Italeri Macchi C.202 Folgore. FINISHED… well almost!

[MDriskill]

Here's two shots of the C.205 at the Vigna di Valle museum. The view from directly above makes Italeri look purty good (!)...but from the side, you have to strain to see anything at all. IMHO hal9001 nailed it: likely surface-mounted (i.e., non-recessed) rivets with shallow, flat, round heads.

 

 

Edited September 12, 2023 by MDriskill

[quang]

12 minutes ago, MDriskill said:

Here's two shots of the C.205 at the Vigna di Valle museum. The view from directly above makes Italeri look purty good (!)...but from the side, you have to strain to see anything at all. IMHO hal9001 nailed it: likely surface-mounted (i.e., non-recessed) rivets with shallow, flat, round heads.

 

Thank you for the pics. They really help.
Considering your first one, the rivets may be shallow but they’re by no means FLAT. I think I know now what Italeri had in mind.

Let’s bring on the beading tools! 

[jep1210]

Looking good so far.

[quang]

TAKING SHAPE…well sort of 

Just when I considered myself done with the assembly stage, the head honcho of Macchi experts, Maurizio di Terlizzi put out an extensive article on Hyperscale about the pros and cons of the Italeri kit.

Hopefully the errors were relatively minor and easily corrected by the truly dedicated. I decided to let it simmer until I consider my actual degree of dedication.

 

Anyhow this is what my build looks like (when I thought it was ready for the paint shop).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My model will depict a early example of Serie III built by Aermacchi sporting the so-called inverse tropical camouflage (brown blotches over dark olive background) during the North African campaign of 1942.

Thank you everyone for looking on and commenting.

Now back to the work desk 

Cheers,

Quang

[dennismcc]

Just perused the same article and thought that there was a lot of information there that would be a pain to correct, so I will be a bit picky about what I correct when it comes to my build.

Yours looks pretty splendid, a lot like a very nice model of a C202, but I am no expert.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

[quang]

19 minutes ago, dennismcc said:

I will be a bit picky about what I correct when it comes to my build.

Words of wisdom, Dennis.

[Thunnus]

The number of issues with the Italeri Folgore kit, as pointed out by Mr. Di Terlizzi, is disappointing.  I can see that you've done a great job Quang in addressing a number of these things including the exaggerated fabric detail on the control surfaces and the heavy riveting along the nose gun troughs.  But I expected a better effort from an Italian company on this iconic Italian fighter... at least get the spinner right.

[quang]

22 minutes ago, Thunnus said:

The number of issues with the Italeri Folgore kit, as pointed out by Mr. Di Terlizzi, is disappointing.

Never meant to be arrogant, John but I’m a doubting Thomas by nature.  I’d have to check the list of issues point by point.

Talk about the shape and length of the spinner.
I never trusted drawings so I enlarged the pics I have to 1/32 scale format and guess what?

 

The proportions of the kit parts are spot on: 20mm diameter x 20mm length.

The curve could be ever so slightly more bulbous but one cannot be sure unless one cuts off the spinner in half and compares the profile.

I have utter respect for Mr. Di Terlizzi’s opinion but I also trust my eyes.

 

I planned to replace the moving surfaces since day one but decided to wait until the build is completed to see how they’d turn out with some slight sanding. Now that I know there’s a missing rib on the rudder, the easiest solution would be to replace them altogether with scratchbuilt items with a more realistic rendering. We’ll see…

 

56 minutes ago, Thunnus said:

But I expected a better effort from an Italian company on this iconic Italian fighter... at least get the spinner right.

I understand your disappointment but I keep on thinking that Italeri’s done a much better job that one would think at first sight.

 

Cheers,

Quang

[Thunnus]

10 minutes ago, quang said:

I understand your disappointment but I keep on thinking that Italeri’s done a much better job that one would think at first sight.

 

Well, you would know much better than I since you have been building the model and I've not really looked at since I took photos of the box contents.  Honestly, I was underwhelmed at first sight when I opened up that huge box and saw how few sprues were included.  The feeling continued when I saw how wide and deep the recessed panel lines were.  I will get around to building it but I'm truthfully not as excited about it as when this model was first announced.  But that's just me! 

[MikeA]

Essentially it appears from the Hyperscale article that "big picture" wise the kit is fine. There are almost always details wrong in kits, which only magnify if you choose to replicate a specific airframe. For me that is a major joy of modelling. Certainly heartening to read your comments on the spinner which was probably the most difficult of the potential issues.

 

The thing I would find most irksome are the typical Italeri wide panel lines, but that is only a personal foible - it was almost difficult to make out a lot of the panel lines on the pristine Museum example I saw, in the USA many years ago, although they would certainly have shown more during action. However that and most of the other fixes recommended are pretty straightforward. This one is looking great and I can't wait to see the paint go on.

 

Cheers,

Mike

[quang]

3 hours ago, MikeA said:

Essentially it appears from the Hyperscale article that "big picture" wise the kit is fine.

The big picture is indeed essential. And IMO Italeri delivered it. 
To me the 3 main things that would make this kit better are:  a more delicate panel detailing , realistic control surfaces and a good pair of wheels.

If I can work out the first two, I’d be happy. I just learned that Eduard will issue a resin set of Macchi wheels in their Brassin range and I’d leave the myriad tiny details to the experten.

Cheers,

Quang

Edited September 20, 2023 by quang

[fastterry]

Quang, nice of you to quantify the spinner dimensions. Fun fact. I have the PCM kit and the 21st Century kit and I know that the PCM spinner is too small, but by how much. Well the PCM spinner is 19mm in dia. x 17mm long so quite a long way off. The 21st Century spinner is 20mm in dia. x 19 mm long so much closer to the real thing. Because I have the two kits mentioned I was sitting on the fence with the Italeri kit but the final killer for me apart from the apparent lack of finesse ie panel lines, control surfaces fabric etc, was the price. I guess if you don't have the earlier kits then this is the only game in town. Having said all that you have done your usual top job on this one and it will look really good with the paint on.

 

TRF

[quang]

12 hours ago, quang said:

Talk about the shape and length of the spinner.
I never trusted drawings so I enlarged the pics I have to 1/32 scale format and guess what?

 

The proportions of the kit parts are spot on: 20mm diameter x 20mm length.

The curve could be ever so slightly more bulbous but one cannot be sure unless one cuts off the spinner in half and compares the profile.

I have utter respect for Mr. Di Terlizzi’s opinion but I also trust my eyes.

…and here’s the kit spinner

 

Let your eyes do the talkin’ 

[quang]

3 hours ago, fastterry said:

the final killer for me apart from the apparent lack of finesse ie panel lines, control surfaces fabric etc, was the price.

For a comparison, my regular online shop (Belgium) retails the Italeri Folgore at 86,10 euros (AUD 143).
Their Tamiya 1/32 Spit/Mustang/Corsair costs 139 euros each.

[Gazzas]

Looks nice!