Italeri's "Classic Bikes". MV Augusta 500cc Tripple. 1967

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July 22, 2015
The box art says it all.
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July 22, 2015
The wheels were not too bad, but the spokes looked like iron bars, a bit on the thick side. :-/
3
July 22, 2015
The engine head and cylinders took a long time to clean up and match parts.
4
July 22, 2015
I had to use these PE bolt and nut heads where that kit had failed to have them.
5
July 22, 2015
These are all the parts from before that I had to clean off all the flash and excess from wher the dies failed to fit 'flush'.
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July 22, 2015
You can see here the massive missalignment results, and I had to get all this removed before it looked half decent.
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July 22, 2015
This is the other side of the cylinder head
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July 22, 2015
Every part had some degree of flash and misalignment issues, but I percevered. 🙂
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July 22, 2015
With some careful cutting and scraping, I managed to get the cylinder fins looking ok.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
You actually get a crank shaft with this kit. !!!
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July 22, 2015
It would be ok if you had the whole bike in pieces in a workshop diorama, but it was really "Chunky" and hard to clean up. :-/
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July 22, 2015
The pistons looked nothing like pistons, but I went with what I had.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
But at least the fitted.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The iron bar twins, and the tyres are a true reptesentation of the Dunlop semi triangular racing rubber, the K-87's
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July 22, 2015
The "Profile" of the tyres triangle looks obvious here, designed this way so that the further the bike leans into the corner, more rubber would meet the road. :-/
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July 22, 2015
The front and back
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July 22, 2015
The DOHC head. poor alignment issuse here too.
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July 22, 2015
The lower crank case is next and the cylinders took a bit of work to have them 'sit right'.
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July 22, 2015
The oil pan/reserve, clutch and all the lower end of the engine goes together now.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The rocker covers are on the head and all parts here will now look something similar to an engine.
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July 22, 2015
Now comes the frame, red plastic and a ton of cleaning of the seam lines to tackle here. A LOT of plastic will come off here. :-/
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July 22, 2015
Just keep an eye on the excess red plastic gather on the paper.
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July 22, 2015
Everywhere you look, seam lines and flow gate luggs. Grrrrrrr
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July 22, 2015
And again, more of it !!!
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July 22, 2015
A dry fit to see how well it sits.
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July 22, 2015
A lot of work but a fair result. 🙂
32
July 22, 2015
The black grips are actually rubber The brake lever and throttle grip and clutch lever are next and it went together really well. The red covering on the levers is actually 'shrink tube', and is seen on the full scale bike.
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July 22, 2015
The oil pan that fits right on the bottom of the motor.
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July 22, 2015
There is quite a bit of chrome on the motor and it really does look half decent once it is all in place.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The cam end covers and the distributor cover.
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July 22, 2015
This is where the carbeuretors will go.
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July 22, 2015
Seam lines, and more seam lines GOD, it was so hard to not lose the profile of the pipes from scraping away so much excess plastic. :-/
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July 22, 2015
Flow gate lugs in the worst positions.
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July 22, 2015
Almost a 'flat spot' from so much scraping. !!!!
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
As you can see by the scrapings, a lot of plastic had to go for a good result.
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July 22, 2015
The pipes were all one piece, no two halves to glue together.
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July 22, 2015
The battery, and the ignition coils
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
Now for the slow and tricky process of marrying all this together, so I hired an octopus to help me out. 🙂
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July 22, 2015
Look closely and you will see the 'flash' on all the lugs on the guard brace.
49
July 22, 2015
"flash' was all over this piece and extreme care was exercised in it's removal.
50
July 22, 2015
So hard to keep it all neat and tidy with great lumps like this on a most obvious point.
51
July 22, 2015
This depression nearly caused me to suffer the same fate.
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July 22, 2015
Both halves of the fairing had one
53
July 22, 2015
I literally 'poured' mr surfacer on to this area to bring the surfaces to a level state, many many times.
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July 22, 2015
The tooling really was crappy, and so much work had to be done to compensate for all the excess.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
Now, that looks a 1000% on what I started out with. :-/
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July 22, 2015
And this one.
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July 22, 2015
The tank was one part that needed very little work.
60
July 22, 2015
filled (or so i thought) and sanded, ready for painting after the base coat was applied. Ha !
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July 22, 2015
The carbies are all ready and were no problem with the fit.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The two halved were bought together, only to find that NOTHING matched, so this is where I like superglue as a filler.
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July 22, 2015
It looks rough, but no rougher than what I started with !!!
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July 22, 2015
I polished the plastic first with Tamiya polishing 'fine' compound and the shine was just great.
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July 22, 2015
mure superglue to build up the seam ready for sanding. :-0
67
July 22, 2015
Getting better. 🙂
68
July 22, 2015
Now, there it is, all smooth and no sign of the seam. 🙂
69
July 22, 2015
Painted "Italian Red" from a can, first decanted and then from an airbrush after I let the paint de-gas by leaving it sit overnight in a small bottle with the lid left lose.
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July 22, 2015
71
July 22, 2015
I had allready removed all the seam lines on the frame before I got to the painting stage.
72
July 22, 2015
The paint went on so easily and just glossed up naturally with constant and thin coats of paint in a very short time span.
73
July 22, 2015
The seam is no where to be seen. 🙂
74
July 22, 2015
The fram is now painted and looks as good as I expected.
75
July 22, 2015
Horibly out of focus, (sorry) but the lower half was masked off and painted with Testors aluminium buffing metalizer.
76
July 22, 2015
and that's when I had my depression attack Garrrrrrrrrr. 🙁
77
July 22, 2015
The "Hole" i thought I had filled had not gone where I thought I sent it !
78
July 22, 2015
So, it was back to Mr Surfacer for some more fun....NOT 🙂
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July 22, 2015
80
July 22, 2015
I just kept loading it up to make sure I had enough to have the depression gone.
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July 22, 2015
82
July 22, 2015
I had to strip down all my hard work in the paint dept and start again.
83
July 22, 2015
I concider this a success, it's finally gone' 🙂
84
July 22, 2015
The repaint went well again
85
July 22, 2015
No sign of the dp at all and I am so pleased about that. 🙂
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July 22, 2015
87
July 22, 2015
All ready for the fitting to the frame.
88
July 22, 2015
To think that tis was a mess not that long ago, but it took a lot of clean up.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The final assembly is under way, with the forks and engine in place.
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July 22, 2015
A nice touch that Italeri added were the rubber "Boots" on the front forks.
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The shoks, rear wheel, battery and brake pedal are now on/in.
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July 22, 2015
The tank looks really nice, well, I think so. 🙂
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July 22, 2015
The war paint. LOL 🙂
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July 22, 2015
I useed pin heads for the bolts in the frame .
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The End. 🙂
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
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July 22, 2015
The decals were so brittle, I am lucky to have got this much of them to 'lay down, as prior to this, there were wrinkles all over the yellow disk.
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July 22, 2015
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Comments

