Complete, except for the cam covers which I melted in lacquer thinner, that is. Fortunately Italeri's spare parts department was able to mail me the cams (and maybe the entire sprue, to be seen) for the princely sum of €6.00 for shipping.
This is a frustrating kit, in some ways. Some parts are not shown on the instruction sheet; and it seemed to me that some of the decals were mis-numbered. There are huge numbers of those little sprue remnants attached to everything; and the position of some of the metal screws makes it such that you can't really turn them with a screwdriver without risking scratching the adjoining paint. And the level of detail, in a kit that retails for $250 to $300, is substantially less than that of a Model Factory Hiro kit. Granted these are 3 to 4 times as expensive, but arguably the detail could have been improved in some areas.
To be completely fair, I built this in a fairly large hurry, and more patience would have led to better results.
On the other hand this is a classic prewar race car, and builds on the P2 of 1924. The Italeri instructions state that this version was driven to a win at Monaco by the great Tazio Nuvolari in 1936, but Wikipedia disagrees, stating he was 4th in 1936 (following a Mercedes and two Auto-Unions), and that the 1936 car was the 8C 35 Type C, a true single-seater with a completely new engine. It is likely that the actual car modelled here is the 1932 Monza GP winner, also driven by Nuvolari.
The engine, another masterpiece by Vittorio Jano, is a 2.3 litre straight 8 with two overhead camshafts and a single-stage supercharger; it was essentially the proven 6C 1750 with two added cylinders. Wikipedia gives the power output as 165 hp, which seems low as the Miller 91 (a supercharged 2 litre of similar design) was routinely making 200 hp.
Comparison with the 1938 Auto-Union Type C is inevitable as the German cars, benefiting from enormous financial support from the Nazi government, ruled the Grand Prix world through the second half of the 1930's. The German supercharged V16 of 6 litres made in the range of 520 hp and was a beast to drive, but it was very, very fast.
That's it for now. Stay tuned!
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