hey guys heres my hobby boss 1/35 merkava mk iv, im planning on doing a street scene with the tank with the issues that are going on over that side of the world at the moment.

well thoughts on the kit, opening the box my first impression was wow how many sprues etc then looking at the instructions and looking at the parts together I thought hmmm this is going to be interesting.

my 2 main areas of frustration in this kit was the instructions are not as clear as they should of been esp placing the pe in places was down to guess work as the pictures supplied did not really make sense, the 2nd area of massive frustration was the reall and ball and chains for the back of the turret not only was that super fiddly but also getting the small links to stay on the pe plates after crimping.

I built this tank in 3 complete stages hull, upper hull turret, rather than building it as per the instructions.







the lower hull was fairly simple and I liked the rubber rings for the road wheels supplied nice touch I thought.

next was the upper hull:











the upper hull was not to bad to put together fairly straight forward except the pe for the exhaust was a little tricky to get right and bend correctly.













so at this point the upper hull isn't glued in place so painting would be easier on the lower hull









I used humbrol primer and the used mig 066 Sinai grey for the colour of this beasty. I then added some matt black for shadowing and off white for highlights















then come some detail painting drybrushing and pin washing for the panel lines and some of the few decals applied also

at this point I forgot to get pics of the turret but heres the turret painted on the tank, at this point the lower hull was joined to the upper hull













I used arbeitlung light rust in places dark rust on the track inserts and starship filth for grime and the pin wash, I then used humbrol smoke pigments for the exhaust and muzzle on the barrel













after this I then added the antennas and washed the whole tank in a light coat of humbrol dust and the added the mig sienna soil pigments and this is where I am at with the build so far.



















so next to be done is the street scene which im gather bits and bobs for at the min.
if you have any questions or comments then please post them up below

thanks craig

That is a work of art. Beautiful!

Thank you David appreciate the comment just hope the dio turns out ok.

Very Nice work Craig, perhaps you will consider sending in a build or photo feature.

thanks Darren I could send in a feature once its finished if you guys think its good enough to be featured. ill keep you all updated with the dio just waiting for stuff to turn up in the post.

looks good, nice job on the merk, can't wait to see the dio, thanks for posting this up

Thanks buddy I've now got a plan of action and know which direction I'm going with it hopefully it turn out the same as what I'm thinking lol

Looks great!

Looking forward to see the diorama and what you have in mind.

Hey jasper sorry for the late reply I missed the notification. I'm going to use the mini art middle east garage and do a street scene then I'm going to put a meng hilux with zpu in the back destroyed by the merkava and burnt out and a few people here and there etc as a spoiler for you lol