Hey Guys/gals

My Meng Merkava IIID Came in the mail yesterday and today i got all day to work on it, starting a build log.

This is a great kit with so much detail, and it so far has been going together like a breeze minus a few issues ive run into mainly the sprue connection to some parts.

this tank will be part of a Diorama which includes this base ive found:

and i purchased the IDF Paint set from MIG AMMO, that has yet to ship... anyone have experience buying straight from MIG AMMO yet? how fast does he ship it to the USA? its been a week since i ordered.

but anyway here were im at so far :



Here you can see the sprue is connected to the drive sprocket in a horrible way. no idea why they did this when the other set of sprockets are reassembled in its own package...

I ordered from mig ammo not that long ago,came in about 11 days to CT.

Off to a great start Kevin! Looking forward to seeing your progress!!

Update:







I dropped the other Rear break Light onto my hard wood floor, Im guessing a 4th Dimension opened up and swallowed my break light. i spent a good hours on my hands and knees last night scouring my kitchen floor and could not find this piece of plastic... im just dumb founded. any ideas on how to scratch build a new break light or what i can do? im lost without it.

Hi Kevin,

Looks like you are making some decent progress getting some part glued on…subsequently loosing some too! Sucks, but it happens to us all!! A couple options:

1 – Get back down on your hands and knees, this time with a flashlight. Lay the flashlight on the floor and slightly angle it moving it slowly back and forth like a prisoner camp searchlight (humming the theme song to Hogan’s Heroes if you like). The angle of the light most often than not will catch the edge of the part; be it plastic or PE.
2 – Grab the vacuum. Take a nylon stocking or pair of pantyhose (assuming you may have some in the house somewhere…not judging) and place this over the end of the wand attachment. Vacuum the floor. Before turning off the vacuum, look at the bottom of the wand…the part should be there and not swallowed up by the beast!

3 – Scratch-build one. Take a piece of styrene rod, or similar size sprue tree and pick away at the end to carve out the same design as on the other light…before you slice off the right size piece as it will be easier to hold.

4 – Leave the light out! Fill the rectangular hole and sand it flush, drill a center hole with surrounding mounting holes and stick a couple small gauge wires out it as if the light was removed. Would add a bit of interest to the model when you are done (unless you are going for the clean look!

For reference and discussion purposes only:


Hope one of these helps or someone chimes in having a leftover they might want to share with you!

Good luck!!

Update today, finished some of the turret and added anti skid texture.

What did you use for non-skid? It looks pretty good.

Rustoleum multi texture paint

Turret and build complete with some temp stowage and IDF mre's. Still waiting on mig ammo paint that shipped 2 weeks ago....

Hi Kevin I'm seeing a nice and clean building and I like it.Great job also on the anti skid texture compliments.I will follow with interest this your building.

Cheers Luigi

Thanks luigi!

All Finished! finally..

Looks good.
I see you solved the problem of the missing marker light.

Looks great! Nice work!

Thanks!