It is very interesting to see that there seems to be a renewal of interest in Italian AFVs. At nearly every exhibition you can see more than one Itali...
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A small Italian desert-warrior by Bernhard Lustig It is very interesting to see that there seems to be a renewal of interest in Italian AFVs. At nearly every exhibition you can see more than one Italian vehicle. Could one of the reasons be that there are some modellers who are bored with German armour? I think one main reason is that in recent years many excellent young manufacturers in Italy have matured and improved the quality of their products, and most of them are interested in the armour of their own country. I took an update set from the young Italian manufacturer “Model Victoria“ and tried to improve the old but still very good Zvezda (Italeri) kit with it.
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The M13/40 was built between 1940 and 1941, until production switched to the M14/42. The modified M14/42 looks very similar to it’s predecessor, but had a more powerful engine, which also was used in the later M13/40. The Italian Army pushed these vehicles into service at the end of 1940. Most of the existing vehicles took part in the disastrous battle of Beda Fomm in the eastern Egyptian desert in February 1941, where more than 100 vehicles were destroyed or captured by British troops. Most of them were later used by the Australian Army. The Australians painted a large kangaroo on each side of the turret to aid identification from distance. The M 13/40 was the main battle tank of the Regio Escerito (royal Italian army), and was used widely by the Italian divisions Ariete, Centauro and Littorio in the desert war. The Ariete and the Centauro Divisions were founded by the transformation of two armoured brigades into armoured divisions. The first armoured brigade was transformed into the 131st armoured division. (Centauro), the second armoured brigade founded the 132nd armoured division (Ariete). The Italian army had three groups of AFVs: L for light tanks (L 3and L 5) M for medium tanks ( M11/39, M13/40, M 14/42) P for heavy tanks (P 40)
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The M13/40 was crewed by four men and had a 125 hp FIAT SPA 8 T liquid cooled V-8 diesel engine, givind a maximum speed of 30 km/h. Later in the war, many vehicles were equipped with a 145 hp-engine like the M14/42. The maximum speed rose from 30 km/h to 32 km/h. This tank was armed with one 47 mm Ansaldo 47/32 gun, one 8 mm Breda Model 38 machine gun on the turret roof and two 8mm Breda Model 38 machine guns in the right front hull. In the desert war the crews often added sandbag-additional armour placed on the frontal armour plate. This and the heavier engine forced the crew to reduce the weight by reducing the ammunition stowage from 70 to 53 rounds. In the time between 1940 and 1941 710 M 13/ 40 were built, and today there is an existing example at the Royal Armoured Corps Museum at Bovington in the UK.
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The basic kit I used was a Zvezda (former Italeri) M13/40. This is an old but nicely detailed kit with some advantages over the Tamiya one. Of course this kit is more than 20 years old and some details are not to the same standard as kits of the 90´s, but the update set from Model Victoria (MV) will correct most of the mistakes and add missing details . In addition to the update set I used a workable resin track set, also from MV. I connected the vehicle according to the instructions. The suspension is pretty good and fits easily together. As can be seen in the photos, the upper hull received the majority of the parts, the front glacis plate and the rear engine deck were replaced completely. Now it’s possible to open all hatches. It would be nice if Model Victoria could provide some interior detail to show when the hatches are open…please! All parts of the MV update were produced to a very high standard and
fit perfectly to the Zvezda kit.
nuts.
A very nice detail is the motor vehicle badge, placed on the vehicles upper left glacis plate. It shows an axe wrapped with rods, a five-pointed star and the insignia “RoEto“. This part was originally cast in either bronze or aluminium. This small detail is too fine to hide behind the sandbag armour!
There are no parts for updating the turret-roof 8 mm-Breda machine gun, so I had to use an Eduard etched brass set. The other parts of this set were placed in the spare box, as they are not necessary for this vehicle.
The kit includes a large amount of personal gear, which was stowed by the crew on the outside of the vehicle. There are nice bedrolls, different kinds of bags, gearboxes and two kinds of 20 L-Italian fuel cans. The use of these parts is optional and I didn’t use several items. The only things I missed are the lenses of the large headlights, placed on each side of the vehicle. Because I had no MV lenses, I took these parts from an Italeri Opel Blitz kit. I filed them down and placed them into the lights. There is a small etched brass fret with parts for the rear air intake, the license plate (two options) and some wing
But my absolute favourite in the MVcatalogue is the workable track link-set. Every track link is highly detailed, and made in resin. It is placed on a sprue, pointed one single time. Take a sharp scalpel and you will cut it easily. You don’t have to clean a single part! Click together and you will get the best workable M 13 track I’ve ever seen! In a very short time the tracks are complete, the price for this is much lower than the Friul ones.
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In 1940/41, the Italian vehicles received a grey-green base colour (grigio verde scuro). Because this colour was obviously inappropriate for the service in the desert, the troops over sprayed each vehicle with a sand colour. I started by painting the whole kit in Tamiya XF 65 (field grey). I used Tamiya XF 55(deck tan) for an irregular overspray. After a drying period of 24 hours, the tank gets a very light washing with Burnt Umber artist’s oil paint.
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Smaller areas get a special washing with a black oil colour. Chipped paint was produced with a very thin brush (3/0) and Andrea acrylics. For rusty areas I used Mussini “laser-oxide-orange“ an expensive, but fantastic colour. The tracks get a basecoat of Tamiya XF 63 (German grey). I used different pastel chalks to give a rusty and sandy impression to the tracks. I mixed them with
Tamiya enamel thinner and put it on the tracks with a wide brush. I painted the divisional signs and the white disc for air recognition on the turret roof with a home made etched brass stencil. The figure is from Royal Models with the head replaced by a Hornet-head. Most parts of the figure were painted in Humbrol enamels.
Zvesda M13/40 Model Victoria M13/40 update set Model Victoria M13/40 tracks Eduard Royal Models figure Hornet Head
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