Italeri 1/12 scale 1927 Fiat Corsa

[Harry P.]

This Italeri 1/12 scale 1927 Fiat Corsa is sort of the "companion kit" to the 1924 Fiat Mefistofele I posted earlier. This car won the 1927 Grand Prix. It's similar to the Mefistofele as far as detail level, but on this kit there is a lot more flash and misalignment of molds, creating large mold seam lines everywhere. Also, the kit is poorly engineered, with many parts competing with other parts for the same space. I had to make many adjustments to get everything to fit. For example, the engine mounting points on the chassis don't match those on the engine, so I had to cut the chassis parts off and reposition them in order to get the engine installed. Many more examples of this sort of bad engineering throughout the kit… but what are you gonna do? Fix it all, I guess.

 

No full blown step-by-step WIP this time... I don't want to bore you guys. Just a few photos of the project along the way. First up, one of the engine mounting points on the chassis was broken, so I had to make a new one of styrene. And besides, they were mismatched with the engine's mounting points, so I would have to move them anyway, broken or not...

 

[Harry P.]

One of the bizarre things in this kit is the floor. The floor details are molded onto the floor, and they give you a photoetched sheet which includes the "wooden" floor, with cutouts for all the various molded-in floor details.

Of course, I was going to make the floor out of real wood, not photoetched "wood," so step one was to cut all the details from the floor...

Here's what I came up with...

[Harry P.]

The kit floor was used as a template to cut a new floor out of thick cardboard, and the cardboard piece was covered with stained basswood strips.

[Harry P.]

More bad engineering... ejector pin marks on the face of the part. It took some tricky sanding to remove the pin marks without touching the molded-in details...

[Harry P.]

Like I said, no step-by-step this time, so we jump to the almost completed chassis. Here you can see the new real wood floor...

I used thin strips of electrical tape to wrap the steering wheel...

[Harry P.]

Like the Mefistofele kit, you get die-cut stencils to use to paint the number 15 on the radiator. But the number is just about invisible behind the grille...

[Jim B]

Beautiful work, Harry.

[bobthehobbyguy]

Harry your detailed wips are never boring for me stunnuing work as usual.

[Zoom]

Allways fun with yours projects. You´re build extremly fast, I think. 

[sjordan2]

Already stunning.

[Twokidsnosleep]

I guess your mojo is back 

Blowing me away with another awesome build of a kit that will stay in my stash awaiting me for a number of years

Good stuff, Harry

[CrazyCrank]

This model looks as fantastic as the Mefistofele....I stay tuned to look your amazing job 

[Harry P.]

Got a few more chassis details installed today, like the gas tank and the braking system (heavy-duty gray thread to represent "steel" cable).

Looks like I still have some stray brake cable to trim off...

[Harry P.]

Wheels and tires are ready to go.

[slusher]

Glad to see you with another build going. Your building fast...

[bobthehobbyguy]

As always a treat to watch your builds come together. Another stunning model in the works.

[sjordan2]

Your talent and fortitude are...well, words fail me.

[bbowser]

Another outstanding replica from your bench Harry.  You set the bar for the rest of us.

[Harry P.]

A little more progress... body mounted, exhausts, seat, windshield...

Heat shield on the exhaust...

[Harry P.]

It took three applications of Solvaset, but I finally got the decals to snuggle down over the louvers...

[slusher]

Looking great Harry!!!!

[peteski]

Nice job (as expected).

[Twokidsnosleep]

AWESOME!!!

A beautiful build at great pace

[cobraman]

Another masterpiece in the making.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Interested to hear your thoughts on the quality of this kit vs the Mefistofele