22 July 2015, 05:08

Martijn Kuijpers
A great bike from the (maybe) even greater Ago, I didn't knew that this kit it self is from 1967 too!! 🙂
It looks like your doing a great job, hopefully the result will be as beautiful as the bike was at that time!!

22 July 2015, 06:35

Kerry COX
I actually stood beside this bike in Melbourne in 1972 when Giacomo Agostini bought one to Australia on a demonstration/ exhibition of his bikes, and he also bought a Honda Rc-166 six cylinder 250 with him as well, and the sound was pure heaven. LOL 🙂

22 July 2015, 06:49

Steve Wilson
...
MV Augusta... One of my favourite Bikes!!!
As a child my friends and I would slip away on our Bikes, (the push pedal type) early morning and sneak into the circuit to watch a race.
A hero of mine at the time rode for MV Augusta, he was Tarquino Provini... Better known as Model maker PROTAR. His MV Augusta kits are still sought after. I still have his autograph!!!

22 July 2015, 07:19

Kerry COX
I have had a similar history, as my uncle, Kieth COX rode for Australia in the 60's on his JAP on all the flat track 1/4 mile circuits both here and in GB, and we would give the ticket box the slip and watch the night races at the RNA show grounds in Brisbane as a kid. Great fun. LOL

22 July 2015, 07:40

Christian Meyerhoff
Hi Kerry! Looks great! You did an excellent job on this golden oldie. The only thing you should repair is the yellow decal on the front of the cowling.

22 July 2015, 09:01

Kerry COX
The yellow decal was at least 35 years old and I was lucky to get it to be like it is now, and I have asked Italeri for a replacement but it is no longer in production.

Any suggestions. ? Please 👍 👍

22 July 2015, 09:41

Album info

This kit was produced by Italeri in 1967. The dies were cut and engraved in the traditional way by craftsman tool makers, before the "new wave" type of die production we know today came into being in the early 80's.
As a result, the kit suffered from huge amounts of 'flash' and dies that did not match together perfectly, creating massive seam lines that took a lot of work to clean up to an acceptable degree.
I have done my best to overcome these problems and finish with a half decent build.

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