ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCE MEDIUM TANK TIRAN-4 - 1968

Description

The meaning of Tiran in Hebrew is beginner. Israel’s chronic lack of AFV’s on one hand and it’s phenomenal victory in the 1967 Six Days War on the other, brought the IDF to adopt captured enemy vehicles for it’s use. The Arab armies lost hundreds of fighting vehicles - mostly Egyptian T-54 and T-55 MBT’s which were abandoned by their crews. In order to allow for greater standardization in it’s armor corps, the IDF initiated a conversion program. The captured tanks were re-engined and re-gunned (with the standard 105mm gun used in the Centurion and Patton MBT’s). Chief was the several hundred captured T-54/T-55 tanks that were taken and modified into the Tiran 4 (T-54) and Tiran 5 (T-55), called Ti-67 (Tank Israeli-1967) in the west. The main difference between the two versions is the main gun armament. The Tiran 4 having a 100 mm main gun and the Tiran 5 having a 105 mm main gun. (Scale : 1/35e)