Fiat 131 Abarth

[Ferrata]

Evening All, 

Allow me to present my Fiat 131 Abarth in the Alitalia scheme and built from the Italieri kit. I normally build aircraft but like to indulge in the occasional race or rally car although I have to admit the last one I built must have been over 10 years ago so I think the change has done me some good. This one represents the 1979 1000 Lakes winner and had been in my stash so long the decals had cracked. The drive to dig this one out and actually build it came from a 70s theme Club group build ending in the December meeting. An email to Italieri and a few weeks later I had a fresh decal sheet and we were game on. Despite its age, the kit went together relatively easily. The only issues being the fit of the rear suspension with the exhaust and the engine to chassis being a bit vague. I added some wiring to the engine bay and seat belts from painted masking tape with buckles from the spares box. Other than that it was a straight from box build.

 

Enough waffle from me, here are the photos and I hope you like it.

 

 

 

[Neddy]

Very nicely built.  The engine bay definitely benefited from the wiring additions, surprisingly bare out of the box.  Really well finished, great job.

[Alpha Delta 210]

Absolutely stunning build of a rarely-seen subject!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[ceeb555]

That really is a super rendition of an Iconic car and colour scheme. The engine bay benefits from the subtle wiring. Stunning

Love cars that Markku Allen drove. His mantra was always “flat out”

Chris

[Vesa Jussila]

Looks good and extra wires add nicely reality to engine bay. I built same kit maybe 25 years ago and somehow then I thought wheels were under scale, but yours look good.  

[keefr22]

That's very nice indeed! Good to see the kit came with gravel tyres for the 1000 Lakes (if they are the kit tyres?)

 

Really good little Abarth!

 

Keith

[Ferrata]

Thanks for all the kind comments Gent's. And yes, those were the kit wheels/tyres. Quite a hard rubber but no seams and nice tread.

[Vesa Jussila]

So we have two versions of this kit. Because I am quite sure that my kit was slicks.

[colin]

Very nice build

[Ferrata]

2 hours ago, Vesa Jussila said:

So we have two versions of this kit. Because I am quite sure that my kit was slicks.

A tarmac rally version perhaps? I think they do that with the Escort RS 1800 kit.

[speedy]

Now that's a cool kit. I recall having a die-cast (big) car as a kid in 80/81.

[Spiny]

I've read lots of bad things about this kit, but your build shows it's definitely possible to get a good result out of it 👍

[keefr22]

52 minutes ago, Ferrata said:

A tarmac rally version perhaps?

 

Indeed, I've still got two tarmac rally boxings both with slicks.

 

53 minutes ago, Ferrata said:

I think they do that with the Escort RS 1800 kit.

 

Unfortunately although they (& Esci and Revell before them) have issued the Escort with gravel rally decals they all come with the same dreadful slicks as the tarmac rally boxings. In fact the whole kit is pretty deadful....

 

Keith

[desert falcon]

That’s a stunning looking Abarth 😍