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Flaming Arrows! RS Models Reggiane Re.2005 Sagittario *** COMPLETED ***


clive_t

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Hi all, herewith my latest assault on the mountain of boxes now surrounding me - and in this choice, more 'firsts' are encountered: my first RS Models kit, and if I am not mistaken my first Italian fighter subject! The intention is to accept all the flaws in the moulding (as I wouldn't know them anyway). That said, I have sourced some rather fancy after-market PE courtesy of Brengun and the Big H (again), so hopefully it will enhance the look of the thing. No progress to report as yet, just setting a stake in the ground as it were. OK, one photo to kick off with - the box-art:

 

XFOZLgJ.jpg

 

Oh, and the decals/colour callouts:

 

qlz3Gfm.jpg

 

The markings look really sharp, which is good; however, I am somewhat underwhelmed by the all-over green colour. I was kind of hoping to have a crack at a mottled desert-type camo or similar, but to date I've found no reference photos to suggest they ever flew over North Africa. If anyone on here well versed in such matters could provide some other alternatives, I'd be interested to see them!

 

Tally Ho, Yellow!

 

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By the time the Re.2005 arrived, the Axis had be pretty much been pushed out of North Africa and it would be long before the Italians surrendered to the Allies, after the invasion. The Republic continued on in Northern Italy with the Germans, so some Italian aircraft were still being built.

 

I shall be following this build. I have two different 1/72 Re.2005 kits in the stash. A Sword kit and a Pavla.

 

 

Chris

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Thanks Chris, ah well I guess I will have to skip the desert camo. I seem to recall seeing a camo pattern that was essentially green with swirly yellow (possibly brown) lines - whether that was Italian or not is another matter entirely!

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3 hours ago, clive_t said:

Thanks Chris, ah well I guess I will have to skip the desert camo. I seem to recall seeing a camo pattern that was essentially green with swirly yellow (possibly brown) lines - whether that was Italian or not is another matter entirely!

Well, for the squiggly camo, actually it was a sand base with green rings, and if I recall, some guy made a decal set of them.

And. If you need a reference: http://www.stormomagazine.com/RegiaAeronauticaColorsinWWII_3a.htm

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Thanks Mr PantherII for the heads up about this, and all the links. I will give this some further thought.

 

In the meantime, I have managed to get a sprue pic:

 

ZtIw9ZI.jpg

 

Some flash is evident, but not massive amounts. The sprue gates are a little on the 'generous' side which may trip me up when it comes to the smaller parts. Having said that, the moulding detail is very good, with some subtle panel lines - certainly nothing like as deep as the tram lines favoured by Messrs Airfix these days.

 

The only real disappointment is the canopy part - a single moulded canopy! I can't believe it would have been any more difficult to mould the front windscreen and the opening (hinged on one side) section separately? As it is, separating the two appears to give very little margin for error, so I may have to ponder another approach to that - namely, sourcing some sort of vac-forming machine to make a replacement in clear acetate then split that.

 

The decals look pretty good to my uneducated eye:

 

w2Z5YPL.jpg

 

And, joy of joys, Messrs Hannants came up trumps with their delivery today of the PE detail set I ordered last week:

 

Q2Qdcf7.jpg

 

So, we can hopefully make a start!

 

 

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Woohoo, Clives goes from also ran ( Meistercrud) to short run and amazingly enough I have some of the Mike Grant decals from when I got his lovely ALPS instrument decals.. Your short run adventure has me eyeing up a delightful Admiral Lunak glider I was given for Christmas...me thinks a man can have too much Airfix Therapy in his short life.

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Thanks Anil, Stuart - not much in the way of progress thus far, mainly fettling plastic parts so that the major PE parts fit without leaving gaping holes. My modelling bench is now officially off limits for the rest of the day (on the instructions of my chiropractor) lest all the good work done on my back this afternoon be undone :(

 

Hopefully some tangible evidence of progress will be forthcoming tomorrow!

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So, it begins - I am attempting to fit as much of the PE as I can before launching into assembly proper.

 

So far I've only managed the seat and the air intake thingy on the underside of the aircraft:

 

uNhVKPi.jpg

 

I also took a look at the mouldings for the ailerons, and decided it was a worthwhile exercise to separate them so that I could pose them as deflected - no particular reason, just 'cos I can:

 

CRcB4OS.jpg

 

That's all for now! :)

 

 

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2 hours ago, clive_t said:

 

So far I've only managed the seat and the air intake thingy

 

 

 

 

 

That's the ventral radiator bath that houses the engine coolant radiator and the engine oil cooler.

 

 

Chris

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1 hour ago, dogsbody said:

 

That's the ventral radiator bath that houses the engine coolant radiator and the engine oil cooler.

