Aerotech Piaggio Pc.7 Finished.

[ericg]

So after finishing the Ansaldo A.1 I thought I would get stuck into something simple and quick, whilst still keeping things a bit obscure. I chose the Aerotech Piaggio PC.7, as I have built a number of their kits and have enjoyed building them. This model has always been on my wish list and when I was at a friends house recently, he wanted to swap it for a Trumpeter A7 with all the Zacto resin. Naturally I jumped at the chance!. Now,  Aerotech make some pretty interesting subjects and their kits are either really simple or need a lot of work. This one luckily is on the easier side, with the parts fitting together well and it features nicely done detail. The aircraft itself is very esoteric, with it not ever having flown due to problems with its gearbox, nevertheless, it will fit in my collection nicely, having a couple of other subjects that reached the taxi stage but never took to the sky. 

 

The Box, typical Aerotech it doesn’t really draw you into the subject!

 

 

apart from the nice resin parts, there is a fairly daunting looking sheet of photo etch which I guess will be the hardest part of the build.

 

 

Onto the build. I started with the instrument panel, which is a chunk of white metal overplayed with photo etch bezels.not much of this will be seen, so I didn’t spend too much time on it 

 

 

next up was the cockpit. I replaced the kit photo the belts with simple tin foil belts that I made myself.

 

 

Barely any of this will be seen, so it has been kept very simple.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 13, 2018 by ericg

[DonH]

Nice start! That's a very bright shade of blue, I assume the pilot had to wear tinted goggles at all times.

[ericg]

I have spent some time replacing some of the resin pins with brass on parts that will be easy to break. The water rudder sticks out a considerable distance and knowing the properties of resin, it wouldn't take too much to break, so this was the first part to receive some attention.

 

The kit `pin'

 

 

 

I drilled a 1mm hole right through the rudder and fitted it with a brass pin. At least if it is knocked it will bend rather than snap off. I have set the brass with super glue and will tidy up the protrusion later.

 

 

I fitted a corresponding tube to accept the brass pin of the water rudder.

 

 

The ailerons have 1 pin to secure them to the wings. Once again, easy to snap off if the model is grabbed wrong.

 

 

I replaced the single pin with 3 x 1mm brass pins.

 

 

Similarly with the boat propeller.

 

 

This model has come together very quickly. Looks great from all angles. The kit comes with a multi part beaching trolley which I have partially assembled to rest the model on.

 

 

 

 

 

[Simmo.b]

Interesting!!

Will end up looking great!

[Out2gtcha]

Well now, that is excellent looking! I've always wanted a copy of this kit, and this has certainly not helped diminish that.

Well done mate.

[Trak-Tor]

Wow, that's looking almost like a sci-fi thing! Great!

 

Juraj

 

 

[paul fisher]

Love this .....I keep thinking about migrating to 1/32 for the Schneider racers, but I have them all in the old Atelier NOIX kits in 1/48...kinda hard to make the leap!

[Whitey]

Wow, interesting concept. Model is looking damn good already.

[TorbenD]

Looking super smart already Eric. Certainly seems to be going together quite straightforwardly and quickly. 

 

Torben

[ericg]

Thanks for the comments guys. 

 

Onto to the daunting task of getting the photo etch onto the wings. You only get one go at these and they will require some thought as to how they will attach to the wings. I considered a few different glues but settled on Zap 15 minute Zpoxy resin glue. You really need to be able to shift the panels around a little bit and it pays to work out exactly where they will go so that you don’t have to move them too much. At least with 15 minute glue there is some working time before the glue sets.i plan on priming the model with the panels in place and then repainting them in a suitable colour rather than leave them in their natural brass state.

 

Each panel was snipped off the carrier sheet, and this photo shows the way each panel has warped.

 

 

i used the top of the kit box and a large section of brass tube to roll each panel into shape. It is critical that the panel sits on the wing, following its natural curves and doesn’t have any areas that lift off the wing, or at least try to minimise that lifting.

 

 

 

mixed up and ready to go. I have already done the top panels and will align the bottom panels by eye to them. The glue allows the panels to be moved around to assist with this. I have roughened the mating surfaces.

 

 

 

Clamped with as many clamps as I could find in an attempt to further stretch the brass over the wing, especially the edges. Notice that the edge of the brass has been protected with Tamiya tape. 

 

 

Reasonable success. Some areas will need a bit of a tidy up.

 

 

 

[cib2265]

Looking good Eric

[Cheetah11]

Hi Eric

 

Such an interesting topic. I am looking forward to seeing this one completed after getting your usual attention. If you visit Italy make sure you also see the Macci MC 72 from the same era. It is unbelievable to see these aircraft from the early thirties when the rest of the world were still designing bi-planes.

 

Regards

 

Nick           

[ericg]

Thanks gents.

 

Nick, I am am about halfway through the MC 72 by the same manufacturer and as much as I like to profess that that I have never been beaten by a model, it has spent a good deal of its life on the shelf of doom!

 

Onto some more etch! I always knew the nose radiator etch has going to give me grief, as it is thin strips of brass that only needs to be looked at the wrong way for it to distort. Despite carefully cutting it from the sheet, it didn’t want to play the game and that was before trying to fit it onto the model. Also the fact that any glue leaking from under each strip was going to be very hard to remove and fix whilst trying to keep it aligned for the glue to set. Any mistake would have meant damaging the part to remove it and start again. I certainly don’t like putting myself into that situation as a modeller so decided to come up with a better solution to alleviate my concern. Having worked with this type of surface radiator with the MC72 (the reason why it was shelved in the first place) leaves me wondering why Aerotech cant incorporate this into the masters rather than giving the modeller a reasonably tough challenge to complete.

 

 

The area where the etch is supposed to go. Not the easiest of areas to be messing around with photo etch.

 

 

I used thin Evergreen strip to simulate what the photo etch would have done. To attach it to the model I used a new product to me, being Zap gel superglue which permits a reasonably long working time. I wasnt too concerned with aligning the strips length wise.

 

 

Tidied up. The strips are too high and stick out further than required but these will be sanded to match the profile.

 

 

I sanded the strips to about half their original height, and then primed the area to check my work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 6, 2018 by ericg

[Flipper]

This seems to be much better when compared to the photoetched part. I think, that on the original plane the ribs - tubes protruding from the surface were not 100perc aligned, so for me it gives some natural look to the model.

What was the original shape of the ribs? I would guess it had a circular cross section.

[ericg]

Thanks Flipper. I am not sure what cross section they have as there is hardly any reference material available.