What Colour Paint for IDF vehicles? - Arab-Israeli Wars in 12mm

 Tinkering with 3D Builder and the multitude of Bergman AFV files on Thingiverse, I decided I’d like to print myself an Israeli Super Sherman. I found a file someone had created in 15mm and married the hull & turret to Marco Bergman’s M4A3E8 running gear and sized it all to print at my 1-130th (12mm) standard.

Pleased with the results I then looked to my quite extensive paint collection and pondered “what colour do I paint it”?

Years ago I’d painted 6mm IDF forces and had relied on good old Vallejo Iraqi Sand but I knew that this wasn’t wholly accurate, though adequate at this small scale. Most colour pictures I’d seen looked like the vehicles of the Six-Day War era were a sort of light greeny grey. As time went on this appeared to darken by the 1982 Lebanon invasion.

Finished article. A M51 Isherman with French 105mm MAin Gun.

I’m not a fan of mixing paints so I turned to the interweb for help and very quickly found the answers I needed.

My paint of choice, Vallejo, had Israeli Sand Grey (71-141) which was a perfect match, but only appears to be available in Model Air or Primer, not the brush paint formulation. So this appeared to be a dead end as I wanted to brush paint.

The process is; two coats of sand grey, followed by shadow added with Army Painter DArk Tone wash and finally, high-lighting added  by dry-brushing Iraqi Sand.

Then I looked a bit further and discovered the MIG Ammo range of paints – a new one to me that I’ve never used before. They offer a (rather expensive!) boxed set for finishing IDF AFVs of all wars or each are available separately in 17ml dropper bottles.

The one that suited my purpose was called Real IDF Sand Grey ’73 (A. MIG -0132) which was ideal for either the Six-Day or Yom Kippur wars. This was duly ordered from eBay and arrived a couple of days later. Incidentally, they also do the darker version for 1982 onwards as Real IDF Sand Grey ’82 (A. MIG -0131).

Firstly, I was very impressed that the bottle comes with a ball bearing inside to agitate the paint as you shake. I bought a pack of ball-bearings for this reason a while back and find them really good.

The colour of the paint was perfect. However, in use I have a few of observations; -

1. • Painting over white primer it takes two coats to cover, the pigment is a little lacking.
2. • It dries to a slight sheen rather than a dull matt
3. • It is terribly slow to dry (could be that the temp in the Loser Shed is dropping due to winter approaching?) – taking a least 24 hours – which in MIG's defence it does says on the label.

But all in all, I’m very happy with the end result. Obviously, one IDF AFV wasn’t enough for me, I now have two small armies for the 1967 conflict printed up, with Minifigs figures ordered to match! But more of that another day.