My number 2 (released) repaint is of a danish spitfire. After the war in '48 and '49, when the RAF sent excess Spitfires to allied countries to help out weapons wise, Denmark received 38 of these. They were both high and low altitude Mk.IX E's and two of them were PR MK.XI's.
The Spits were nicknamed "Arrigtrolden" amongst the pilots and groundcrew - it translates to somethign along the lines of "the angry troll" or "the grumpy troll".
The Spitfires, being the first real fighter plane to serve in Denmark, had a quite rough time here. They were flown hard, fast and low, which resulted in quite frequent crashes. Actually, 8 of the 38 were damaged beyond sensible repair, 4 of the crashes being fatal.
Examples are:
- 41-408 which hit a tree during a ground attack exercise.
- 41-404 and 412 were discarded after a collision during head-on attack practice.
- One (Its registration unknown to me) collided with a tractor, during an exercise.
- 41-419 / 420 and 424 which were all discarded after bellylandings, two of them because of engine failure.
Also there are quite a few interesting stories and some of incidents that didn't go that wrong. One story tells the tale of a pilot who did a very, very low flight over the waters of Ringkøbing fiord. When he returned, the mechanic couldn't believe his eyes when he saw that the pilot had cut the outermost 20 cm of the propeller!
But as all Spitfire pilots, the danes regarded it as a wonderfull plane to fly. By the mid 50'ies, all the Spitfires were either crashed, scrapped or used as practice airframes for mechanical students.
This particular plane, 41-422 (former RAF registration RN252) has a succesfull service life, untill scrapped in September 1952. Please notice the little "Arrigtrold" on the side of the engine cowling. Because the picture I found of it is quite bad, I had to do this from scrath and much to my own design..
Download link:
http://peecee.dk/upload/view/291035
