is it worth the 19 bucks?
I was not too pleased with my Type 69 but I am unsure if I have the Iraqi variant. I think mine is the Chinese Type 69. It had the motorization gearbox pre-affixed inside the hull and the underside of the turret and upper hull had a bunch of markings where you were to drill holes based on which tank kit you had.
I do believe that it is the exact same kit. THe lower hull for sure is the same moulding from what I recall, but I’m not sure about the Iraqui addons, if there are any. Either way, it’s on par with the rest of the Trumpeter kits of the T-54/55 variants.
I have the kit, haven’t built it yet. The motorization junk is not in it any longer. No screws either. Road wheels attach with rubber bushings like a Tamiya style kit. Additional Iraqi armor and add on pieces look pretty good. I think it is worth the $19, I got it in a trade.
okay. thanks for the feedback on it. think i’ll pick it up
Weird, I’m looking at mine now, and it’s still the same meant-for motorization hull. That isn’t cool at all. I wonder if it’s just my kit…
Mine must be a newer kit. No motorization stuff, a blank piece to fill oblong motorization hole in the hull botton near the rear, no screws (screw hole covered over, not even molded into hull), road wheel hub pieces that I thought were soft vinyl like Tamiya for attaching road wheels is actually hard plastic (comprises outer hub detail) so wheels simply glue on. Overall pretty good. Sorry you have the older motorized toy version. I had heard that they were improving their T-54/55 series and getting rid of all the motorized features, guess I got lucky with on of the newer ones.
IMO, it is not worth $19 to buy this kit. I built it and had to use two different types of glue on this kit. I used regular glue on the hull, but had to switch to super glue for the turret assembly. After I painted and weathered the kit, the glue started to loosen and pieces started coming off of the kit. For some reason the strange plastic Trumpeter used on their T-54/55 series of tanks do not react well when a wash is applied to the models. If you have a spare Esci T-55, I recommend that you replace the drive sprocket on the Trumpeter kit as it is oversized due to the kit originally being motorized.
Dump and run. I had the kit and there was no comparison in quality to Tamiyas T55. Get the Tamiya T 55 and get AEF designs conversion to the T 69
Sounds good… thanks for the warnings!
Never compared the quality to Tamiya. Still think it can be built into a nice model. Never had any problem with Trumpeter plastic not working with normal styrene glues. For the price, you can’t beat it. I doubt he wants to spend the $80-$100 for the Tamiya T-55 and AEF conversion set. For that matter, lets throw in a few PE sets, distressed road wheels, metal barrel, fruil tracks… That about covers it. Now we are left with very little Tamiya, lots of resin, metal and PE and a model that looks good and cost about $250 to build. What a bargain. You can get the same effect with some carefull building, scratch-building a few missing details and and a good paint/weathering finish. All for about $20 bucks with the Trumpeter kit. Sounds better and better doesn’t it?
you could also just pour out some rusty metal and screws and place it next to an Abrams as a destroyed tank and save the 19 bucks 
I have this kit half built but the instructions for drilling holes in the turret are mind blowing, lots of lines and numbers on the inside of turret but no real ref to what they are. Everything else went together ok. on the side of the box it says “this particular tank served with the Iranian Army”. The paint scheme looks good. Instructions say wheel rims should be white! Any info on this? Thanks, John.
You know, that exact same thing is happening to my T-54. I built it a while ago, and now all of a sudden, everything is falling appart. The other day, I picked it up, GENTLY, to dust it, and the damn barell fell off. Haven’t had any problems with their M1 series of tanks, and they were earlier releases too. Maybe they switched to different plastics through the manufacturing process.
What I ment was that for $40 for the Tamiya kit and $17 for the AEF conversion he could have a real nice T69. Thats not a bad deal. If you figure the time in that it takes to scratchbuild and repair the inaccuracies, you will be way ahead with the Tamiya conversion, especially if your scrachbuilding skills are still maturing.
I had a similar problem with my Trumpeter kit. The plastic was “glue resistant”. The normal Testors liquid cement or Tamiya Extra Fine liquid cement did not bond. I went out and bought the Ambroid Pro Weld as recommended by others who had this problem. The Ambroid did the job but did leave white stains on the plastic. Not a big deal since the kit had to be painted.
would there be THAT much change if I wanted to build on of Tamiya’s T-60 or 72’s as Iraqi?
Iraqi used T 72s, T 62s, T 55s and T 69s. There are some minor changes between the T 55 and T 69 but nothing major. The T69 is a Chinese copy of the T 55 The Tamiya T 72M1 is the same one the Iraqies used so no big changes would be needed.
iI don’t know about that kit but I am building the T-55 and the fit SUCKS!!
Where is the fit problem? My Tamiya went together easily and I had no problems.