Is italeri Good?

i have heard alot of good and bad things about italeri come to think of it more bad, i have done 2 models from italeri and one didnt have a problem with and the other i had problems with.

Italeri is pretty good, but its main advantadge over other companies is price (well, at least here in Europe!). They have a pretty large range of stuff, from AFVs to trailers, helicopters, from figures, ships to aircraft and large scale cockpits...

They are very good at marketing stuff other would not dare trying, and they are often the first to release a kit of anything new, and here we can therefore find models that lack details, or end up being wrong in various ways. I like the way their kits usually give you more than just one variant and just one decoration to chose from.
The number of parts is rather high, and fit is normally good, but Italeri markets other people's kits under its label (Zvezda for instance) and those kits are not always up to the usual Italeri standards.

When I think about it, it's been a long time since I've built a Italeri kit... It must be the M7 Priest in 1/35 and this was many years ago... But I loved it. I have purchased a number of their since, in particular in their quite amazing range of 1/72 copters, but haven't completed any so far. The latest Italeri kit I tried was this 1/48 F?A-18 E/F that was a complete disaster, but it could just be me!

So, all in all, not the best kits on the market, but great stuff nevertheless.

Italeri is a hit and miss company when it comes to kits.

Pure Italeri kits that originated with Italeri made molds are generaly good and go together with few problems.

The problem is that Italeri often issues kits from other manufacturers, usually Testors or Esci originated molds and you really have to do your research to figure out where your "Italeri" kit is coming from in origins.

When Socialism came to an end in the early 1990's, Italeri boxed up a few kits from Eastern manufacturers, most notably Bilek from the Czech Republic and Zvezda from Russia. Italeri did make a point of marking on the box what the origins of those kits were. Bilek is good stuff if you have some previous building experince under you belt, I built a Zvezda kit once and you couldn't get me to build another if you held me at gun point.

Like I said, do your reaserch, kit reviews can help a lot as can a hobby shop with a suitably knowledgable staff. My experience with italeri goes like this:

1/72 T-45 Goshawk (very nice kit)
1/72 Panavia Tornado (also very nice)
1/72 NATO F-16 A/B (old Esci molds, not up to today's standards)
1/72 C-119 Flying Boxcar (a classic, good kit but needs an experienced modeller to do it justice.
1/72 SU-22 Fitter (from Bilek molds, generally nice kit with few problems)
1/72 F/A-18 Hornet (questionable engineering in places, more complicated than it needs to be)
1/72 Harrier GR.5 (a decent kit that I have no complaints about)
1/72 Antonov AN-2 Colt (another from Bilek molds, don't try this without significant modeling experience, its good, but complex)
1/48 F/A-18 Hornet (I think this one bounces back and forth between the Italeri and Testors labels, its workable, but you can find better)

Well, thats my Italeri experience, I hope its helpful to you. Pure Italeri kits can be a joy, just do you homework before shelling out for a kit from them.

I've heard that Italeri's new 1/72 F-8 Crusader is just a reboxing of older Hasegawa moldings, can anyone confirm this for me?

Hi Upnorth. Thanks for that info on the AN2 i was thinking of getting that kit but was put off by the thought that it may be the old plasticart kit, don't know if anyone else will agree with me but i don't think that the canopy that is suplied with that kit is for the AN2 because the fit is that bad and it looks nothing like the original. Generaly i like Italeri kits and must say that i have never built a bad one. I especialy liked there Cant Gabiano flying boat....Greg

Some of Italeri's newest releases are some of the best. I got the F/A-18E right after it first came out, and wasn't disappointed. The only problem was the lack of cockpit detailing but Black Box makes a set for it now which is second to none (at last I think so). Italeri's 1/72 Hellcat is the most accurate one around. It has the correct engine and cockpit configuration (finally!) and dropped flaps. I think that Italeri is a good kit maker and is worth a shot.