hey all this is Academy's offering with Legend productions conversion set to a Mk III C. This has been a huge pain in the but with the ball and chain skit being totally independant of eachother until you build it.. Now that I'm finished I would definately build it again! I hope you guys like my first IDF/Modern armour piece in years! Fruil tracks were used in this kit aswell!












let me know what you think

Very nice! Like the weathering.

nice ball and chains..my waterloo.

TIP: always check the vinyl/rubber wheels. they tend to melt the rims and other plastic parts.

Very nice done James! The effort on the ball and chains were worth it as it does give it some character. Very nice and subtle weathering as well.

Did you find any inaccuracies with this kit? Im contemplating between the Tamiya version and the one you built.

umm there were some inaccuracies, but I would recommend Academy's kit so long as you're getting a Legend or other ad ons. The finer detail is a little to think really, which the resin and PE took care of. The Basket with the ball and chain is the worst in both kits, and you'd do well to get an AM turret basked aswell as hull baskets, that is if you can handle the ball and chains... Tamiya isn't bad, but it's a replica of an older Merkava, the I I believe... other than that it depends on which version you want to build.. Mk II and up, get Academy IMHO

WOW VERY GOOD WORK!!!
Ron

Very nice Job there. I only see one small thing, well maybe not small, but the left side tracks are backwards . Maybe You can switch them around, other than that it looks Great.



Nice Work
Herky

awsome eye!!! Thanks for that, yeah they're fruils should be easy enough

You did a really good job with the weathering. Not too much, just subtle.

Great looking Merkava. Have you used lead foil for the arial markings?

Erik

IIRC, tamiya have the Mk1 while academy have the mk2 and 3. So its up to you to choose what version

as for academy inaccurasies, here are some:
- tracks are too narrow
- the whole turret, they say that the turret depicted in academy kits are the one in prototype.
- the road wheels should be more smaller in diameter and the pattern.
- height of the tank itself, it should be lower.

Legend conversion kits really provide the necessary AM. but , say if you bought the whole conversion kit for the mkIIID. about 10% of the academy kit will be left he he he

IDF gurus, correct me if im wrong

GREAT WORK!!!

the merk is my number 1 tank

Tanker25 thanks for filling it all in... it's hard to type when your eyes are red and you've had 4 hours of sleep total for the past couple of days, and you're waiting to drive your wife to work etc. LOL. You're right about the conversion kit leaving little left of the original kit. What remains of this kit is the hull and the wheels. I got rid of the tracks, because yes indeed they are too narrow, and because I knew that I'd run into a problem with them sooner or later and Fruils seem to be easiest to work with! Thanks all for your kind comments, this really was the most challenging build I have done to date and I am really proud of it.

very nice James.

I love modern armor and espiceally IDF MBTs (I'm biased), and I'm glad to see a build involving a Legend conversion because they dont pop that often.

I have their mk.IID conversion and I hope to build one of their Mk.III conversions too in the future.

btw, did you use the swedish company AFV Decal's markings for the Merkava?

Yes I think I did. They were the worst decals to work with, I didn't realize that the film was the entire sheet and when you were cutting the decal out, you were also cutting the film. This made the potential for silvering even worse. I'm glad my weathering and such hid that!!! Shalom brother!

Very nice job on the Merk. This is by far one of my favorite tanks. I', trying to save up to buy either a IID or IIID. I have both the Academy base kits so I just need the Legends sets. Who lnows I may do both! Just one question on your IIIC. By the time the IIICs came along, hadn't the IDF gone back to the all steel wheels for their Merks. All of my reference shows that they had but I may have missed something. I know the IID and IIID have all steel wheels. Anyway, very nice job. I really like your tank.

This has been a question that has popped up a couple of times. My sources don't show a steel wheeled Mark III. I have seen many mark II's with stell wheels but not any Mk. III's,

actually, both the Mk.II and Mk.III have the all steel boogies.
some steel boogies have a rubber sole but the older Mk.I style boogies, present in the Academy kits, are not used anymore thus you need to get the all steel wheels anyway for any conversion of the Mk.III kit and for any Mk.II from the early 90s and afterwards (which means both of the add on armor conversions by Legend: B and D).

Very well constructed and weathered....looks awesome.

Pardon my ignorance though...what is the purpose behind the ball and chain attachments on the bottom of the turret?

yes there is a huge purpose for the ball and chain. There is a huge problem in the design of the Merkava. The rear of the turret has a huge shot trap that is an open invitation for a RPG. To counter this, the chains are there to cause a round from an RPG to explode on them instead of the turret itself!

see maybe in your experience you've seen only steel wheels, but I refer you to this website, yeah it's sitting in a museum, but it's an example that rubber wheels were used on Mk. IIIs http://data.primeportal.net/tanks/andre_patschke/merkava_mkiii/merkava_mkiii_05_of_37.JPG

maybe in y our experience that was the case, but I have seen other references that show rubber wheels too.

really cool looking tank.
What color did you use for it?

mmmm wow.. I stated out with Model Master Green Drab and mixed US Marine into it in a progressive way. I couldn't even tell you the mixture rate....

James,
the boogies in your photo are the all steel boogies with rubberized sole.
they may have rubber on them but they are not the boogies present in Academy's kit.

the Academy kit represents the Mk.III's prototype which doesnt look exactly like the production vehicle.
the picture in your link actually shows the prototype, now residing in the Latrun museum, retrofitted with the newer all steel wheels with rubber soles.

there is the old roadwheel present in all injection plastic kits of the Merkava, it resembles the Centurion roadwheels and is no longer in use on Mk.2s and never been used on Mk.3s or 4s.
on tanks with these roadwheels the first roadwheel will be a skeletal style roadwheel (refered to as 'sport boogie' ).




then there is the newer all steel boogie which sometimes has a rubber sole but it looks distinctively different.
these boogies sport 5 distinctive drain holes close to the rim of the wheel.

it is often you will notice tanks with a mix of both the rubberized roadwheel and the bare steel roadwheel.

there is also a new roadwheel- flat faced with more bolts than usual. I only seen it on a merk 4 though.

great pic bro! Thanks for sharing! Although I really don't care too much, not because I DON"T care, but more because I enjoyed building the model! Thanks for that info and the pic, it's great to know for future reference...

thats what matters.
unfortunatly it is extremely expensive to build a modern IDF tank because the kits availiable are all drastically naccurate and you have to pay a visit to resinland in order to get everything right.

that said your model is still a beautiful piece.
most people wont pay attention to the boogies.

here's a pic of the older style boogies, those present in Academy kits:



notice the skeletal boogie (refered to as 'sport boogie')is not always present and often replaced by a normal boogie on the first torsion arm.

here is a pic I took at LIC 2005 showing the 2nd type boogie on the left (the all-steel boogie) with a rubber sole and right to it is the newest type boogie only present on some Mk.IVs.