discussion SMER FIAT Cr 32 Freccia in 1/48 ( ish!)

[yak face]

Seen as how ive nearly finished the Zero for Karls GB , a month early no less ! , I thought I could squeeze in a quickish build before Andys Japanese GB starts in july .
This is the SMER reboxing of the old Artiplast tooling of the FIAT Cr32 . The kit is actually 1/50 scale but when SMER reboxed the Artiplast kits they marketed them as 1/48 . Its not a problem for me , i know it would drive some people mad though . Anyways its a 1960s tooling , so the detail in the cockpit is a seat ….thats it , just a seat ! But the external detail is quite nicely done and its got great decals ( I’m going to do the spanish civil war version ). Ive done one of these before , many moons ago** and got round the cockpit problem by sticking a pilot in - bugger all can be seen once hes installed , so i’ll be using that strategy again .
**https://www.scale-models.co.uk/thre...utica-fiat-cr32-and-typhoon.11034/#post-91630
First off though , Ive got to fabricate a replacement tailplane and elevator as ones missing !

 

[Jim R]

Well Tony, you don't go for the easy option. A pretty basic kit with bits missing - right up your street :smiling:

 

[yak face]

Well Tony, you don't go for the easy option. A pretty basic kit with bits missing - right up your street :smiling:

You know me too well jim ! :smiling5:

 

[yak face]

Made a start on this. Ive drilled out the exhausts and cut a divider out of plastic card to stop the see through effect. I got a fat little mester out of the spares box to fill the opening nicely . The inside of the fuselage has been primed and will just be getting a coat of interior green. I was wrong about the kit only supplying a seat , theres an instrument panel too , so that doubles the parts count in the cockpit , yay !

 

[adt70hk]

Eduard it is not but looking forward to what you do with this!

ATB

Andrew

 

[Jim R]

.... theres an instrument panel too

They're spoiling you :smiling:

 

[Guest]

The detail on the fuselage is not half-bad for a kit of this vintage, though. Recessed panel lines and rivets that are fairly fine, it could have been a lot worse.

 

[yak face]

The detail on the fuselage is not half-bad for a kit of this vintage, though. Recessed panel lines and rivets that are fairly fine, it could have been a lot worse.

Yes its quite nicely done jakko , a perfect mix of recessed panel lines and raised rivets ( although the rivets do look a tad big ! ) , it makes into a great looking model with a bit of fettling and a few refinements .( not to mention smoke and mirrors and just plain cheating - stick a pilot in to hide the lack of interior !) Cheers tony

 

[yak face]

The illusion has now started !
No its not Alice Cooper , I thought I’d try and help with defining his features so dry brushed white over the black primer . He’s now had a full face makeover and now looks a bit more human !
The fuselage has had the instrument panel added after painting a generic set of dials on it ( it wont really be seen as its quite deep under the coaming ) and the chubby Senor was tried for size.
This revealed that he was too low and couldnt see out of the cockpit ! So a booster cushion was installed under his square arse ! I also added a control column from stretched sprue as this would be visible between his legs . He’s now nestled in the cockpit and the fuselage halves have been glued , blocking all view of the total lack of interior . Next job sort the fuselage seams without losing any detail and fill those two whacking great sink marks on top of the nose !

 

[papa 695]

Just seen this one Tony, a cracking start, and very nice work on the pilot. even though he looks like a child sat on a chair with his feet dangling.

 

[flyjoe180]

Nice start Tony. The face on you pilot is one of the best I have ever seen (not the KISS version).

 

[The Smythe Meister]

.....The face on you pilot is one of the best I have ever seen

Couldn't agree more...
.... A superb job on him.

 

[Waspie]

Just seen this one Tony, a cracking start, and very nice work on the pilot. even though he looks like a child sat on a chair with his feet dangling.

I flew with a pilot of similar stature so nothing amiss in my eyes!!!! :thumb2: :upside: :smiling3:

 

[yak face]

Got the seams and sink marks filled and glued the lower wings on . I now turned my attention to the missing tailplane .two pieces of plastic card were cut to shape and glued together with a strip between them at the front edge for the elevator. The tailplane was cut from a piece out of the spares box .
I glued plastic strips for the ribs and decided to try and simulate the covered effect with microporous tape . I tried a bit and it looked good so both sides of the elevator were covered , cut to shape and given a coat of primer. Once this has dried it can be cleaned up and fitted .

 

[Jim R]

Excellent work Tony. Pedro the pilot looks superb. Tail fabrication is really good.

 

[Neil Merryweather]

Ooh very impressed,sir! I do like the microporous tape idea.

 

[Geoffers]

Great stuff Tony, I’m enjoying watching you put this together :thumb2:

I must say that it seems better to have limited cockpit detail to hide once buttoned up rather than spend age’s creating lots of detail that no one will ever see :thinking:

Geoff

 

[yak face]

Progress has been a but slow lately , due to being busy at work and other things taking up spare time ( changing my car and laying some false grass !)
Ive been cleaning up the fuselage and lower wings and now its in primer , with a few raised rivets reinstated with tiny blobs of canopy glue . The holes on the wings for the interplane struts dont line up with the struts fitted to the top wing ( i remembered this from the last one i built) so these were filled and re drilled . I also filled the holes for the machine guns as the kit supplied items were pants , plus I read that the wing guns were often removed to save weight .
A lot of the kit parts either need replacing or extreme clean up like the square section , flash ridden cabane struts , these being sanded down to an aerofoil section . Other bits like the tailplane struts will simply be replaced with rod
Ive also assembled the wheel spats and cut out a section of the wheels so they can be fitted last off to save masking ( like @The Smythe Meister , with his fascination for turrets , i’m very partial to a spatted wheel ! )

 

[Tim Marlow]

Very cool. Excellent work that’s bringing this up to standard very quickly.

 

[yak face]

Forgot to say , I replaced the dodgy kit gun tubes with styrene tube , cut at an angle and flattened into an oval shape .
Been looking at the pics on the walkaround and realised that the interplane struts have a collar type fixing at each end . Obviously the kit doesnt so I used curved strips of kabuki tape to wrap around the ends and secured them with a drop of superglue . I’m going to have to do something similar at the bottom ends and also on the N shaped cabane struts . Once this was done the underside of the top wing and the fuselage and lower wing got a coat of sky grey. That was yesterday so today the undersides got masked up and the top of the wing , fuselage and wheel spats got a coat of sand yellow . Next up is the green and brown mottles .