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In-Box Review
124
Audi Quattro Rally
Audi Quattro Rally
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by: Andy Brazier [ BETHEYN ]

History
In 1980, during the Geneva Motor Show, the German car manufacturer presented to the public its new two-door coupé called Audi Quattro.
Produced for all the '80s the Italian name chosen by Audi (Quattro is the Italian word for “four”) ine was pointed out the main feature and the most important selling point : the four-wheel drive. It was the first time that the 4x4 solution was adopted on a coupé with the goal to achieve high numbers in terms of production and sales on the market.
The Audi Quattro was able to release good driving performance, thanks to its frontal longitudinal engine, and very good reliability on all type of road conditions.
From the mass production a dedicated car for competitions was developed on 1981 and it debuted in the World Rally Championship, achieving good results.
The success of “Quattro” cars is still existing today in fact the name has become a real “brand” that identifies all the range of Audi’s four wheel drive production.
Info from Italeri

In the box
Many moons ago Tamiya had the best 1/24th Audi Quattro rally car on the market but as that is as rare as a teenager without a smart phone nowadays, quite a few manufactures have picked up the slack, with Beemax, Reji, Profil 24 and now Italeri all adding thier kits to the market.

But, there's always a but, the Italeri kit is none other then the 1983 boxing of the Esci kit, which has also been released by Revell, so not a new tool one then, but it is one of the cheapest I might add, so lifting the lid on the top opening box we find inside -
One light grey sprue - holding 41 parts
One black sprue - holding 20 parts
One white body shell
One clear sprue - holding 15 parts
Four rubber tyres
One sheet of decals
Set of instructions

All the sprues are sealed in one bag apart from the clear sprue which is bagged on its own in the main bag.
Quality is pretty good from Italeri although some parts, most notably the wheels have a little flash on them, and one of the rubber tyres.
Ejector pin marks are very few and what there is look to be in places that wont require any sanding or filling, apart from the underside of the roof which has three fairly deep pin marks which will need filling.
The plastic, especially for the white body shell is very smooth and shiny, although there is a very minor moulding blemish along one corner of the front window pillar, which will require a little sanding to smooth out. On the whole the moulds have held up well after all these years.
The clear parts are very nice, thin and very clear without any blemishes found on them.

Construction is rather simple and straightforward as Italeri have gone with the easiest way of building a car kit.

The chassis has the floor pan moulded onto it, as well as the bottom of the engine, gearbox, running gear, exhaust pipe, and pretty much everything else found on the underside of a car.
The majority of the parts to fit too the underside are the suspension arms and shock absorbers, along with the steering rack at the front, and the exhaust box at the back.

The tyres are rubber, and have the logo raised on the sides, and have some very nice tread pattern, if a little glossy, a little light sanding should alleviate that problem though. One of the tyres does have a little flash which will need scraping off. The wheel hubs slot into the tyres and are held onto the main brake/suspension units by a plastic pin for each wheel.

The interior is rather basic, with two seats, the centre console, gear stick, hand brake steering wheel, dash board, roll cage and two fire extinguishers making up the inside detail.
The two bucket seats have a deep cushion pattern on them, and Italeri have supplied the seat belts as decals. I will probably leave these on the backing sheet, or they will conform to the seat cushions and look rather odd.
The dashboard has decals for the instrument dials, which fit over the raised bevels, so a drop of gloss clear over them should seal and give you the impression of glass on them.
The roll cage is made up of 4 parts, and fits into the two side inserts for the door panels.
The steering wheel, with a separate steering column with indicator stalks, a handbrake and the gear stick pretty much make up the interior.
Two fire extinguishers are supplied, one fits in front of the navigators seat with the other behind the centre console in between the seats.

The one piece clear part covers the interior glass, which sorts out the front and back windscreens as well as the side windows. A rear view mirror is also added.

The last stages cover all the sticky out bits, such as the lights, windscreen wipers, number plates, side mirrors and the rear spoiler.

Instructions and decals
The instructions are printed on a bigger then A4 size sheet (unknown size as its bigger then A4 but smaller then A3) which folds out too four pages long for the build and paint sequence. I'm not a fan of this type of instructions as you end up with a great big long sheet, which always in my case ends up taking up half my desk and being folded all over the place to size it down.
The build takes place over around 14 stages, and is very easy to follow.
Internal paint numbers for Italeri's own brand of acrylic paints, along with the FS numbers, are given throughout as well as any decals that need to be added.

The decals are printed in house by Italeri, and have very little carrier film around them, and are glossy in appearance. Colours are quite vibrant and the white portions are not discoloured at all.
The car is white, with all the logos and the black/silver/red stripes taken care of by decals.

I have used Italeri decals before, but for the life of me can't remember what on, but as I don't have any reoccurring nightmares over them, I would imagine they went down well.

One marking option is supplied -
1981 Monte Carlo Rally - Rallye Automobile de Monte-Carlo and driven by Hannu Mikkola and Arne Hertz with car number 5.

Please remember, when contacting retailers or manufacturers, to mention that you saw their products highlighted here - on AUTOMODELER.
SUMMARY
Highs: Nice detail, easy build, colourful marking option.
Lows: Simplistic detail, but it can be detailed further by the modeler. A liitle flash here and there.
Verdict: For a 36 year old kit, this still looks rather good, although its a very nice and easy too build kit, it does lack a little detail in places.
  Scale: 1:24
  Mfg. ID: 3642
  Suggested Retail: €32.00
  Related Link: Audi Quattro Rally
  PUBLISHED: Apr 18, 2019
  NATIONALITY: Germany
NETWORK-WIDE AVERAGE RATINGS
  THIS REVIEWER: 84.81%
  MAKER/PUBLISHER: 79.68%

About Andy Brazier (betheyn)
FROM: ENGLAND - SOUTH EAST, UNITED KINGDOM

I started modelling in the 70's with my Dad building Airfix aircraft kits. The memory of my Dad and I building and painting a Avro Lancaster on the kitchen table will always be with me. I then found a friend who enjoyed building models, and between us I think we built the entire range of 1/72 Airfi...

Copyright ©2021 text by Andy Brazier [ BETHEYN ]. Images also by copyright holder unless otherwise noted. Opinions expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of ModelGeek. All rights reserved.



Comments

Nice one Andy! I've been looking at a few Italeri car kits lately, wondering whether to get them. I love your comment about the decals! Perhaps that's how we should rate any manufacturer: how do they rate on a recurring nightmare scale. All the best Rowan
APR 18, 2019 - 07:57 AM
Thanks Rowan, I would imagine Italeri's own tooled kits should be quite nice. I have only just stopped having night terrors over Academy decals . Andy
APR 18, 2019 - 08:55 AM
Hi Andy Yes, Italeri is one of those manufacturers that have re-boxed a lot of older kits from various sources - that's why I've hesitated over some of the stuff I've seen on the shelf in my LHS. All the best Rowan
APR 18, 2019 - 08:30 PM
   


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