1:144 Caproni Ca.3
This is a 1:144 scale model of a Caproni Ca.3 bomber, more specifically a Ca.33. Since many painters choose their own mounting system, no peg is included on the plane. Pegs can be purchased separately in the Accessories section of this catalog.
The Caproni Ca.33 was the first in the series of Caproni Ca.3 bombers. Italian airfields could be pretty rough, so the undercarriage was strengthened and skids were added. Two pilots sat in tandem with a gunner/observer in the nose and another in a cage above the pusher propeller. Ca.3 aircraft were built from late 1916 though 1918, and they served with a dozen squadriglie and one Italian naval unit, with some still in service at the Armistice.
A combination of production problems and indecisiveness of the Italian military limited the Ca.3's success. The military had gotten interested in S.I.A. bomber designs, all based on yet-to-be-delivered engines, and halted Ca.3 production. The promised engines never materialized and the S.I.A. designs never flew, but restarting the Ca.3 production lines proved slow. The prototype plus 250 Ca.3s were built in 1917, with a further 20 built in 1918. Remarkably, small batches of Ca.3s (in the form of the Ca.36) were built all the way through 1926, most of them for the Italian Navy.
French attempts at a license-built Caproni Ca.1 proved unsuccessful due to inadequate choices for the engines. The license-produced C.E.P.2 proved a better solution, using the same triple 150hp Isotta-Fraschini solution as the originals. Production was slow, though, and only 41 to 59 of the machines were supplied in 1917. They were supplemented by Italian-built Caproni 3's, redesignated as the CAP.2 B2. French use of the Caproni C.E.P.2 began in March 1916 with CEP 115.
For more data and gaming info on this plane, see https://linen.miraheze.org/wiki/Caproni_Ca.33.


