 

 

Chris

Thanks Chris - every day's a school day on here :D

 

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A bit more progress today - the replacement wheel well PE was assembled - this is just one of two, obviously :):

 

PtDfSSJ.jpg

 

I also did the PE detailing in the cockpit sides, and the floor plate:

 

YrLx9Vx.jpg

 

I still have a couple more pieces of PE to go, mainly the instrument panel(s) and the frame for the gunsight!

 

This is one of those kits where feasibly one could zip up the fuselage halves before fitting the office, however it was fortunate that I checked first - it appears there is also a bulkhead for the tail wheel! In checking that out, it became very apparent that there were some large injection pins to get rid of:

 

NfpaKsM.jpg

 

With those out of the way, I was able to fit the tail wheel bulkhead:

 

1jM0CtJ.jpg

 

Just for good measure I added an internal framework to the inside of the tail wheel housing:

 

Hkhz9gz.jpg

 

Not impossible to see once done, but difficult without picking it up!

 

That's all I have for now, thanks for looking! :)

 

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Stalled a bit on this, but I've managed to get some paint on the interior, just bog standard cockpit interior green:

 

Us2XkAr.jpg

 

I also spent a good deal of time separating out the smaller components in preparation for painting:

 

VfHgCC1.jpg

 

I also pinched an idea from @giemme, specifically his epic C202/C205 WIP thread (here), to highlight the IP dial backgrounds by painting the rear of the acetate with dots of white paint:

 

AfC7yoa.jpg

 

Thanks Giorgio! :thumbsup2:

 

Some progress made today - the landmark moment when the two fuselage halves are zipped up:

 

hlRR78l.jpg

 

I took the liberty of removing the rudder, as I intend to refit it deflected slightly to port - just for a minor bit of interest, really.

 

I also sprayed the instrument panel PE parts NATO black, and assembled the gauge acetate parts and the gunsight:

 

q5lYJt5.jpg

 

That was harder work than I expected!

 

I also had a go at dry-fitting the lower part of the wing to the fuselage:

 

pIXchqo.jpg

 

Some fettling was needed to get it to fit, but it looks OK. In doing so, however, it became apparent that I am going to have some problems fitting the undercarriage mechanisms to the wheel wells once the wings are fully assembled - with the PE wheel well detail in place, there's no room to get the legs into the right position to fit. I am somewhat at a crossroads now, as by the looks of things I am going to have to fit the undercarriage before assembling the wings! Scary!

 

I am also concerned that my attempt to separate the two parts of the canopy is going to go badly wrong, so I have taken a cast of the part using some moulding silicon rubber:

 

9B0k95C.jpg

 

This has now been filled with Milliput, which when cured should give me a master from which I might be able to vac-form a replacement - assuming I can avail myself of the technology!

 

Thanks for watching! :)

 

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1 hour ago, clive_t said:

Thanks Giorgio! :thumbsup2:

No problem, glad I could be of some help :thumbsup: The white background for the acetate IP isn't actually an idea of mine, just something I read somewhere on the Internet :winkgrin:

 

You are doing a great job on this little kit, BTW :clap: I always liked the Re2005 sleek line, too bad there isn't much choice in 1/48...

 

Ciao

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6 hours ago, clive_t said:

 

 

hlRR78l.jpg

 

I

That shot there: That says to me that noted Italian aviator and playboy, Luigi Linguine , bought himself an Regia Aeronautica Folgore, had his amici at Ferrari sort out some tuning and  a nice red paint job and then he went a Reno racing...I will shortly have a workstation free (if the resin kit from hell decides to at least stay together for the RFI) plus a nice simple Hasegawa Folgore free from photo wretch etc...Clive my man, you have inspired me...now where's that ferrari red I got from Hiroboy...

 

Ciao bella!

 

Anilo

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From my reading of various sources re this aircraft, it seems to be generally regarded as the most beautiful fighter of ww2. I imagine that view would probably not have been shared by any pilot trying to avoid being shot down by one at the time.

 

I was looking at the fuselage this morning, and for the briefest of moments I imagined how it might look with a bubble canopy - I don't know if development of the aircraft got that far, but to my mind would at the very least make a highly feasible WHIF project!

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Another small but landmark moment this afternoon - the office is now complete with IP and seat. I had to rework the gunsight as I realised after fitting it to the panel that it was offset slightly (but noticeably) to the right. I foolishly neglected to take a pic of the office prior to fitting, but I guess it's no great loss. Anyway, here is the office in situ:

 

UnwGQsP.jpg

 

You may also have noticed that I have attempted to fill and smooth any visible seams on the fuselage. Hopefully that will stand up to scrutiny once it's primed.

