Fiat
G.50bis
In 1935 the Italian Ministry of Aviation issued specification R that called for a cantilever monoplane fighter with retractable landing gear, preferably powered by a Fiat A.74RC-38 engine. Several companies entered the competition with one of them being the Fiat Company. The development was complicated by the Ministry's vague and constantly changing requirements that ranged from light interceptor to fighter bomber. The prototype first flew on February 26, 1937. It was then handed over for military trials after some slight modifications. The initial order for 45 machines was placed even before the machine was transfered for trials. Compared to its competitors, the G.50 ended up in second place behind the Macchi C.200. Eventually both types were accepted by the military. In February 1939 12 machines were sent to Spain for combat trials but they arrived too late to see combat. Service experience found issues with the original bubble canopy material and faulty landing gear retraction. Newer machines were designated G.50-II were equipped with a semi opened canopy, new landing gear and modified tail planes. In 1940 production was switched to the G.50bis version which featured the final shape of the tail planes, enlarged fuel tanks and strengthened armor plating. Due to its common African assignments this version was often equipped with a dust filter. By 1943 the G.50bis was already becoming obsolete compared to other Allied types and many were switched to the fighter bomber role with wing racks installed. 67 of them were defending Sicily when the Allied landing occurred. When the armistice was signed, the Italian Allied Air Force took over 48 machines. Finland placed orders for the G.50 in October 1938 and the aircraft was quite successful in Finland, during the Winter War they had a victory to loss ratio of 11/2 and during the Continuation War 88/4. In small numbers the G.50s served in the Croatian Air Force and the Luftwaffe.
The Kit
Photo below show the molded interior framework, only one of the ejector towers may show and even it may not be that visible once the cockpit parts have been installed.
The PE fret is mostly for the seat harness but there are a couple of other cockpit details as well.
The clear parts are reasonably thin and nice and clear, other than the windscreen the only other parts supplied clear are for a navigation light, only one of the four shown are called out in the instructions.
The decals are thin, well printed and appear to be opaque where needed. On some of them you may want to trim away some of the excess film. Markings are supplied for four different aircraft, all in the usual complex Italian schemes that will test your talent and patience. See below.
The instructions are printed on three A4 sheets folded and one half page put together to form a small booklet of fourteen pages. The first page has the aircraft history in Czech and English, pages 2 and 3 contain a parts map and symbols chart, pages 4 through 9 are the assembly steps with one containing a color chart with Gunze numbers and generic color names, pages 10 through 13 have the painting and marking instructions and page 14 is a catalog of Special Hobby items.
After Market Goodies
Other than resin wheel sets offered by both CMK and Squadron I have found no other items available at the time of this review.
Conclusions
This is another nice kit by Special Hobby of a significant aircraft that has been mostly ignored by the main stream manufacturers in this scale. Special Hobby kits have been getting much better the past few years and while they are far from being a shake and bake kit they do build up into nice models even though they still have some fit issues and challenges. Recommended to modelers with some limited run kit experience.
Links to kit build or reviews
A build review of the non bis version but essentially the same kit can be found here.
References
Back to the 1/32 scale Italian Aircraft page