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Siluro a Lenta Corsa Maiale~Italeri Mode

"Crew-mate Grzegorz Zięcina (pedro) shares his build of Italeri Models, SLC 200 Maiale kit in this MSW Build Feature!"



The Siluro a Lenta Corsa (slow running torpedo) Maiale is an interesting little kit of even more interesting subject. It was kitted by Italeri in 2007 so it is really new model on the market. Being an armour modeller I would probably have not bought this earlier, however, a friend (non modeling) handed me the box with "Maiale" and asked if I would build it for him…

I started the build as per instructions and followed the steps in the booklet. The kit proved to be very well engineered and the parts fitted really nice. When the torpedo's body was complete I painted the inside of the gage cluster black and put the nice decals in it. I then covered it with a window cut out from the acetate sheet provided by Italeri. I've left the PE work till all the plastic parts were glued together. As the PE provided was a tad thick I had to anneal it over gas lighter flame to make working with it easier. Only thing I had to add to this model myself were the steering cables and those I made of 0.3 wire and glued with cyanoacrylate.

I had to mask the gauge cluster window with Maskol and it was ready for paint. With this model I decided to use the color modulation described by Adam Wilder in this feature over at Armorama:

First I primed the torpedo, torpedo rack and figures with matt black humbrol as I do with all my models. It gives much better grip for the Valejo and Games Workshop acrylics I use for the colors. As the base color I used Vallejo yellow olive. Then I highlighted the areas that would catch most light with medium and light variants of the base colour each mixed with yellow in different proportions. The outcome was a really bright green torpedo with some dark undershade on the bottom.

Then I had painted on numerous chips and scratches in the areas that I thought would get most worn over time of training the crew for example. Chips were done with Vallejo german grey colour and chips borders were highlighted with base colour lightened with some yellow. The two "serial" number decals were placed on a box behind second "riders" seat as per instructiond. For this I used a layer of Future and Humbrol's Decalfix. Unfortunately it left me with few air bubbles beneath the decal film but those were remedied with a sharp X-acto blade.

In order to tone down and tie together all the colors on the torpedo and generally dirty it up I used oil filters, Van Ghog's raw umber for the most part. Wooden rack was painted with GW's acrylic "bestial brown" and higlighted with base color with few drops of beige. For better effect I washed it with naples yellow red and raw umber thinned oil paints. Two days later after I had painted the figures, everything was sealed with Vallejo's matt varnish and before it was glued to the base I only had to glue in a "windshield" in the operators hood.

Now it is finished and awaits for it's new owner in a cozy, dust free box. It was extremely enjoyable little kit and I am sure I will build another one , but this time for myself.