It's been over a
decade since I last submitted an article to ARC. Since then, I've moved to a new
city, and acquired a wife and kids. As my quest is to present Italian Second
World War aircraft to the ARC viewing public, I have decided to exhibit some of
my old builds. Someday when the littles are older, I plan to start up production
of my 'Regia Miniatura' again.
The Meridionali
Ro.37 Lince (Italian: "Lynx") was a two-seater Italian
reconnaissance biplane, a product of the Industrie Meccaniche Aeronautiche
Meridionali (IMAM) company. It appeared in 1934 and had a composite
structure of wood and metal. It saw operational duty during Italy's
invasion of Ethiopia and the Spanish Civil War. During the Second
World War it saw duty on almost all fronts, except for Russia and the English
Channel.
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The old Classic
Airframes kit is a multi-media affair including lots of resin and photo etch.
The photo etch includes rims with very delicate spokes for the main wheels. This
was beyond my ability to reproduce on the model - besides, my subject was going
to have the wheel spats on. This kit was my first biplane - talk about jumping
in with both feet! The rigging was very complicated. To this day I don't
remember how I did it. It's fishing line. If you look closely you can see
where I made an anchor for the rigging on the lower wing out of a bit of photo
etch. This corresponds to what I saw in a picture while doing my research on the
rigging. It was built entirely out of the box - CA kits came with the
aftermarket stuff already included. I added some plastic rod for internal
structure along the sides and a few bits of plastic and wire for the interior.
My model represents a Regia Aeronautica aircraft serving in Scutari, Albania
with 39a Squadriglia during 1941-1942.
The original version
was powered by the 560 hp Fiat A.30 inline engine, which was unreliable, so the
Ro. 37bis with a more powerful Piaggio radial engine was developed. The Ro. 37
was exported to a number of countries in the 1930s, including Afghanistan, which
had 16. A few years ago, modern Italian troops in Afghanistan found some Ro.
37bis wrecks in a boneyard outside of Kabul. They recovered the wreckage and
shipped it back to Italy where the aircraft was restored and can be seen at the
Italian Air Force museum on Lake Bracciano.
Leonardo
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