Merkava mods

[tank_me]

I broke down and bought a Merkava. Toucan had them for $70 off the normal price for the all metal (minus the hull) version. I already started trying to build a cope cage for it as seen in the recent conflict:



So I found one on Cults3D to print:

https://cults3d.com/en/3d-model/various/attempt-for-cope-cage-for-merkava-4-1-35-panzer

Unfortunately no matter what material I tried to print it in, it failed to print in either version. Tried it in ASA, PETG, and ABS like resin. The mesh or the bar version was just modeled too delicately to print right in 1/16 scale. The bars and mesh got distorted as it would detach from the resin printer's FEP or the supports on the FDM printer were too difficult to remove eventually breaking the bars or the mesh. At that point, I took the bad PETG print, cut out all the center sections, found a free scalable plastic grill mesh on Printables, printed it out, cut out the sections I needed and glued them to the cope cage. As you can see, even a few of the squares broke getting off the build plate as they are like less than a mm high.



This is the result I got:

.
Next steps...finish mounting the cope cage legs and replacing the fake rubber skirts with real silicone rubber skirts (or TPU).

[cmdrcody]

Here is the cope cage I installed on mine.

[Handy Lance]

A small adjustment of z offset and or tiny bit less flow can make your prints release better. Also try PEI textured build plate. I’ve printed small fence for slot cars. Tough but settings will make it doable. If you are getting any elephants feet, re level the bed and give it like .01 more starting distance from head to build plate.

cool tank

[tank_me]

Here is the cope cage I installed on mine.

I like the round bases mounted to the hull so it can be removed. I may have to do something similar. Did you print it yourself or have it printed? The material looks like the stuff Shapeways does.

I do plan on putting some camo net on top of it like all of the vehicles I saw in Afghanistan always did. It's not so much for camo, more for shade.

A small adjustment of z offset and or tiny bit less flow can make your prints release better. Also try PEI textured build plate. I’ve printed small fence for slot cars. Tough but settings will make it doable. If you are getting any elephants feet, re level the bed and give it like .01 more starting distance from head to build plate.

cool tank

It was printed on a PEI textured build plate in PETG. PETG is known to stick a little too well. I'm sure PLA would've released better, but I don't print in PLA as it will deform in the Texas sun. Elephant's foot really isn't an issue on my Bambu as the lidar, filament calibration, and auto bed leveling works well. The screen itself is less than 1mm high which is why it's so delicate. The mesh itself is modeled with the lines on top of each other. It prints better that way. In order to get it to be scale, I had to shorten the height of the mesh considerably. The mesh only took like 20 minutes to print so having a few broken squares isn't an issue. I just printed a second one to make up the difference. The issue is more of trying to print the cage it as one piece with the mesh on it. I adjusted the support Z distance from the default 2.0mm to 2.5 and even 2.7, but the supports still stuck too much and broke the mesh when removing. Supports on ASA come off easier, but the bridging on ASA isn't as good and therefore the mesh just printed like crap. The designer even said, he had not tried to print it yet. The cage itself wouldn't print without supports as the mesh was modeled in the center of the crossbars. Definitely not designed for optimal 3D printing. These cages are not really commercially manufactured so there is some variance in them. Once the camo is on, it will look the part.

[cmdrcody]

I like the round bases mounted to the hull so it can be removed. I may have to do something similar. Did you print it yourself or have it printed? The material looks like the stuff Shapeways does.

I had "RichardSJohnson.net" print mine. You would need to contact him (email: killroy321@hotmail.com) for pricing and maybe he would give you his printing settings and what he used for the material. I went to local craft store, Michael's, and got the materials to fabricate the cope cage frame support and mounting parts.

[tank_me]

I had "RichardSJohnson.net" print mine. You would need to contact him (email: killroy321@hotmail.com) for pricing and maybe he would give you his printing settings and what he used for the material. I went to local craft store, Michael's, and got the materials to fabricate the cope cage frame support and mounting parts.

Thanks for the info. As I suspected, it was printed on an industrial printer since Rich uses a 3rd party printing company which explains the finish on your cage. The industrial printers tend to create that grainy look as it uses a sintered or powdered type of plastic. Since I own a couple of 3D printers now, it kinda defeats the point of owning them if I just buy parts already printed. My Frankenstein printed cage will work for my purpose.

[RichJohnson]

I actually print some of my parts and also use JVM3Dconcepts to print others. Anything I want to look like injection molded that is large enough to have them print I do, they use a varrying array of special resin mixes for me that offer detail and strength for my parts, while other things I print on a CR6SE as the cope cage because it is linear and square and is much more structurally sound in PLA+ rather than any resin.
each printer has its benefits and uses.

[tank_me]

Yeah, I can't use PLA+ for my tank parts. Won't survive the heat. It's glass transition temp is too low. The only things I print in PLA or PLA+ are for my girlfriend's projects or anything that doesn't leave the house. I had printed some PLA+ rings to use on cardboard spools for my Bambu AMS as it doesn't like cardboards spools. I forgot about them and put the ASA roll equipped with the PLA+ edge covers in my Sunlu S2 filament drier and they warped to the point they were unusable. Had to chuck them in the trash so I reprinted them in PETG. A lot of other folks have printed Inkor's tanks and had them warp just sitting in a hot garage when printed in PLA. PLA+ is a bit of a mystery because not every PLA+ is created the same from each manufacturer. There is no standard for PLA+. It may have better heat deflection or it may actually be worse that regular PLA depending on what the manufacturer did to make it "+".

