GBModelli

Cannone da 254/40 su affusto De Stefano

Historical background:
The 254/40 was a siege gun used by the Italian Army during WWI. Originally it was a naval gun, converted into field use by mounting it on a De Stefano chassis. The gun itself had no recoiling mechanism, so the backward momentum when it was discharged made it move backwards along two interconnected rails, sloped upwards posteriorly, so the gun could later travel back into position with minimal human intervention (do not forget to reproduce this detail when mounting the gun on a diorama !).

As it is typical of the GB Modelli production, parts come in a plastic bag, backed up by a piece of cardboard and the folded manual. I counted 36 parts, very well cast in the usual cream-coloured resin, with some light flash that will be easy to clean up. The only warping I could find lies in the rails, which are very long and thin so it had to be expected somewhow. Nothing that a careful bending can not cure.

Other commendable characteristics of GB Modelli production are the very clever engineering of mouldings (all pieces look firmly attached, yet easy to detach without ruining any detail) and the near-maniacal attention to small pieces: not a single piece, as small as it might be, is left to the modeller's scratch-building ability: everything is there, with the only possible exception of a cable around the pulley for ammo loading and some more wooden plancks to create the posterior slope for the rails. Rivetting is correct as usual.

Clever mould-making made it possible to build the huge gun as a single-piece affair, with mould irregularities confined in the lower half, where they are not visible.

The manual has a single exploded type drawing, which is adequate given the relatively small amount of pieces.

References

[1] https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/254/40#254.2F40_D.S.

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Article Last Updated: 11 July 2015