FIAT cr42 n nightfighter in 1/40 scale

[Ian M]

Just read the whole thread from start to here.
Wow. I mean just wow. The work that you have put into this is mad. In a good way that is!
Silk purses and sow's ears dont even come close!

[colin m]

Splendid work. And a freelance owl as well. You'll be painting your own £10.00 notes next.

[yak face]

Thanks Ian and Colin , it’s taken a lot of work so far but I’m enjoying it nonetheless. Got a lot more little bits done today. I was never really happy with how the seat belts looked especially when seen in close up so I decided to remove and replace the shoulder belts and rear cushion. This was done by using wine foil ,fuse wire and the riveter to make some semblance of stitching.The new ones look better to me . Other things I’ve done are- rear view mirror added using nail gem , machine guns fitted (including cordite stains on cowling in front of guns) ,leather coaming round cockpit and windscreen fitted using fine silicon tube ( apparently it’s for fishing somehow?) position light at tail fitted using stretched clear sprue, gunsight fitted in cockpit ,wheels added and exhausts and fixing brackets fitted . The big job left now is the fitting of the top wing and final outer struts. I’ve fixed the wing on and am now going to leave it to set for a week (why you ask ? Cause I’m going on holiday ) The struts will be fitted next then it’s a case of tidying up the strut to wing joints and fitting the steel bracing between the outer struts

[Fernando N]

Looking better and better with each update Tony, love the seatbelts and the subtle weathering.
Happy holiday!

[BattleshipBob]

Lovely work Tony, looks superb!!

[yak face]

Back from holiday and got a bit more done on the Fiat. The final four outer struts have been fitted and all the strut attachment points have been filled . Once these have dried and I’m happy I’ll touch them up with the airbrush. I tried something new that I read about on t’net the other day for filler . PVA glue mixed with talcum powder . I’ve used the talc and superglue technique before but thought mixing with PVA would be easy to tidy up with water before it starts setting . It seemed to work nicely being quite workable and easy to clean up ,and once it sets it’s quite hard and doesn’t seem to shrink too much . Not a lot left to do now , just the bracing wires between the two outer struts on each side and the aerial wire on the rear fuselage then it’s finally done . I’m thinking about making a display base for it , I was toying with the idea of using a circular mirror plate about 7 or 8 inch diameter and painting the crescent moon and owl on it .

[AlanG]

Superb Tony. I'm loving watching you build this

[Ian M]

A lot of work going into this and it shows.
Big thumbs up from here!

[flyjoe180]

Nearly there Tony, looking great

[yak face]

Well after a final push I’m calling this finished. I touched up the strut attachment points that had been filled and smoothed off, using the airbrush , attached an aerial wire using Zak gold knitting in elastic and fitted the wire bracing on the outer struts. This is the only bit of bracing on the aircraft and on the real thing is a substantial steel rod rather than the usual stranded wire cable. To replicate this I used acupuncture needles .I saw this technique being used in a magazine ages ago and picked some 100mm needles up cheap on e bay a while back. I had already drilled the inner sides of all four struts so when it came to fitting the wire I just got the length with a pair of dividers , added a couple of mm ,cut them to size and gently sprung them into the holes.
Looking at pictures ( lots!) of the propeller it has markings on the front of the blades . After researching it I found out the props were made under licence from Hamilton Standard and carried a similar trademark on the blades . I couldn’t find three Hamilton Standard logos in the decal spares box but did find these oval markings which look very similar ( off a Colombian BAC jaguar sheet, Airfix 1/48) and I can’t imagine the Italian logo being exactly the same as the USA one anyway. Here’s a couple of rather poor pics to finish off this thread and once I’ve took some proper pics I’ll put up a ‘completed’ thread. Thanks to anyone who’s been watching , ciao tony!

[Fernando N]

Very nice result Tony, looking forward to see the completed set of pics :thumb2: :thumb2: .

[Neil Merryweather]

Lovely Job, Tony

[scottie3158]

Tony,
A very nice result all the detailing paid off.