[tank_me]

Got some more work done on it today before work.

First I magnetized the lower hull. It was a little more difficult than some as the lower plastic bosses in the front were pretty short. I had to cut a little off the tow hooks before I could glue them in. I also removed the front hooks as they will probably dig into the dirt when running the tank. I may add some removable 3D printed ones later.

Front magnets:



Rear magnets:


I didn't like the look of the fake rubber skirts so I 3D printed some TPU skirts as replacements. The skirt pieces I printed are 1mm thick which might be a little thicker than I'd like, but I can always print more later. Each piece also has a thinner mounting tab used to glue it to the back of the armor skirt. I had to remove the fake piece so I scored along the seem line and bent them off using a needle nose pliers. Quick and simple with minimal cleanup.


Pulled out the razor chopper and cut them into 40mm sections. The sections on the slat armor and the first and last 40mm section were printed with an angle per the real ones.




Just used some CA to attach them and they looked like this from the inside:



Not a fan of the Philips screws that came with everything to mount the dangling balls and the engine grate so I replaced them with mini bolts:



Continued in next post...

[tank_me]

And the final results:


That's all for now...

[Handy Lance]

Sweet, I love the micro hardware we can get. What an age we live in😂😮💨

I’m am finding these tanks really fun to work on.

[tank_me]

Sweet, I love the micro hardware we can get. What an age we live in😂😮💨

I’m am finding these tanks really fun to work on.

Yeah, I get most of my scale metal bolts from this place as they are one of the only ones that does it in the US: https://model-motorcars.myshopify.co...parts-hardware

The only issue is that they are REALLY slow to ship. I think it was three weeks from order until delivery the last time I ordered from them.

[MGTbrOdiE]

Curious what dimensions on the cope cage I was going to try to fabricate one versus the 3d printer version. Also just did the interior light mod for the merkava that toucan hobby sells I posted some photos here of the install. The drivers lights plug on one of the headlights tabs and works with headlights the other for interior and cctv and gunners sights were supposed to work on the L10 plug port as the pictures provided from toucan hobby show after requested and they don’t work, possibly a 7.1 only feature or the light set is wired wrong or a dud, I am waiting to here back from toucan about this. You do have to cut the bb tray some as in photos one side being more cut than the other. Tape or blue tac the wires as seen in photo with blue painted tape. And it works with the lowered elevation post mod for those who do that there is just enough clearance depending on how much you cut the post down. Hope this helps someone else out and great tanking to all this weekend!

[tank_me]

Curious what dimensions on the cope cage I was going to try to fabricate one versus the 3d printer version.

Mine ended up being 17cm wide by 22cm long.


After consulting some more reference materials, I saw that the front and rear mud flaps also needed some attention. I printed some more flexible TPU and cut out some mud flaps for the front and rear. I still need to add some fake fasteners to the faux mounting strips. I also blued the tracks to get rid of that nasty silver color:





In the first post, I didn't show how the front magnets were attached. They will eventually be covered with the plugs that came with the tank like the ones in rear. I have had glue fail so my magnets are usually mechanically attached using fasteners.



Speaking of magnets, I decided to magnetize the turret together as I've done on other tanks. I also started work on a mount for the LegoDEI apple. I 3D printed the mount and found a junk piece of ABS to put the mount in securing it temporarily with the screws for the BB chute which has been removed. I haven't ever shot a single BB through any of my tanks. I've only installed 4 magnets, but I think I will be adding at least two more to ensure the turret stays closed.





Remnants of the BB chute as it had part of the barrel mount attached. I had to cut it down that much to clear the new elevation and recoil unit.

The hatch can still mostly close when I'm not using the apple.



Speaking of the new elevation and recoil unit, I had one of the metal units in the stash so it was installed and the BB recoil/elevation was removed.







A couple of M4 stand offs and some failed ABS print material was used to create a support for the servo and the platform for the servo to sit on.



Mounting the barrel in the new unit took some brass tube, two M2.5 set screws, and removing a bit of length from the back of the barrel. I had to then drill/tap the hole for the set screw in the barrel and do the same for the plunger on the metal recoil unit.



Being a modern tank, I wanted modern tank speed so some Taigen 390 motors were installed:



Since my local battle club tends to have more HL tanks than Clark based ones like I typically build, I decided to try installing the CS-TK6.1 unit I had bought a long time ago. Everything was going well with the unit until I tested the battle functions. It took hits just fine, but unfortunately after using both the HL IR emitter and an Osram emitter, I couldn't get it to give hits. Using the my phone camera I could see the Osram unit light up, but I'm going to assume it wasn't lighting up for the required length to register a hit. The Open Panzer TCB had that issue until Luke increased the pulse length of the IR LED.



