. The flap wells have corresponding rib detail moulded into them. It's worth mentioning that Airfix have confined ejector pin marks to places where they will not be visible (with one small exception) which is encouraging.
The inner flap sections have the often overlooked hinge detail represented.
The radiator cores are provided as front and rear faces, and will look very convincing once treated to a wash to deepen the shadows.
The undercarriage is nicely done and there are two flavours of mainwheel, large diameter and small diameter hub types being catered for. Tyres are flattened and bulged on the wheels intended for use in the whells down configuration. The correct hub detail has been provided on the inboard faces for the two different wheel types. The outboard faces of the hubs are separate parts, which is very welcome. The detail on these is again very good; the large diameter hubs even have the valves moulded in. Scissors links are provided as separate parts and are good.
There is a selection of items to hang underneath the Seafire, comprising slipper tanks, a centreline tank and 3" rockets. The rockets are nice but the fins are on the chunky side.
Moving inside, we have the instrument panel, compass and rudder bars from the Mk.XII kit (no problems there then) and a newly tooled rear cockpit frame. This would benefit from having its lightening holes drilled out, a simple enough task.
The cockpit sidewalls have moulded detail and are dressed up with a couple of separate parts and will look the puppy's privates once painted.
The seat is the same item provided with the Mk.XII and much to the consternation of the League of Very Important Modellers on teh interwebz has an ejector pin mark on the seat pan. The League of Very Important Modellers are most upset about this and are queuing at Ultracast's door for new seats. There is also the option of manning up and taking 45 seconds with a drop of Mr. Surfacer and some wet and dry glued to a pencil eraser to fix this major crime against humanity. Nobody ever seems to mention the flare rack that, for all that it is beautifully done, is almost certainly wrong for anything later than a Spitfire Mk.V (although I would be happy to be corrected on this).
There is a nicely sculpted Johnny Pilot who looks much better in the flesh (plastic?) than he does in this photograph. He even has a tie.
The cockpit door has been improved from the Spitfire XII and is no longer blighted by ejector pin marks.
The transparent parts include the correct pattern gunsight, curved windscreen and two sliding canopies, one each for the open and closed positions. These are much better than the ones in the old FR.46/ 47 kit. The parts are not as crystal clear in my example as the ones in the Spitfire Mk.XII and will benefit from a polish and a dip in Klear.
What is encouraging is that Airfix might be listening to modellers and have taken the sprue gates to task. The ones on this kit are much more petite than those on previous Nu-Airfix releases. This sounds like a minor point but the king size attachment points on the Sea Vixen were a pain and it's good to see this being addressed. Little things mean a lot.
Airfix have joined the tiny band of manufacturers who realise that the FAA had more than one post-war camouflage scheme. The F.XVII kit has options for the early low demarcation EDSG over sky scheme. the temperate EDSG/ dark slate grey disruptive pattern over sky scheme and the later low demarcation EDSG over sky pattern whci will be familiar to most people. The temperate scheme is a very attractive one with its yellow codes and trim.
The decals are by Cartograph and if the ones in the Mk.XII kit are a guide they will be a joy to use. There is a full set of stencil data, colours are good and register is perfect. Aftermarket decals of this quality would cost a good portion of the price of the whole kit.
As Airfix continue on their apparent quest to kit every mark of Spitfire and Seafire in 1/48, they keep improving with each new release and the have raised the bar once again with this kit. Finally, after 15 years, they have a kit that can stand as an equal by the side of the FR.46/ 47 kit and that is no small praise. To say that they are beginning to approach Tamigawa levels of quality with their 1/48 releases is no exaggeration and when you take into account the very reasonable price of the kit (£18.99 RRP) it starts to look like a regular bargain. When you consider that you will end up with enough spares to kitbash a Mk.XII to turn out a Seafire XV, the F.XVII becomes a must have item for Spitfire/ Seafire and FAA fans. This is a highly recommended kit.
