Matchbox 1/72 Fiat CR.42 Falco

MATCHBOX (REVELL) 1:72 FIAT CR.42 FALCO

Reviewer: Tim Beales (rec.models.scale)
Kit Review submitted: 28 November 2002

The Aircraft:

More than anyone else, the Italians held on to the concept of the biplane fighter until the bitter end. The Fiat CR42, known as the "Falco" (falcon in English), was one of the last biplane fighters in the world, and first flew in 1938. Like most Italian fighters of the period, it had a low power engine, high manoeuvrability, but was relatively lightly armed. This made it perfect for fighting in air battles like those seen in WW1, but a death trap come the 1940s. Nevertheless, Fiat sold the CR42 to Belgium, Hungary, and Sweden before WW2.

In 1940, CR42s fought well against France, but suffered heavy losses against the RAF early in the Battle of Britain. After 1940, CR42s were withdrawn from northern Europe, but fought on in Greece, the Balkans, and in north Africa, where they at least held there own against the antiquated RAF biplanes operating in that theatre.

Amazingly, the CR42 fought all the way through WW2 with about 2,000 built in total. After the Italian armistice in 1943, the CR42 fought on both sides, with the Luftwaffe taking over the few that remained in north Italy, using the CR42 in Russian-style tactics that employed older planes at night for ground attack raids.

Kit Parts:

I think this kit is out of production at the moment, but can still be found with some difficulty in a few shops. I picked mine up second hand for less than an ice cream. The front of the box was damaged, but the kit was quite buildable.

This is a "Skill Level 2" kit, seemingly dating from 1994. There are 27 parts in a sand-coloured plastic and a tiny transparent windscreen. The instruction sheet has "Revell" written on it in several places, as does the old-style stand that comes with the kit. As the parts are not in the usual two-colour Matchbox style, I assume that this is a reboxing of an earlier Revell kit by the German-owned Matchbox.

Revell boxart supplied by Marcelo Rabello

All the parts are finely detailed, and there is no flash, sink marks, or blemishes of any kind (Airfix take note).

Instructions:

The instructions are in the form of a fold-out American letter-sized sheet, with the front being the usual information in several languages and a paint guide using the normal Revell practice of defining the paints by A, B, C etc. The two inside sheets provide exploded views of the assembly steps, and the back sheet shows a three-view painting guide and decal placement.

Construction of the Kit:

The interior consists solely of a pilot figure sitting on a seat. The pilot and seat locate onto pins protruding from the inner side of each of the fuselage halves. Before construction, I painted all the parts while they were still on the sprues. After the painting was dry, the pilot was glued to his seat, and this assembly was then glued to one of the fuselage pins, followed by cementing the two fuselage halves together. One thing that annoys me with Revell's paint guides is that I have to keep flipping the instruction sheet over, as I forget what colour "A" or "E" is. In my opinion, it is much better to put the actual paint number, as Airfix does for Humbrol colours.

There is a nice little two-piece engine unit that fits into the cowling, with the usual choice of having a movable propeller if one should chose. The engine/cowling unit attaches directly onto a ridge on the front of the fuselage. The fuselage assembly then locates onto the one-piece (small) lower wing. Two machine guns in the form of tiny straight pieces of sprue are then fitted into recesses in the front fuselage, along with the tiny windscreen. The two tailplanes are also added at this stage. No filler at all was needed - lovely.

I chose to fit the struts next, making sure that the holes were big enough and all lined up during dry-fitting runs. The struts (six "V" and "W" 's in all) are well designed and fit nicely into recesses in the top wing, lower wing, and on the fuselage. The one-piece to wing locates directly onto the struts.

The two spatted undercarriage units were constructed next. These consisted of a right and a left half, and a wheel that fitted inside each unit. These then attached into holes located in the lower wing and to a "vee" unit that was attached to the lower fuselage. A slight smear of Humbrol filler on the join here was all that was needed.

From what I can see, the only rigging required was two cross wires on the outer struts of each wing, and control wires for the upper ailerons.

Decals:

Only one version is supplied of an anonymous aircraft. I find this a common problem with early Revell kits, and very annoying. This would not have happened if this was a "real" Matchbox kit. Perhaps a reader will be able to identify this aircraft for me.

The painting guide is given in Revell paint numbers. The undersides are a light grey, the upper surfaces in sand with a green mottle with a red nose. The decals are nice and thin, and perfectly in register.

Accuracy:

Matchbox quote the model dimensions as: length = 11.4 cm, and span = 13.4 cm, which scale out perfectly to the full aircraft dimensions I obtained from a book of: span = 9.7 m and length = 8.27 m.

Overall:

I highly recommend this kit for its ease of construction. Top hole Matchbox! It is an attractive, delicate airplane that just oozes Italian style. I personally find the Italian mottled camouflage of this period to be one of the most attractive styles for painting models in. It's a pity about the lack of detail about the actual aircraft depicted. I haven't seen this aircraft kitted by anyone else (there are some resin choices - Ed), so grab one if you can.

Related INBOX Reviews:-

Mister Kit 1/72 Fiat CR.42 Falco

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