Hi all,

I've seen many of you painting the white stripes on the top of Merkava IV gun barrels, but I'm unsure how to accomplish this. I know some folks have said they painted the barrel white, then masked the white and sprayed the overall tank color, leaving the white 'stipe in place when the mask was removed. I think this would be relatively easy, IF the barrel was smooth. However, on a Merkava gun barrel, there are 'collars' with bolts on the top of the barrel that would make that mask next to impossible to lay down smoothly.

I know there is a way to make a very precise stripe in white, though, because I've seen models that have such a stripe. I know it's not a decal, because the same problem would exist with a decal. And hand painting would be a nightmare, at least for me. So masking has to be the way this is done, but with the difficult details in the way, I'm stumped as to how to do this.

Please help me figure out how to accomplish this task!!!!

Curt,

I've had very good luck with high quality decals (Academy Merkava MK IV) with setting solvents and a gloss coat on the barrel prior to applying the decals. It was a lot of back and forth but it turned out really well especially after weathering.

As for painting and masking I did try this technique - it worked but it was a tedious and the end result really didn't look much better than the decals.
I painted the barrel white and then spent way too much time cutting Tamiya masking tape for the shapes/sizes I needed. I then laid the mask in the pattern I wanted and taped up the entire rest of the barrel. I used my airbrush with a lightened shade of the hull color and lighted it up one more time before going with the white. I did this so I wouldn't get over zealous and do too much at once and ruin a lot of work. When all the mask came off the white stripes looked pretty good.

This is the decal method looks pretty good and it was fast!!!


Best of luck!

Tim

Spray the barrel white, mask what you want to show and then spray the base colour.

I used the decal on the Academy MkIV and it snuggled down well using Solvaset. On my Tamiya Tiran 5, I airbrushed the stripe after the base color was applied. As for the ribs and other bumps I just masked it as straight as I could and when painting over those areas tried to paint directly 90 degrees to the surface over the irregular areas. That will minimize the over spray to the sides and make it much easier to touch up. I applied the white after the base because its easier when touching up to cover the lighter white with the base than the opposite.

Personally I wouldn't paint the stripe over the collars on the barrel, I've seen alot off photos of various different IDF tanks with the barrel stripe that only have it on the barrel and not the collars. Going that route has the added advantage of really simplifying the masking.

Other thing to consider is that I have seen plenty of photos showing that not even the 1:1 vehicles have the strips straight and evenly applied, seems like that they have the exact same issue masking the full sized ones as the scale versions.