Ferrari 643 1/8 scale by Rosso *** part 1

[Sennake]

The 1/8 Rosso kit came out sometime in 1992. I had heard a lot about it, but I had never seen it until I accidentally ran across it in my favorite model shop. A man (who I thought to be a lunatic at that time) was buying 10 kits at once, and paid the $5000 cash, with a smile!
But he was not a madman, he must have had inside information, because a few years later there was no kit anywhere to be found anymore and the company had gone broke. The kits are very hard searched for nowadays, and sometimes you can see one pop up at some exchanging fair, at prices around $1250 a piece!

Anyway, I saved a lot of money in 1992 because I knew I just had to buy that fabulous model kit. And at the end of the year, I bought the $500 kit plus a $100 upgrade kit. I intentionally did not add any more details, all I did was put it together straight from the box(es).
The model has lots of good points, and its a pure joy to build, but it also has a lot of negative points, which I will not hesitate to tell you as well. I try to describe the building process chronologically, as I wrote down my notes years ago, because I always intended to write an article about this car.



Ok, here we go!

When you open the box, the first thing you see is the perfectly airbrushed aluminum cowling. They really did a superb paintjob, and because of this, it is a shame to take off the paint in order to open the holes in the cowling that unfortunately are not pierced through. I decided to paint them flat black and to leave the superb paint job as it is. The box is full of details, most of them are metal parts, and once put together the model weighs about 5 kilograms!

But let's not rush things, and go through the construction step by step...

First of all, I have to say that the kit comes with 3 sorts of decals. There are waterslide decals, dry transfers, and real stickers. The waterslide decals were not of a good quality. As the yellow decals at both sides of the front spoiler keep on coming off, no matter how many softener I use, I throw them away and paint the yellow stripes instead. Not only do they keep on coming off, they also break pretty easily due to multiple manipulation trying to keep them in place. Furthermore, they dry in an awful way, because on some spots the "black" spoiler comes through, on some other spots the "yellow" remains yellow. So I mask the area to be painted, and I paint it with Testors No 1584 (Flat Chromate). This color is even more realistic than the decal color...
As the for the spoiler itself, it is beautifully made with a realistic looking texture, and I almost decide to leave it unpainted. But some areas are flat, and other seem to be semi gloss black, so I decide to paint it anyway.

When I move on, I notice that the decals that should come on the front side of the spoiler are exactly the same as the ones I threw away. So I repeat the exercise and get a fair result. I also would like to warn you for the dry transfer decals. Once you make contact between the decal and the area where it is to be put, there is no more turning back : they stick and will stay there forever! It is impossible to slide them, and if you try to take them off the area again, they tear off and small pieces stay glued to the area, so your beautiful decal is ruined... But I have to admit, once they are in place, there are wonderful, because they have no carrying layer.

Putting together the nose cone goes without any problems. Just make sure not to mix up the small screws, as they come in different shapes and sizes, and you don't have a lot of spares. After finishing the nose, I put the dry transfer decals on it, and I have to admit : I immediately knew why they put 2 sets of decals in the box. I got one decal wrong and it really is impossible to slide it or to remove it without damaging it... I had to rinse it off and use my spare decal...very very carefully!



The tub

The next step is the monocoque. If you use the upgrade set, you will have to use it here for the first time. The beautiful made dashboard is a sticker that you have to put on the backside of a plexi glass cover, then you fix the whole thing to the bulkhead. Then you have to paint the buttons on the plexi glass cover. All the rest goes without any problems. It's so great to put this kit together!

[935k3]

Fantastic work on a difficult but great model. I would have put the transfer decals on to clear decal sheet, then they caould be moved around as necessary. Also I always add a little white(pva)glue to decals that don't stick well and use a hot damp tissue or cloth to get decals to conform and lay down. Just a few suggestions for the decal problems you had. The model is gorgeous.

[Vric]

WOW !