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This is an ancient Tamiya Centurion kit. It appears to have been molded in about 1971 - 72! I picked it up on eBay several years ago not realizing how old it was. Certainly it would have been much easier to simply buy the new AFV Club kit but I wanted to see what could be done with this old relic. The kit was intended to be motorized so the lower hull and sprocket mounts look like Swiss cheese. Filling the holes and the undersides of the sponsons was project in itself.
In order to make an Israeli Centurion Sho't I first had to convert the kit from a Mark III to a Mark V Centurion. From what I can find in doing research, it seems that the only Mark IIIs used by the Israelis were those they captured from the Jordanians during the 6 Day War in 1967. Fortunately, Eduard's excellent photoetch set gives you most of what's needed to convert from a III to a V. The main differences are the gunner's vision periscope on the turret front glacis, the elimination of the rear hatch on the back of the turret (an add-on part in the Tamiya kit), and a differnt configuration for the hull sponson stowage boxes. The Eduard set gives you the gunners vision periscope so you only need build up the fairing on the glacis. Also included are the new stowage boxes so its just a matter of cutting off the ones molded on the Tamiya kit.
The Sho't variant is most noted by the switch to the L7 105mm gun and I bought a metal one from Barrel Depot, an easy conversion. Also added are the Israeli style Jerry Can holders, which I got from Tank Workshop, and the stowage box on the turret rear left hand side which I scratch built. Note this is the early style which was just a box. Later versions had a 5 sided arragement. In addition to the Eduard photoetch detail sheet, I also used Eduard's photoetch sand skirts. The kit's suspension is rudimentary so using the sand skirts was a must. Lastly, I replaced the tracks with the excellent metal set from Fruillismo. The .05 cal MG is from Tasca with the a few extra details and a scratch built mount. The figure is from Verlinden. The model was painted using Model Master enamels. The primary color is Israeli Armor Sand that was lightened and then panel faded over a dark brown. Weathering was done with oil paints and some pigments on the tracks and suspension.
Certainly this project was unnecessary with the new AFV Club kit on the market and would have been more costly too had I not collected most of these parts over the last few years before the AFV Club kit came out. [View discussion] [Discuss my model]
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