Italeri 1:12 Fiat Mephistophele Finished

Oh boy!  I've been eyeballing this kit for a while.  The daunting part has always been the price for me.  Following this build for sure.

I recently built their Alfa Romeo 8c 2300 and it was a fantastic kit. There were virtually no problems and everything fit perfectly except for one body panel that was reluctant to go into place but eventually did. This was my first Italeri kit and I was concerned about both fit and quality but shouldn't have been. The 1/12 scale kits are expensive but probably worth it. Your club members made a huge mistake giving up on the kit. 

Cool. 

Don,

Looking at how you finished your Mercedes, I have no doubt this one will be a jewel. I'm looking forward to your updates. Thanks for sharing the build with us.

Ben

This build was really fun. Wood floors/firewall are not as hard as you might think.  The engine is really a separate model.

 http://cs.finescale.com/fsm/modeling_subjects/f/4/t/182021.aspx

Dave

Don;

   Most folks look at the Name and say Uh Uh. What a horrible name for a neat Auto. Keep us in the loop okay? I have some cars I got from Gene so I will be watching. Also a perfect car to do real wire wheels on.

Tanker-Builder

Don;

   Most folks look at the Name and say Uh Uh. What a horrible name for a neat Auto. Keep us in the loop okay? I have some cars I got from Gene so I will be watching. Also a perfect car to do real wire wheels on.

 

The wheels are not bad for plastic molding.  I suspect the wheels used pretty heavy spokes anyway because of the weight of the beast.  Name comes from loud sound and noxious fumes.  Big aircraft engine.

I have started working on the engine.  As someone said, the engine is a model kit in itself- I figure if I work on chassis, body painting, and the engine, sharing time, I will have the engine ready when needed.

The cylinder heads have a tube running between them.  The kit has little nubs on each head, and some vinyl tubing.  You are supposed to cut the black vinyl tubing to fit between the nubs, and leave it black.  But photos of the real engine shows these tubes were brass.  So I cut lengths of 5/32 brass tubing to replace the vinyl tubing.  Each length is less than 1/8 inch- I had to make a jig to control length- made this tube cutting jig from MDF.

Even with the jig I had to touch up several with a file to get them to fit.  But it looks good now.

I am also painting each molded in bolt head a different color than the casting itself.

Got the front suspension onto the frame.  Sorry for the bad lighting.  Each axle has four friction shocks.  Each shock is seven pieces held together with screws and a screw fastens it to the frame.  These are tiny metal screws that self tap into the plastic. Holes are a little tight!  Hard to apply much torque to a small 1/16 tip screwdriver.  Already poked painful hole in thumb when screwdriver slipped.  I'm starting to drill out the pieces and glue screw in.

Also continuing on with engine.  Have cam housing ready to mount, but need to put in valve stems.  The valve stem, spring, and rocker arms are open.  They supply the spring, but it is a little thin in cross section, so valve stem should be visible, but they do not supply stems.  No problem, I thought- little pieces of steel wire will surface.  Problem is drilling the small holes.  We've discussed the problem of poor quality 60-80 drill bit sets.  I'm tearing my hair needing to drill 24 holes (4 valves per cylinder).  The soft plastic does not drill easily.

Great looking detail on the engine.

Wonderful build so far and nice colors on the engine.

Ben

I especially appreciate this WIP becuase I have one on my shelf, purchased some time ago from Hobbylink Japan at a price too good to pass up.

Looking good so far, and do keep it up please.

Been wondering how this might compare to the Pocher kits of the good old days. With your help, I'll be able to find out without cracking open the plastic seal.

Greg

...

Been wondering how this might compare to the Pocher kits of the good old days. With your help, I'll be able to find out without cracking open the plastic seal.

 

This is far superior to the Pocher kits.  It is a quality kit- detail sharp, fit very good.  There are tiny parts, and some are supposed to be screwed in spots that do not have good access to screwdriver.  I have been drilling out more screw holes to clearance diameter and replacing screw with glued-in 80 mil styrene rod.  Painting is fun- I love painting small details by hand.  Been around race cars enough I know what colors small parts probably are.

Don Stauffer

This is far superior to the Pocher kits. It is a quality kit- detail sharp, fit very good.

This is every exciting to me. I suffer from Pocher nostalgia, often feeling sad that the old kits aren't there anymore (yes, I know they are available occasionally from collector sites but though I could afford the new ones as a youngster, I cannot afford them now).

