Among Special Hobby's recent quarterscale releases is a fine model of the first Griffon-engined Seafire.

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If you have comments or questions please post them here.

Thanks!

What's that great huge divot in the middle of the seat pan all about? I've never seen anything like that in other Spitfire seat.

Hi Jessie

It's correct for a moulded seat: http://spitfiresite.com/2010/07/anatomy-of-spitfire-cockpit.html/01__15_020

All the best

Rowan

Okay, that's a new one on me. Any guesses as to what its function was? I rather doubt that seat pack parachutes were shaped to fit it exactly.

It's also interesting to see the colour of the leather back pad. I had been under the impression that it was supposed to be black.

I'm no spitfire or seafire expert but I'd imagine the 'divot' in the seat would be so when the pilot landed back on a pitching carrier at sea he'd sink more into the seat rather than having his head smashed into the canopy, just my theory Ant

It was designed to accept the air bottle, for inflating the dinghy, and dates from around 1941. First seats had only a slightly undulating base, then a square receptacle, for the parachute. Pilots initially had a sorbo pad, between their "delicates" and the parachute, for comfort, but lost that when the dinghy (not available during 1940) arrived.
Edgar

Aha! I kind of suspected it was there to provide clearance for some piece of kit or other. People in wartime just didn't design things like that for no reason.

A day you don't learn something is a day wasted

Sorry, missed the bit about the seat-back; the cushion is not easy to pin down, since it was supplied by the seat-makers, who were based in Glasgow, so could have been "standard," or Basil" leather (made from sheepskin.) My feeling is that it would have been a brown, of some type.
Not necessary, in a model, but possibly of interest, is that late Seafire seats tended to have two wooden strips attached to the back, presumably as a brace, to stop the seat rocking during arrested landings and assisted take-offs. This led to the "QS" harness being introduced from August, 1946; this had a parachute-box style of release, rather than the Sutton-style, as seen during the war, and seems to have been a middle-blue colour, rather than tan.
Edgar