Italeri's 1/9 scale
Ducati Desmosedici

by Andrew Judson

images by Brett Green

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Wow! What a kit! It is big, and it is a Ducati. It is fantastic to see a current bike of this type being released. Well done Italeri.

Italeri's 1/9 scale Ducati Desmosedici comprises six sprues of well detailed parts and two decal sheets. One of these sheets covers the team and rider markings, while the other contains the carbon fibre material.

The level of detail is very good with everything engineered as simply as practical without compromising the authentic features of the real bike. The sprues are coloured for the respective parts of the bike so that a beginner could assemble the kit without paint is desired. However, the more experience modeller can go to town with paint and detailing. Either way, this will be a truly eye catching model when finished.

One of the things that really grabbed me was the fact that one of the riders is former Super Bike champion, Australian Troy Bayliss who, over the time he has been with Ducati, has helped them develop this bike into the competitive Grand Prix machine that it is.

I knew that I had to finish the bike using this marking option!

Italeri's 1/9 scale Ducati Desmosedici was very straightforward to build, with all parts fitting well.

Even though I built the kit straight from the box, and despite the simple kit engineering, the detail on the finished kit looks great.

The only modification was to scuff up the rubber tyres slightly, as if they had seen some time on the track!

My Ducati was painted with Gunze Acrylics applied through an Aztek A470 airbrush. I thinned the Gunze acrylic paint with automotive lacquers. This thinning method delivers a smooth, high gloss that is a good representation of an automotive finish in this scale.

The decals in this kit are outstanding. All the markings went into place without any hassles at all. I only needed to slice the two rear numbers to conform to the compound curves, and used minimal Gunze Mr. Mark Softer on the remainder of the markings.

The white decals were especially impressive. They are perfectly opaque, even over the challenging bright red paint of the bike.

In addition to the markings on the body of the bike, decals were also supplied for the tyres, instruments and carbon-fibre texture.

I am very happy with the end result and I am now eyeing off my 1/6 scale Honda, also from Italeri!

I can heartily recommend this kit even to relatively inexperienced modellers.

Thanks to Italeri for the sample kit.

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Model and Text Copyright © 2004 by Andrew Judson
Images Copyright © 2004 by Brett Green
Page Created 14 August, 2004
Last Updated 10 September, 2004

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