Thank you for the additional info and for making me feel better about my purchase, Don.

I did it! Got 24 tiny holes drilled down into the head to hold the valve stems (pieces of steel wire).  Gave up trying to do it with pin vise.  The quality of today's small drills are so crappy I had to resort to my mini drill press.

Then I had to cut short lengths of the wire and glue them into the holes- easy job.  Next I had to paint valve springs.  I feared this job- the springs were stainless, but I stuck them down on a piece of double side tape and airbrushed them with graphite metallic.  They came out okay.  Next job was gluing on the rocker assemblies and cam housing.  I would have to hold all twenty four springs in the right position and fit them over the valve stems while gluing cam housing in place.  I first glued springs to rocker arm tappets, brought it down over the stems.  Took two tries, each time only one errant spring.  Got every thing lined up okay second time.  Fortunately, the springs were strong enough it held the cam assembly about a sixteenth of an inch up above mounting surfaces.  That was enough to get some CA glue on those surfaces.  Valve and cam stuff complete!

Looking very nice!

Great project and progress, Don.

Outstanding work.

That's a work of art. 

Love your additions to the engine.  Beautifuly work.  Adds a lot.

Dave

The frame and suspension are now complete, waiting for a good gloss coat on body parts.

Finished the instrument panel- a project in itself.

Still working on engine. Parts on engine sprue do not have as good a fit as chassis sprue, but still manageable.  Mold relief angles are fairly steep and flat mounting surfaces of parts cast in two pieces have a pronounced shallow V that has to be filed flat.

Looking really good Don

Ben

This thing has 24 spark plugs! For six cylinders. I know a lot of aero engines have two plugs per cylinder- but four?  Of course, I claim no expertise in Italian WW1 aircraft engines.  Anyway, there are two looms, one on each side of the engine.  The wires will just be going from distributer into the loom, and wires coming out of loom to plugs.  There are four distributers, each distributer has six leads going to six plugs (completely redundent ignition).  Making up the leads now- three down, 21 to go :-)  I do notice some learning curve even after only three.  By the way, those are mini craft clothspins, not full size ones.  I find them very useful for many modeling tasks.

There are then 24 leads going from looms to plugs.  Instructions call for a little sleeve on end of wire going onto pin on loom.  But photos of real engine show normal wiring with wires going through holes in loom.  So I cut the pins off (upper loom) and drilled them with a 57 drill.  I will just glue wire stub into hole in loom. 

Even without the sleeve there are still three parts to plug and wire (sleeve between end of wire and plug terminal.  Haven't started on the plug wires yet.  Not sure how long the remaining 21 distributer wires will take.

Outstanding work!

dlh

This build was really fun. Wood floors/firewall are not as hard as you might think.  The engine is really a separate model.

 http://cs.finescale.com/fsm/modeling_subjects/f/4/t/182021.aspx

Dave

 

Beautiful.  I hope mine comes out as nice.  I did a new graphic for the big tach, to show it with the extant car, but otherwise OOB.

Phil, I did order the wire from Amazon, got it yesterday.  Started the plug wiring.

I made a booboo in not following the plans exactly.  I thought while waiting for the wire I could go ahead and mount the intake manifolds and carburetors.  That was a mistake.  Lack of room makes putting plug wiring in on that side very difficult.

Dashboard looks splendid.  Great work.  What did you use for the shiny brass finish?

Dave

Don Stauffer

 

 

dlh

This build was really fun. Wood floors/firewall are not as hard as you might think.  The engine is really a separate model.

 http://cs.finescale.com/fsm/modeling_subjects/f/4/t/182021.aspx

Dave

 

 

 

 

 

Beautiful.  I hope mine comes out as nice.  I did a new graphic for the big tach, to show it with the extant car, but otherwise OOB.

Phil, I did order the wire from Amazon, got it yesterday.  Started the plug wiring.

I made a booboo in not following the plans exactly.  I thought while waiting for the wire I could go ahead and mount the intake manifolds and carburetors.  That was a mistake.  Lack of room makes putting plug wiring in on that side very difficult.

 

 

I wish I had used smaller wire than the kit includes. I had a lot of trouble fitting the distributor bundles into the loom.  I'm still not happy with the result.  The kit wire is just too large.

Dave