 

Cheers all! :)

 

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21 hours ago, clive_t said:

I had to rework the gunsight as I realised after fitting it to the panel that it was offset slightly (but noticeably) to the right

Clive, I think the gunsight was actually offset on the real thing; I'm not 100% sure for the RE2005, but there are evidences on the WEB for other RE fighters, and I'm positively sure it was offset for the Macchi C202 and C205; since it was basically the same gunsight, I'm inclined to believe it was offset on the Sagittario too ... sorry for pointing that out :shrug: Actually, I don't know if you can actually appreciate the difference in this scale, so you may as well ignore my comment

 

Ciao

Edited by giemme
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Thanks Giorgio - apologies, I misled you! I meant to say it should have been offset slightly to the right - I corrected it so that it was exactly so :)

 

I think you're right about the small scale, and I believe I might have gotten away with it with the canopy closed; however I intend posing this model with the canopy open so I'd like to at least make an attempt at getting it right! Thanks for your reply though, much appreciated :thumbsup2:

 

 

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Good job on what is actually a good kit for a short run. I built this in the past and fit is IMHO pretty good for this cathegory of kits. It's also an accurate and well detailed kit from the box, but of cours the PE parts enahce detail even more.

Regarding colours, unfortunately you're stuck with one scheme only: the Sagittario carried the standard scheme of the era for continental based fighters, that is dark green over light grey. As very few of these fighters were built, none of them had any other scheme.

From a historical perspective IMHO the most interesting subject is the 362 Squadriglia aircraft with the unit insignia on the white band, as these were the 2005s that saw most action.

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5 hours ago, giemme said:

I'm positively sure it was offset for the Macchi C202 and C205; since it was basically the same gunsight,

Good to know ... I have a Hasegawa Macchi 202 in the pipeline now. 

 

Dennis

Edited by Corsairfoxfouruncle
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On 3/13/2019 at 3:41 PM, Giorgio N said:

Good job on what is actually a good kit for a short run. I built this in the past and fit is IMHO pretty good for this cathegory of kits. It's also an accurate and well detailed kit from the box, but of cours the PE parts enahce detail even more.

Regarding colours, unfortunately you're stuck with one scheme only: the Sagittario carried the standard scheme of the era for continental based fighters, that is dark green over light grey. As very few of these fighters were built, none of them had any other scheme.

From a historical perspective IMHO the most interesting subject is the 362 Squadriglia aircraft with the unit insignia on the white band, as these were the 2005s that saw most action.

Thanks Giorgio, although I am having issues with some of the PE parts! Having looked at the decal sheet for this, I am probably going to finish this as 362/5, for no other reason that it has the red 'Sagittario' motif on the tail, as opposed to 362/2 which has the motif in white. Lacking any real knowledge of either of these aircraft, it seemed as good a reason as any :)

 

On 3/13/2019 at 4:08 PM, dogsbody said:

Though this is from the Ali d' Italia No. 3 Reggiane Re2001 book, it does show the gunsight mounted slightly to the right of centre.

 

4262384d-b6f4-405b-83ef-05fbf3a835f0.jpg

 

 

Chris

Thanks Chris, nice to see this as there don't seem to be many online references to Re.2005 cockpit interiors. not that mine looks anything like this, of course! :)

 

On 3/13/2019 at 8:28 PM, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Good to know ... I have a Hasegawa Macchi 202 in the pipeline now. 

 

Dennis

Looking forward to seeing how yours turns out Dennis

On 3/13/2019 at 10:22 PM, Giorgio N said:

Checked a few pictures of real 2005 cockpits and the sight is indeed located at the right end of the flat section of the windscreen 

Thanks again Giorgio, I think I now have mine slightly further to the right than it should be, but seeing as I have the fuselage zipped up I will not be tempting fate by trying to relocate it!

 

Anyway, some faltering progress since my last update. The ventral radiator bath ( as I now know it to be :) ) was fixed to the underside of the wing section:

 

j0zxaUZ.jpg

 

I was about to try and fit the wheel well PE to the lower wing half, when I noticed one of the microscopically small pieces had gone missing. I don't know which is worse: witnessing a piece of brass so small that excising it from its sprue would constitute splitting the atom, fly off into the stratosphere; or to notice said collection of brass molecules were no longer in situ, with nary a hint of when or where the calamity occurred! In any event, I decided out of sheer bloody-mindedness to make a replacement, and the carpet monster and the bench beast can both go hang, so there! Here was my replacement in place, fashioned from an offcut of very thin styrene:

 

GpKY9dW.jpg

 

As mentioned earlier, before fitting the wheel wells, I had to get the undercarriage in place. Wheels down, as is my habit:

 

GCpcKPv.jpg

 

Then at last, I was able to fit the brass wheel wells, and unite the fuselage to the lower wing assembly - hoping all the while that my dry-fitting of the wing upper halves as not been incorrectly done:

 

yIvotHk.jpg

 

That's where I am right now, waiting for all this to dry.

 

Thanks for watching! :)

 

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