I love my Vespa and wanted to build a model of it...

July 26, 2025

Build log of building the Italeri 4633 Vespa Model

This is a high quality Italian made plastic scale model of a Vespa Primavera.  Looking forward to building it.  It will be a fun fairly short project compared to some of the more involved models I have built.  I also do not normally build plastic models so that will be new and interesting.  I will use superglue cyanoacrylate, often called "CA", to glue the pieces together.  My advice is to use is sparingly, a little goes a long way, and you will avoid blobs and stuck together fingers.

A photo log is below showing all the steps of building the model, but first, here are pictures of the finished Vespa Primavera Model:

Model of a Vespa

Italeri Vespa Primavera 125 Model, completed.

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Vespa Model

Finished model of a Vespa Primavera

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Building the Italeri Vespa Primavera model:

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The kit arrives, again this is the Italeri Vespa Model of a 125 Primavera. It is 1:9 scale.

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The kit was nicely packaged and includes graphic instructions and decals. No tools , glue etc... are included.

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Here are the parts of the kit. There are white, chromed, black, silver , and clear injection molded hard-plastic parts and also solid rubber parts.

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The underside of the handlebars was hollow, with no parts to cover or fill this, which I thought looked bad. I filled this void with Vinyl filler and will carve/sand this smooth.

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The wheels feature nice solid rubber tires and each wheel has a to part rim. Assemble the two halves of the rim into the tire; each rim has two different dimension parts and the two halves of the rim will snap into each other.

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The hub pieces snapped together nicely and I glued them together.

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My Vespa is light blue/green, and I already have a model that color, so I will make this Vespa model gloss red.

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Let the paint dry for a day, flipped the parts over and painted the other side.

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Assembled the front brake assembly. Do not glue together the rotating hub, otherwise the wheel will not spin.

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Here is the main front wheel shaft. This part needing sanding and scraping of flashing.

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This find model includes a functional suspension. Here are the components of the front shock absorber.

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Assembled front shock absorber. Apologies for the repitition, but avoid excess glue in order to ensure the piston and spring can retain their movement in the cylinder.

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I decided to paint the cylinder flat black.

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Here is the front wheel attached to the hub and the brake-lines cut to length and attached.

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Engine and transmission components

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I found that I needed to trim the rear wheel axle a bit to minimize play after attaching the retaining cap.

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Here is the inside of the engine/transmission assembly showing the retaining cap shown on the rear axle.

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Completed engine/transmission assembly. Looks great , these are nice parts.

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assembling sub components of exhaust and engine cover

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Added exhaust and fuel tank

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Completed engine and transmission. IT has nice interior details that will never be seen again!!

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Approaching final assembly steps!

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Cleaned out the bore for the front steering shaft with a small round file and then it fit well.

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Used a metallic silver paint pen to paint on chrome trim and foot strakes.

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Rear suspension components

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fitted the large chrome suspension pivot shaft and the rear suspension shown in this photo.

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This photo shows the nut on the other side of the chrome suspension pivot shaft.

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Silver paint on hand brake levers and handles, then added rubber grips and chrome

Time to add lots of fun chrome parts!

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Installed brake pedal and brake line.

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Painted the kickstand retention block silver, and installed it.

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Adding decals. Soak them in room temp water for 20 seconds then carefully slide the decal into place on the model and tamp with a cotton cloth to remove and air bubbles and water. The decals are cut to shape on the paper so you just need to cut the decal roughly out of the paper, not exactly to the edge of the decal you want to apply.

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I 3D printed a 11.5mm diameter x 1.5mm thick white disc to use as a backdrop for the headlight. You could use paper of tin foil or whatever you want.

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Finished Italeri Vespa Primavera model!!! This was a very fun model to build.