Being me, I wasn't happy with the end result of the way the dangly balls that Heng Long supplied. I had spent hours on the HL units only to not really be all that happy with the way they looked. Visually they were lacking, plus since adding the turret magnets the HL units were actually magnetizing up to the rear magnets. So back on AliExpress and Amazon I went. I found some 4mm chain (Amazon) I liked and some 4mm brass balls (AliExpress) that are used in making jewelry. Since both the chain and the balls are non-ferrous, no more magnetism issues.





You can see a comparison of the HL units on the left and the new ones on the right. Much better IMO.



And after hours of playing with these little balls, this is what I got:



A very satifying result:



I'm currently waiting on a HL 7.1 controller to show up so the project will go into hold status until that arrives.

That's all for now...

[Rubicon99]

Mine ended up being 17cm wide by 22cm long.


After consulting some more reference materials, I saw that the front and rear mud flaps also needed some attention. I printed some more flexible TPU and cut out some mud flaps for the front and rear. I still need to add some fake fasteners to the faux mounting strips. I also blued the tracks to get rid of that nasty silver color:





In the first post, I didn't show how the front magnets were attached. They will eventually be covered with the plugs that came with the tank like the ones in rear. I have had glue fail so my magnets are usually mechanically attached using fasteners.



Speaking of magnets, I decided to magnetize the turret together as I've done on other tanks. I also started work on a mount for the LegoDEI apple. I 3D printed the mount and found a junk piece of ABS to put the mount in securing it temporarily with the screws for the BB chute which has been removed. I haven't ever shot a single BB through any of my tanks. I've only installed 4 magnets, but I think I will be adding at least two more to ensure the turret stays closed.





Remnants of the BB chute as it had part of the barrel mount attached. I had to cut it down that much to clear the new elevation and recoil unit.

The hatch can still mostly close when I'm not using the apple.



Speaking of the new elevation and recoil unit, I had one of the metal units in the stash so it was installed and the BB recoil/elevation was removed.







A couple of M4 stand offs and some failed ABS print material was used to create a support for the servo and the platform for the servo to sit on.



Mounting the barrel in the new unit took some brass tube, two M2.5 set screws, and removing a bit of length from the back of the barrel. I had to then drill/tap the hole for the set screw in the barrel and do the same for the plunger on the metal recoil unit.



Being a modern tank, I wanted modern tank speed so some Taigen 390 motors were installed:



Since my local battle club tends to have more HL tanks than Clark based ones like I typically build, I decided to try installing the CS-TK6.1 unit I had bought a long time ago. Everything was going well with the unit until I tested the battle functions. It took hits just fine, but unfortunately after using both the HL IR emitter and an Osram emitter, I couldn't get it to give hits. Using the my phone camera I could see the Osram unit light up, but I'm going to assume it wasn't lighting up for the required length to register a hit. The Open Panzer TCB had that issue until Luke increased the pulse length of the IR LED.



Being me, I wasn't happy with the end result of the way the dangly balls that Heng Long supplied. I had spent hours on the HL units only to not really be all that happy with the way they looked. Visually they were lacking, plus since adding the turret magnets the HL units were actually magnetizing up to the rear magnets. So back on AliExpress and Amazon I went. I found some 4mm chain (Amazon) I liked and some 4mm brass balls (AliExpress) that are used in making jewelry. Since both the chain and the balls are non-ferrous, no more magnetism issues.





You can see a comparison of the HL units on the left and the new ones on the right. Much better IMO.



And after hours of playing with these little balls, this is what I got:



A very satifying result:



I'm currently waiting on a HL 7.1 controller to show up so the project will go into hold status until that arrives.

That's all for now...

Good call on the ball & chains👍👍. I wish I had changed mine out when building it. Just too lazy at the time. My next one though will have proper chains at least.

Something to consider. The Merkava has a huge hallow hull and turret. Those two thing coupled with metal tracks and metal return rollers tend to turn it into a big loud echo chamber especially when running at higher speeds. I used some sound dampening material in the hull and turret which made a tremendous difference and really quieted down the tank.

[tank_me]

Good call on the ball & chains👍👍. I wish I had changed mine out when building it. Just too lazy at the time. My next one though will have proper chains at least.

Something to consider. The Merkava has a huge hallow hull and turret. Those two thing coupled with metal tracks and metal return rollers tend to turn it into a big loud echo chamber especially when running at higher speeds. I used some sound dampening material in the hull and turret which made a tremendous difference and really quieted down the tank.

Well, I did put the HL ones on first so I had to remove all of them and replace them with the ones I built. Being brass, they have a nice weight to them and act better than the HL ones also. The HL ones tended to get tangled sometimes and these don't. The little plastic balls also fall off pretty easily since the loop holding them on isn't completely closed. I bought enough of the brass balls to also do my 3D printed Merkava MK3.

These were the balls I bought in the 4mm size: https://www.aliexpress.us/item/22518...r_list.order_l ist_main.79.2fe71802wyvMPO&gatewayAdapt=glo2usa

This is the chain: 33ft 4mm Width Stainless Steel Rolo Cable Chains Findings Fit for Jewelry Making &DIY (SC-1027-D) https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...e?ie=UTF8&th=1