Precisia 1/43 1769 Le Fardier and Cugnot Automobile

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Precisia 1/43 1769 Le Fardier and Cugnot Automobile plastic model kit

1/43 Precisia 1769 Le Fardier and Cugnot Automobile

Plastic Model Kit,   Box Condition: Good

Very Rare. From the late 1950s. It is very finely molded for that time and is approximately 6 inches long when assembled. Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot was a French inventor who built the world's first automobile that could carry passengers. He first built a model in 1769, then the full sized version in 1770. He was a military engineer and the French Army showed great interest as this would an ideal way to move field artillery. The model and vehicle was know as fardier a vapeur (steam dray) and it did work, although not well enough for the Army to abandon horses. In 2010 a perfect copy was built at Arts et Metiers ParisTech and it performed perfectly. This is the only assembly kit known of this remarkable and historical vehicle. It is molded in red plastic and has 63 parts. The kit has never been started. All the parts but the frame are still in the factory sealed bag. The frame is intact and complete but never sealed. The instructions are present and in 'very good++' condition. They are in French but there is an old hand-written translation (from the early 1960s) of every word included. Precisia kits are so rare and almost never turn up for sale in public- only a small handful since 2009. Little is known about them beyond the fact that they are of high quality and cover unusual subjects. For years advanced collectors knew of Precisia and assumed them to be metal models...an easy mistake to make since no kits had ever been seen. We have only learned in the past 18 or so years that they were plastic. Precisia also made a 1900 Tonneau Renault 4 CV, Bugatti 1927, 1899 Grobron-Brillie and 1898 Coupe Peugeot model kits. Arnold Madderom reports that the 1898 Coupe Peugeot is molded in 3 colors- blue, black and clear plastic in 1/32 scale 1-32. The Gobron-Brillie is in 1-24. As far as the 1900 Tonneau Renault 4CV and Bugatti 1927, he has never seen them and has never heard of anyone seeing them; they were announced but probably never released.

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