Currently building the Takom Merkava 2B. Looking at pictures it seems that not all Merrkava 2Bs had the anti skid applied. At least it seems that way from the photos I have found, although I am not 100% certain as my eyesight is not what it used to be. Can someone confirm this or otherwise set me straight.

Thank you.

A-Smith;

I'm well into that Takom 2b kit. I applied a DIY anti-skid coat, based on both considerable photo-viewing and research into that question and the understanding that basically "all" Merkava from 1b on were either factory-coated or unit-coated. And even many Mk.1 were soon retro-coated. I am pretty confident that at least the vast majority of 2b received anti-skid. That said, I am less certain of whether that anti-skid came onto every individual tank "right after birth"... For those tanks being done by units, there could well have been some service time spent "pre-coating" before the stuff actually got put on.

Do note that the anti-slip rapidly became standard and probably should be viewed as being a consistent and "universal" feature on Merkava from 1b on - the IDF of the later 20th and early 21st centuries is not the WWII German armored forces faced with war and sketchy supplies and disorganized and disrupted industry. The IDF clearly identified a substantial value to having that coating applied - a matter of crew safety - and as crew safety is of paramount focus to the IDF, there is little plausible argument for it not being applied, there being no actual shortage of supplies nor available opportunity to put it on.

As for the photo record... There are LOTS of "Merk" pics. Even better-quality photos often seem to not distinctly show anti-slip - it may not show up in some given light and circumstances as being particularly distinct and different from the sometimes great abundance of dirt and sand seen on Merks... My conclusion is that most of those photos simply didn't clearly capture the coating that was very most likely actually present.

Just my opine and thoughts about this!

Cheers! Bob

All had/have them. Since even the youngest example is at least 30 plus years old, on many of them it might've significantly deteriorated though.

And that last part, about the "significant deterioration", is both the interesting modeling question - much like working out how much and to what degree one might want to chip and spall the zimm on his veteran Pz.IV or Tiger I - and technical modeling challenge!

Of course bear in mind that the remaining Merk 2b are all in storage or mothballed for the reserves... While they were more-current front-line tanks, their non-slip coats probably were not too badly worn down... but recent "storage" pictures likely won't well-represent what they looked like back in the 1980's and early 90's. So looking for active service pics from back then would likely yield the best insights into how one might best portray a serving 2b with some wear and tear.

FWIW: My approach was to lightly chip and wear my non-slip following what I could discern from some active-service pics from the mid-1980's, when it was a common in-service version.

Bob